Unfortunately for BMW fans, the 135 only weighs a little less (like 150 lbs) than the 335 and is in my view far more “bangled” than the 335 coupe.

The G37 is the great value here and a damned nice car to boot. I compared the 335 sedan with the latest G35 and decided on the 335, but it wasn’t an easy decision. Infiniti has gotten much closer to BMW responses than the Mercedes “C” class, and promises better reliability than either of the German cars.

It is interesting to watch, however, as the Japanese get closer to BMW’s driving dynamics and BMW is working equally hard to match Toyota reliability. In the end, a great competition for any of us who love cars…

Maybe it’s a capacity issue? 12-row engine oil cooler? Bigger oil Tubes to the turbos?

-I guess if you spend that much, you shouldn’t have to think of such things.

I know Redline puts out “Water Wetter” that helps increase coolant efficiency.

I drove the Infiniti back-to-back with a 335i at Willow Springs a couple of weeks ago. Justin’s line about the car making you work just a bit harder for speed, and giving a bit more visceral feedback along the way, hits the nail on the head. The G is a marginally more blunt instrument than the 335i, but it isn’t so effortless to drive that you forget who’s doing the driving.

I've driven both the 335i and the G37. The G37's handling isn't nearly as communicative or involving, the engine not NEARLY as sensuous as described here, and the accelerative differences were VERY apparent; the Infiniti felt suitably slower in a back to back contest, enough so that it was unsatisfying.

The BMW is for the pure enthusiast, the Infiniti is for those trying to get BMW performance but for a bit less dough, and they almost get it. Key word; Almost.

(Taken from Car and Driver’s August 2007 issue that had the BMW 330 sedan long-term wrap-up)

Poor electronic nanny control of the automatic tint rear view mirror, crummy automatic wiper speeds, and the dynamic cruise control with a HAL 9000 mindset.
Problems included:
37,000 miles – grinding noise from the left-rear wheel bearing caused by it failing.
37,000 (est) files: stuck climate control buttons.
At least four times the a/c failed. The high-tech solution was to turn off the a/c and wait at lieast 15 minutes.
38,000 miles – the ignition failed since the slot ofor the key fob broke.
Possibly flimsy equipment like easy to fall apart mirrors and plastic bits.

If GM released a car like this, they would be torn a new one. Those kind of problems before 40,000 miles just reeks of dirt poor quality. Failed ignitions and bearings normally involve you waiting in a parking lot or driveway while the flatbed arrives to tow it (once again.) While C&D can live with a piece of junk that they didn’t pay for and have multiple other cars to drive while the BMW gets to know a service bay yet again, for most of us, it is a pain in the butt. Yup, call your boss and say the BMW is dead again. Too many times with that and soon the payments might be too difficult to make since you’ll be w/o a job!

I miss the old BMW – the one with real steering, non-computer controlled handling and easy to use bbuttons. The game plan seems to have been lost in the quest for gizmos.

For the life of me, the average person probably would be exploring the Lemon Law if this was their own car. I just cannot believe the rags still suck on the exhaust pipe while they love a shell of a car that was at one time a pure driving machine.

I did find the G37 to be the better ride.

I must say I don’t like the look of the G37 at all. It’s not ugly, it’s just nondescript and a little bit messy, like most of the rest of today’s cars. If I were grading on an absolute level, not a curve, I’d give it a C- or maybe even a D+. On a curve, a C.

As to the brake rotors, it is possible that the reference is to the fact that BMW specifically designs the brake system to use up both rotor and pad when used heavily. I have no idea why they do this, but found that after 20,000 miles and lots of hard usage (including four track days), the rotors on my ‘01 325 needed replacement by virtue of wear and not due to warping. Given that some of us by these in order to explore performance driving, and are willing to pay for same in replaceable parts like tires, pads and rotors, the replaceable rotor does not seem like a bad idea. I’d guess that the rotors on my 325 would have gone 60,000 miles in normal driving and I’m more than happy to replace at that interval for typical driving. I do know that when I replaced my rotors, they had been “machined” by use and it was my heavy use of brakes that caused the wearing.

Many cars use harder rotor material, but it has been my experience that these often warp after heavy heat cycling as one does on the track. I’d frankly prefer to have non-warping rotors.

I remain on the fence as far as 15,000 mile oil changes, but the BMW dealer insists they have 200,000 mile engines out there on which the oil was changed only in accordance with BMW service intervals.

As I mentioned earlier in this thread, it was nice to read that the G37 is pushing BMW, as it means BMW will push back. I’m guessing the reason we got the 300 hp version was that BMW saw a 300 hp IS350 and G35 and figured they needed the power to be competitive. We all win when competition improves the cars. In the end, it just depends on your planned usage of the car; a 2+2 luxo cruiser is damned well satisfied by the IS250/350, near 5-series sport sedan for under 3-series price by the G35, and a truly nimble (if portly) sport sedan in the form of the 328/335. Add the revamped CTS to the mix and we have arrived in “entry-luxury” heaven.

Brilliant!

I liked carnick’s response except for alot of misinformation: Engines aren’t grenading. The first several thousand 335’s had a bad batch of fuel pumps, of which many failed. That’s about the only “failure” so far.

335 automatics did not have an oil cooler. I railed against this obvious oversight by BMW, and I am still angry at them for not extending the warranties on any car so (non) equipped. But it has been rectified. I believe all 335’s are now equipped with that oil cooler….I KNOW all sport package equipped 335s are now so equipped.

The engine oil temp gauge would get up to the ~300 degree range and the engine would enter limp mode. BMW engineers responded that this was a cutoff to prevent damage, not a sign the engine was being damaged. Oil cooler equipped 335s are now regularly seeing track-day temps of 250-260. Well within an acceptable range.

Carnick mentions the fact that the 335 does not have a limited slip, and he is absolutely correct. I find it absurd that my 20k Honda Civic and my 1988 ford thunderbird had limited slips, but this performance beast does not.

That being said, the 3-series has not had a limited slip since the 1987-~1990 325is. Only the M-series cars have been equipped with an LSD. So this is not a new measure of cost-cutting, it is a distinction to help differentiate their track-cars (M3, Z4M, M5, etc.) from their road-going cars. In the same fashion Porsche limits it’s cayman and boxster platform from outshining the 911…so too does BMW.

Speaking of Porsche, they’ve been recommending 15k oil change intervals on their boxsters since 1997. True, their sump holds 10 quarts. Nonetheless, it is an established oil interval. While I personally would prefer no longer than 7500…or even 10000…on a turbo engine, I imagine BMW did the short and long-term math on this one. BMW has never been a company to make short term gains at the expense of long term pain.

Composite brakes that need to be replaced at 20,000 miles and can’t be cut? I have no idea where that came from. To my knowledge they are using normal vented rotors, which can be machined (though BMW probably recommends replacement of rotors/pads as a set…as do alot of performance makers due to the loss of heat-capacity in machined rotors). Regardless, BMW replaces your brakes free for the first 4 years, 50,000 miles. So apparently they are willing to do a seriously expensive brake job by your reckoning…

I’ll touch on one last thing. As a previous poster mentioned, this engine is nowhere near it’s max. BMW moved away from the magnesium-alloy and back to all-aluminum for their twin turbo. It’s a well built engine and can be easily, and cheaply, tuned for produce another 50 crank/brake HP/torque.

Me personally, I’ll be looking for a 2008-2009-2010 335i 6-speed with the sport package, 2 years old and CPO’d with BMW’s extended maintenance package (6 years, 100,000 miles). Considering that covers everything from brakes, to those windshield wipers, to oil changes, to a new clutch…and it’ll be around 33-34k to buy….well, I think that’s going to be a darn good deal for such a strong performing machine. I’ll probably get 80,000 miles of gas, tires, and go.

As for the original topic, The G37 is a fantastic looking GT car in real life. It’s very long and low slung looking, and sounds great. Infiniti has done a phenomenal job on this car. They just need to bring their manual transmissions up to par. Are they putting over-strong clutches in them? Maybe they are using non-organic clutch plates?

Joe

The G, 3-Series, C-Class, IS, CTS, and TL most usually represent the “entry-level luxury sports-sedan market.”

The “upscale midsize sports-sedan” market that you are referring to normally represents cars like the M, 5-Series, E-Class, GS, and RL.

The CTS and G35 are about the same size as the 5-Series, but they are in a different class of cars.

The next class up is the S-Class, 7-Series, A8, XJ, and LS.

This is heavily disputed. BMW reports 300 horses. Several folks have put the 335i on a dyno and found so much power at the rear wheels that they estimate the actual crank horsepower to be well over 300. There is no objective answer to this since the dyno tests have been disputed, too. It may be as much as 350 horsepower, if you believe the more optimistic ones.

BMW had plenty of incentives to underrate this engine. A big one is that saying the turbo made, say, 350 horses would have killed E46 M3 sales, with the naturally aspirated 333 hp I6 engine (and less torque than the 335i), not to mention the Z4 M models.

The problem facing BMW is that the G37 has further closed the preceived gap between the 3 series coupe and the G coupe. The G37 is a much improved car over the G35. The 335i while faster than the last generation 330i is not much of an improvement in any other way, yet the price keeps rising! Price wise the G37 actually competes with the 328i, a car that the G37 has a whopping 100hp advantage over. Needless to say the G37 will spank the a$$ off of a 328i all day every day!

The next question is what would Nissan/ Infiniti be able to come up with if they decided to match the price of a 335i? I bet for 50grand we would have a G45 with a v8!

So were does BMW go from here? It is easily conceivable that the next G can surpass the performance of the 3 series yet still hold the price advantage. The prestige factor for the Nissan/ Infiniti brand will also have been elevated. Nissan now has the rather similar looking GT-R (a car that easily bitch slaps an M3)to use for Halo props. The “Ultimate Driving Machine” tagline wont mean much when the cars are out performed by the likes of some lowly japanese mainstream automaker.

Or does the 3 series continue its march up-market?

How about the 1977 BMW 320 Turbo
and they used turbo on some of their M Series too
FYI: By the 1970s, BMW was establishing itself as a full-fledged car company. It was a pioneer for many emerging technologies, including turbocharging and advanced vehicle electronics. This was also the period when BMW of North America was established and consumers, who coveted both sports and luxury cars became loyal “Bimmer” owners. The ’70s also saw the birth of BMW’s three-tier sport sedan range consisting of the 3 Series, 5 Series and 7 Series cars and the creation of its performance M division. My Father car is GAS Turbo

So much for Beamers(new street name) or should say Bimmers (old school name).

Because it Beam just pass you.

Maybe on YOUR planet, but the 335 in the only turbo gas engine BMW is doing right now. They even dropped the SC from the Mini.

Now if you’re talking turbo diesel, then you might be onto something. But on the other hand, EVERYONE who does diesel is doing a TD. It’s just the most effective way to extract the extra energy from diesel fuel.