What is your five-star car?

I bet the M3 is a great car, just irrelevant to me. I aint spending $50K+ on a car. Any car. Hand me a blank check, and while I might drop stupid money on something like a 427 Cobra or a Lambo Miura, or maybe even something goofy like a suicide lincoln, I'm still not going to drop $50K+ on a new sedan. I won't fault your 5 stars, and I won't fault someone else for buying one, though I might roll my eyes whethey aren't looking at the thought of how much more car they could have bought for less.

OTOH, I recognize that since I'm not a potential buyer of the car, that my opinion is irrelevant, and I'm OK with that too.

As for what is my 5 star car, value is a part of the equation, so they are all used. While the new M3 might not get 5 from me now, it very well could in a few years. Other 5 star cars:

05+ Mustang - For getting the modern muscle car right.

Original Subaru 2.5RS - Right car at the right time for Subaru Integra Type R - The ultimate FWD machine, even 10 years after it's introduction

JK Jeep Wrangler - In the face of watered down competition, Jeep releases the best wrangler yet, and makes it family friendly for the first time.

People buy cars that they like. Whether they could have gotten what someone ELSE thinks is more car for the money doesn't matter if that other car doesn't appeal to them in some way. I can build cars, so I can build a lot of car for the money, though i couldn't do it if i was living in an apartment or HOA. I loved my SVT Contour, but I could have BUILT more car for the money if I wasn't living in an apartment. But I got something I thought was cool, with a warranty so I didn't have to work on it. So someone might want a new M3 for similar reasons.

yo vanilla wrote:

Chris_V wrote:

yo vanilla wrote: It's hard for me to give any BMW a great rating. It wasn't that many years ago I worked at a BMW dealership, and we called them BMTroubleU's because we had to push so many of them into the shop...

The problem with this line of thinking is that people that work in ANY manufacturer's service department will have the same feelings towards that manufacturer's cars. Why? Because no one has you work on a non-broken car except for oil changes and scheduled service intervals. So pretty much all you'll SEE are the few broken examples (and even if only 5% of the cars made are broken, it equals a large number in the service bay at any given time).

I have worked with bmw, mb, volvo, saab, land rover, jaguar, volvo, porsche, honda, toyota, scion. besides land rover, nothing even came close to the sheer volume of broken bmw's, many of which had to arrive at the dealership by flatbed. mb was just a tab behind coming close though ;) But please don't assume that I'd be so naive to not notice that the only cars that came to service were the broken ones...

I've heard your reasoning from way too many service guys. I've OWNED over a hundred cars from most major manufacturers. My personal BMWs have been fairly reliable given the age and condition when I bought them. My 740il has had very little in the way of repairs and maintenance in a year and a half, and the ones it needed (radiator, cooling tank, regulator/brush combo for the alternator) were cheap. Even at 160k miles, and guys like you say that they are ALWAYS broken (and cost a lot to fix). So I take it with a rather large grain of salt.

Personal Picks?

2004 WRX STi
1994 Miata R-package
1977 Trans-Am (Bandit FTW)
Yenko Stinger Corvair Mazda Autozam
Suzuki Cappuccino

As with anything in life, it comes down to perspective. I haven't driven the new M3 (heck I haven't even seen one yet), but from many accounts it sounds like a great car. Problem is, I can never from a practical standpoint ever consider owning this car. It's beyond my means now as a new car and when the price is more welcoming 10 or 15 years later as a used car (this is often the silver lining of BMW ownership), the lack of fuel economy will continue to keep me away. Face it, for most of us, we're just not living in an 8-cylinder world anymore.

So, the short answer: this could quite possibly be a five-star vehicle for some people, just not the masses.

Swift GT EG Civic Hatch (50 mpg on long trips, 40 mpg on a bad day, 60 mph in 2nd gear, enough room to haul anything and fun to drive almost bone stock..) first gen Protege Lx's

My 5 star car?

The M3 V8 (S65B40 I think?) stuffed into my E30 along with old school Group N rear subframe that changes the rear trailing arm angle for less toe and camber change on compression.

Chris_V wrote:

yo vanilla wrote:

Chris_V wrote:

yo vanilla wrote: It's hard for me to give any BMW a great rating. It wasn't that many years ago I worked at a BMW dealership, and we called them BMTroubleU's because we had to push so many of them into the shop...

The problem with this line of thinking is that people that work in ANY manufacturer's service department will have the same feelings towards that manufacturer's cars. Why? Because no one has you work on a non-broken car except for oil changes and scheduled service intervals. So pretty much all you'll SEE are the few broken examples (and even if only 5% of the cars made are broken, it equals a large number in the service bay at any given time).

I have worked with bmw, mb, volvo, saab, land rover, jaguar, volvo, porsche, honda, toyota, scion. besides land rover, nothing even came close to the sheer volume of broken bmw's, many of which had to arrive at the dealership by flatbed. mb was just a tab behind coming close though ;) But please don't assume that I'd be so naive to not notice that the only cars that came to service were the broken ones...

I've heard your reasoning from way too many service guys. I've OWNED over a hundred cars from most major manufacturers. My personal BMWs have been fairly reliable given the age and condition when I bought them. My 740il has had very little in the way of repairs and maintenance in a year and a half, and the ones it needed (radiator, cooling tank, regulator/brush combo for the alternator) were cheap. Even at 160k miles, and guys like you say that they are ALWAYS broken (and cost a lot to fix). So I take it with a rather large grain of salt.

Good for you, doesn't change a thing. I personally saw over a hundred cars per week as a service writer. Oh my goodness, right? ;) Of course, many of them were repeats. The point is that the other brands were able to make it into the service bay under their own power. Yup, BMTroubleYoo's, 'cause we had to push them in

To be a 5 star for me.. I'd like a hatch back.

Cause then it's useful.

MitchellC wrote: Lotus Exige. Daily driver? Why not?

Maybe it could get at least 32MPG combined (it should really be able to get close to 40)...I don't know how it manages 26. Its ability to make gas magically disappear would keep it away from a straight 5 IMO.

David S. Wallens wrote: Okay, time to chime in since this thread is starting to get ugly. Some of you have taken something and run waaaaaay out of control. Some of you are also forgetting that talking about cars is supposed to be fun. And cars aren't always about numbers. Once you start arguing over horsepower per liter numbers without discussing the driving experience, you have become the poseurs you like to mock. (What's next? Arguing about Ferrari vs. Lamborghini even though few of us have driven one?) Are we turning into the big buff books? Um, I don't think so. Do we like the new M3? Heck yes. However, the fact we really like a $55k car isn't going to change everything about us. Sometimes it's okay to like things you currently can't afford. It's what inspires you to work harder and improve what you already have.

It definitely was a great article and great comparison. No other mag that I know of has done such a comparison and it was an interesting read Especially since it was from a set of drivers and writers that we know we can trust to tell it like is.

Just for clarification, David's original question was referring to the online review of the M3 (http://grassrootsmotorsports.com/new-cars/2008-bmw-m3-sedan/) not the M3 comparison in the magazine.