BMW Xcreable X6

by Justin Berkowitz

December 17th, 2007 10:37 AM

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About nine months ago, a BMW X5 went out drinking with a Scion tC. They had way too much Jose Cuervo and yada yada yada… And since BMW is a traditional Catholic, it didn't have a lot of options. Now after carrying their tequila inspired offspring to term, the X6 has been born. Pictures of this new BMW landed with a dull thud over the weekend as embargoes were broken- yet again- across the web. BMW calls the new arrival a "Sports Activity Coupe," which my Cray supercomputer tells me abbreviates to the unfortunate acronym SAC. Looking at the X6 pictures, it looks like a SAC, what with the SUV body and hideous sloping rear hatchback. There was a time when the term "coupe" meant something. I'm not being idealistic, I'm just confused. Because "coupe" now apparently means jacked-up four-door SUV with a low roofline. The silver lining to this charcoal cloud? The BMW SAC will debut a new engine: a twin turbocharged 4.4 liter V8 with 400 horsepower and 450 ft. lbs. of torque. Considering how heroinific the turbocharged 3.0 liter I6 is, and how fantastic BMW's V8s are, this engine alone will probably make this unfortunate SAC worthwhile.

Justin Berkowitz

Immensely bored law student. I've also got 3 dogs.

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4 of 19 comments

DaPope on Dec 18, 2007

Gawd-awful. But, in truth, it's going to sell well as it really doesn't look so different from the thousands of egg-shaped Lexus (Lex-i?) floating around my suburb.

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Whatdoiknow1 on Dec 18, 2007
“a twin turbocharged 4.4 liter V8 with 400 horsepower and 450 ft. lbs. of torque” Shows how far BMW has fallen, they need turbocharging to get 400hp out a 4.4 liter engine. NOt for nothing but BMW has already proven that they are quite capable of getting 400hp out of a NA engine. Please remember the 5.0 v8 from the previous generation M5 and Z8 and the new 4.4l V8 in the new M3 which makes 420hp IIRC. The Turbos are there for the torque! Now getting 450 ft lbs of torque out of a 4.4l NA engine would be an amazing feat! Now it can be done but you would be looking at peak power of about 650hp @ over 10,000rpm and that torque peak would come in at about 7000rpm!

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Akitadog on Dec 18, 2007

Yeah, it's hideous. BMW following in the footsteps of Michael Jordan. Create the ugliest basketball shoe and watch the people eat it up. For BMW's sake, I hope this thing bombs.

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Justin Berkowitz on Dec 18, 2007

@whatdoiknow1: You are 100% right. Consider for example the twin turbo 3.0 inline 6 from the 335i,535i, 135i etc. BMW already had a naturally aspirated I6 that got 330 horses in the previous M3/Z4M. But when they turbocharge, they seem to give gobs of torque at low RPMs (the 335i's torque curve is flat starting at a paltry 1800 rpm). It's not only better suited to popular automatic transmissions, but it's better suited to city and suburban driving, too.

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