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(from BMW Press
Release) The fresh face of BMW: 50 years of BMW New Class
Waiting times averaged
around half an hour. That's how long you had to queue up at the 1961
Frankfurt International Motor Show (IAA) to get a close-up look at
the star turn of the show – or indeed to sit inside it, if for no
more than a hurried minute. “Anyone who was in the vast exhibition
area, for whatever reason, felt drawn to the stand of the Bayerische
Motoren Werke,” noted reporters from a leading German magazine, “or
to be precise, to the new BMW mid-range car which until then had
been a closely guarded internal secret but was now on public view
for the first time at the BMW stand.”
BMW 1500 celebrates its world
premiere.
Resplendent in virginal
white, one of the two prototypes of the mid-range car from Munich
slowly rotated on a closed-off turntable. A few metres away stood
its twin, inviting visitors to touch it and even sit behind the
wheel. Anyone who managed to secure a spot in front of the adjacent
knee-high barrier had an unhampered view of the impressive four-door
model performing its slow-motion pirouettes. A flat panel under the
front bumper gave a brief summary of its salient cutting-edge
specifications: 4 cylinders in-line, 75 hp at 5,500 rpm, 5-bearing
crankshaft, OHC, front strut suspension, rear semi-trailing arm,
front disc brakes, top speed 150 km/h, weight (fully fuelled)
approx. 950 kg. Not even the strikingly elegant eight-cylinder 3200
CS Coupé alongside it, revealed to the public for the first time,
could detract from the sheer magnetic pull of this new model.
In no time at all the
new BMW had emerged as the ultimate “mid-range dream car” for the
950,000 or so visitors to the 40th IAA – marking a record attendance
and furnishing impressive proof of the burgeoning interest in cars
among the population at large. More than that, the motoring world
likewise credited this BMW debutant with excellent future prospects.
“The BMW 1500 really has a great deal to offer that makes it stand
out from the crowd of 1.5-litre cars and lends it that aura of
technical exclusivity which for so many people is summed up by the
three letters BMW,” wrote Germany's leading motoring magazine. The
four-door model was equally compelling for its clean, uncluttered,
modern lines:
“It is a visual feast in the gallery of saloons. But we would hope
that this most beautiful of production saloons will one day also be
on sale at the stated price.” BMW had quoted 8,500 deutschmarks as
the anticipated cost of the 1500 – good value, but far from cheap.
The new car couldn't
have timed its arrival better. Average incomes in Germany –
initially the main target market for the BMW 1500 – were rising by
some ten per cent annually in the early 1960s and stood at DM 6,723
in 1961. In that year the number of new car registrations in Germany
crossed the one million threshold for the first time. Along with
climbing incomes, there was also a rise in the demands made on cars
– which BMW was unable to meet with its existing model range.
Between the conservative eight-cylinder saloon – popularly dubbed
the “Baroque Angel” – and the agile 700 series small car, there was
nothing to offer the aspiring middle classes. At the same time, an
ongoing restructuring process was taking place within the individual
automotive classes. Up to 1958 the microcar category, for example,
which included BMW with its Isetta, was steadily expanding. At the
same rate as this vehicle class subsequently diminished in
significance, registrations in the lower mid-range – which included
the BMW 700 – were on the rise. Added to this, the Borgward Isabella
premium model had left a gap in the medium range when the
Bremen-based car factory announced it was filing for bankruptcy just
a few weeks before the IAA. It was BMW's clear intention that the
1500 should largely plug the gap which Borgward was leaving after
posting sales figures of more than 4,000 units in 1961.
1960: increase in capital
generated financing for development and production.
On the other hand,
though, this brand-new model was also a huge gamble. In 1959, BMW
itself had come within a whisker of bankruptcy and having to sell
out to Daimler-Benz before being rescued by its majority shareholder
Herbert Quandt.
BMW's image ambassador flagships – the BMW 503 and 507 – had been
phased out in 1959, but this did not free up sufficient capacity for
high-volume production of a new vehicle. And so it was decided to
build a completely new factory hall at the Munich-Milbertshofen
plant where the new “middle-class car” – its original internal
description – was to be constructed. To raise the necessary capital,
BMW's equity was initially reduced from 30 million to 22.5 million
marks in 1960 and then raised to 60 million marks. That secured the
necessary means for both the plant and development work. The sense
of a new era dawning was tempered by certain reservations, as a
media comment at the time revealed: “The plant may be out of the
red, but whether it has already won the game will only be confirmed
if the BMW 1500 now on show in Frankfurt actually goes into
production and sells.”
The development
engineers in Munich pulled out all the stops to keep to the
schedule, which stipulated a market launch in the summer of 1962.
After all, the first customers had already signed contracts during
the IAA stating delivery in the “second half of 1962”. “We firmly
expect to be building the pilot series in June of next year,”
promised Paul Hahnemann, the head of sales at the time, shortly
after the Frankfurt Show. “Production is then scheduled to start in
July.” The intervening period was rife with rumour. In April 1962 an
impatient headline – “When will the BMW 1500 be out?” – preceded a
claim that series production would not start up until August 1962,
when the plant reopened after its holiday closure, while pessimists
were already banking on a price hike to 10,000 marks.
In fact, the project ran
almost exactly to schedule. By early June 1962, advance orders had
already swelled to around 25,000. BMW's press department invited
auto journalists from Germany and abroad to Rottach on Bavaria's
Tegernsee lake for the first test-drives with the 1500:
“We've made it: the final soundings on design development have been
completed, the tough, tiring endurance tests on motorways and minor
roads of all quality levels have corroborated the deliberations and
calculations of the designers, and in Milbertshofen a new,
impressive state-of-the-art steel structure has been specially built
as a production hall for series production of the BMW 1500.”
Design with Giovanni Michelotti’s
signature.
Lined up for the
journalists was the forerunner of the so-called “Neue Klasse” – “New
Class” – that would finally secure BMW the breakthrough as a
producer of globally desirable modern automobiles. Its spacious
four-door body featured lines that dispensed with any stylistic
excesses; indeed, it was so subtle and transparent in its
streamlined form that it would endure for a very long time. The
design was neither conservative nor influenced by American style –
it was more reminiscent of Italian cars. Which was hardly
surprising: when developing the design of the 1500, BMW's chief
stylist Wilhelm Hofmeister had sought the advice of Giovanni
Michelotti, who had already collaborated on the 700. Hofmeister's
team developed Michelotti's draft through to completion, and so the
car body bore Michelotti's modern, unadorned lines along with a
radiator grille panel harking back to the era of the 507.
When principal
shareholder Herbert Quandt saw the finished design, it is said that
he insisted the classic BMW twin kidney be reinstated. The designers
rapidly put together a suitable kidney grille and placed it in the
centre, coupling the twin kidneys with the horizontality of the
radiator grille to create a new BMW face. From the 1500 on, the
kidney grille was more ornamentation than key component, with the
headlights taking on an ever more important role in design. Another
detail made a “double debut” – on the BMW 3200 and the new mid-range
car: the transition from the C-pillar to the car body was no longer
round but featured a “kink”.
At the outset this was down to perfectly prosaic reasons: the
widened support base of the C-pillar was a result of the one-piece
steel construction of the 1500 designed to exclude any potential
weakness at the transition to the roof. As a tribute to design
director Wilhelm Hofmeister, who had developed this form as a BMW
styling cue, it became known years later as the “Hofmeister kink”.
80 hp four-cylinder with the
latest engine technology.
Working away under the
bonnet was an all-new 1.5-litre four-cylinder unit developed by
BMW's engine guru Alexander von Falkenhausen. This was one of the
components that had been palpably or visibly altered since the
prototype marked its global debut at the IAA: instead of 75 hp at
5,500 rpm, as originally cited, the power unit now delivered 80 hp
at 5,700 rpm thanks to an increase in the compression ratio from
1:8.2 to 1:8.8. The engine had originally been intended to run on
standard petrol as well, but was now designed for super grade fuel.
And that was good for a top speed of 150 km/h, an outstanding figure
when viewed against its rivals. The same applied to acceleration,
with the new BMW completing the sprint from standstill to 100 km/h
in a sporty 16.8 seconds. Thanks to its streamlined shape, the car
body offered relatively little wind resistance, which made for
impressive fuel consumption figures: in the prescribed DIN
measurement of fuel consumption at 110 km/h, the 1500 managed to
undercut the ten-litre threshold by a tenth of a litre. BMW
specified fuel consumption on the road as between nine and ten
litres per 100 km. With a tank capacity of 53 litres, that was
enough to cover a distance of more than 500 kilometres.
A raft of special
features in the engine design showed it to be a highly advanced
unit, and the company did not hold back in announcing future boosts
in output: it offered every potential, they declared, “for keeping
its performance up-to-date for the next ten years at least”. That
this would prove true all the way to world championship-winning
heights, nobody could of course anticipate at the time.
When it made its debut the four-cylinder was the only German touring
car racing engine in its class to feature an overhead camshaft and
inclined valves in a V arrangement. The valves were slightly
off-centre, which made for straight rocker arms subjected to minimal
load. This valve arrangement allowed for the combustion chamber to
be designed as a “swirl pan”. The fuel-air mixture passed through
the chamber in a twist-flow motion, thus creating a turbulence which
improves combustion and make the engine more economical.
Excellent engine
charging was down to minimally curved intake ports and a
sophisticated gas cycle on the inlet and exhaust side which was
fine-tuned to reduce vibration. The pipe lengths ahead of the air
filter housing and between the air filter and the carburettor were
aligned extremely accurately both to the length of the fan-shaped
intake pipe and to the volume of the intake silencer and the engine
timing.
The five sets of
bearings for the rigid and meticulously counter-balanced crankshaft
ensured high running smoothness across the entire rev range, while
its four-layer bearings broadened its dry-running characteristics.
The grey-cast iron engine block featured water chambers between all
the cylinders and extended down well below the crankshaft mid-point.
Over the course of the engine's subsequent development, this
crankshaft proved so robust that it was able to withstand many times
the loads it was originally designed to take.
With a stroke of 71
millimetres and a bore of 82 millimetres, the four-cylinder engine
was designed as a modern short-stroke unit for the higher rev
ranges. Yet it generated 98 Newton metres of torque over a broad
bandwidth from 1,400 rpm to 5,700 rpm, with the curve peaking at 117
Newton metres. That placed it at the top of its class while also
permitting lazy shifting thanks to its great flexibility. But in
terms of gear spacing, the four-speed transmission was targeted at
the sportier driver. It had four all-synchromesh gears that enabled
fast, smooth shifting without the need for double-declutching.
Innovative new chassis design with
impressive reserves of talent.
The BMW engineers
marshalled by development chief Fritz Fiedler and head of testing
Eberhard Wolff also performed some ground-breaking work in the
design of the chassis. This was the first time that a spring strut
front axle had been combined with rear wheels using rocker arm
suspension with such care that the roll axis – the imaginary line
around which the body tilts when driving through corners – remained
virtually horizontal even under varying loads. The BMW 1500
displayed a largely neutral steering tendency even under extremely
dynamic cornering and with varying loads, allowing it to resist both
understeer and oversteer. This chassis set-up was achieved in
essence through the inclination of the front spring struts and the
deployment of the rear wheel rocker arms in coordination with the
spring characteristics.
“The terms understeer
and oversteer lose their significance in this car,” BMW Director of
Technical Sales Planning Helmut Werner Bönsch was quoted as saying
in one major German news magazine. “Its fine roadholding has come
about not by chance, but as a result of precise work by the
engineers.” The research carried out by the BMW designers, the
magazine continued, has put them in a position to “accurately
identify around 130 of the 168 factors which affect a car's
roadholding, to establish their impact and, in so doing, to adjust
the car's handling characteristics to the desired effect.”
In order to more
effectively exploit the potential available within the chassis, the
BMW engineers increased the size of the standard production model's
wheels and brakes. A new tyre dimension was developed specially for
the 1500. The result: low-profile tyres in size 6.00-14. A
round-shoulder design and wide contact patch, coupled with a low
height, ensured high lateral forces and therefore impressive
stability through corners despite the soft tyre suspension. Another
critical enhancement achieved through the switch from 13-inch to
14-inch rims lay in the scope for larger brakes.
The exterior dimensions of the front fixed-calliper disc brakes duly
increased from 238 mm to 268 mm, the diameter of the rear drum
brakes from 230 mm to 250 mm.
Functional and practical body and
equipment.
The car's body was built
according to cutting-edge construction principles. Its structure was
welded to the rigid floor assembly and, as a self-supporting
all-steel body, formed a cell combining high bending strength and
torsional stiffness with low weight. Inner door openings of 828 mm
at the front and 726 mm at the rear revealed the importance attached
to ease of entry. The individual front seats were contoured and
given a bucket-like design in the lower section to provide lateral
support around fast corners. With these features, and an additional
transverse spring providing extra back disc support, the sporting
future of the new model series had already been programmed in.
In the early 1960s,
passive safety was still largely a foreign concept. However, the
first key details could already be found in the new 1500. Screw
connections were provided for all four seats to allow seat belts to
be installed. The grippy two-spoke steering wheel had a padded
impact plate, and the dashboard minimised reflections in the
windscreen – as did the instruments set well back in the dark,
padded dashboard. “Added to which,” continues the press clipping,
“wherever you look you'll see that „Aus gutem Grund ist alles rund'
– „things are circular (also means „going well') for a reason'.”
The exceptionally
efficient use of space in the interior was duplicated in the large
boot area, which had a low rear panel to ease loading and a totally
level floor to allow the space to be exploited to the full. Its
600-litre capacity allowed the luggage area to swallow up three
normal-sized pieces of luggage, two smaller cases and a number of
other bags with ease. The boot also had to be opened if you wanted
to top up the fuel tank, as the filler cap was positioned under the
boot lid on the right-hand wing.
The bonnet rated as another special design feature of the car. In
order to fundamentally rule out the possibility of the bonnet
opening while on the move, it was front-hinged and held itself wide
open.
Although BMW was unable to stick to its original price for the new
1500, the eventual rise was not quite as drastic as the scaremongers
had feared. The company instructed dealers to quote a sale price of
9,485 marks, which included “all standard fittings without which the
car cannot be delivered, such as the disc brakes, windscreen wash
system, etc.,” as Board member for sales Paul G.Hahnemann was keen
to emphasise at the press launch.
A roundly positive reaction in
press: “This car is worth the money”
The first road test
reports provided a ringing endorsement of the initial enthusiasm.
“This car is worth the money” led one drivers' journal, and gushed:
“The BMW may be an off-the-peg garment, but it doesn't let it show;
its workmanship would be a credit to any bespoke car manufacturer.
Its body is a work of precision, its construction a genuine
masterpiece.” Their counterparts at Germany's leading car magazine
warmed to the theme: “Two initial impressions from behind the wheel
which are likely to strike anyone sitting in a BMW 1500 for the
first time sum up this car: the agreeable seating position, offering
excellent visibility, and the nimble handling which could almost
lead you to believe you were driving something far smaller.” The
Italian press lauded the new mid-size BMW as a car with much
competition in the four-cylinder saloon class, “but whose rivals
cannot keep pace with it in terms of its completeness, the
cutting-edge status of its design and its engine power.” As a whole
and in its details, the new kid on the block left French testers
with an “excellent impression. Here we have a car whose makers have
been careful not only to keep price as low as possible, but also to
ensure satisfied owners over the long term.”
The development story: early
projects were launched as early as 1953.
For the creators of the
BMW 1500, the market launch of the new car represented the
fulfilment of a long cherished dream. It had, after all, been a long
and winding – not to mention, at times, rocky – road to get to this
day in June 1961. Back in the early 1950s the company had been
struck by the lack of a mid-size four-cylinder car to sit between
the large six and eight-cylinder models on the top end of the range
and the small single-cylinder and twin-cylinder variants at the
opposite extreme. Although it was far from certain where the funds
would be found to finance the project, development work got underway
in 1953. Emerging from a pack of engine concepts as the leading
candidates for a place under the bonnet were two four-cylinder
powerplants derived directly from the celebrated aluminium V8 in the
BMW 502 / 507. For the unit known internally by the codename M521V,
the eight-cylinder was sliced in half crossways; for the M521R the
cut was lengthways. This “partnership engines” concept was so named
because of the potential for low development and manufacturing costs
generated through component sharing with the V8. Although the 1955
engine failed to make the grade, let down by its unacceptable
vibrations and running characteristics, the four-cylinder in-line
engine concept in general was looking extremely promising. Mounted
at a 45-degree angle, the V8 derivative soon became known as “Der
schräge Otto” (“schräg” meaning “sloping”) within the factory walls,
inspired by a popular film musical in Germany at the time. The
1.6-litre engine, which developed 62 hp in testing, was housed under
a body later described by BMW Director Bönsch as “futuristic”.
Rather than sloping down towards the tail of the car in conventional
style, the rear screen was angled back towards the front, in a
manner mimicked in subsequent years by a small French car.
By 1957 the process of
further development had ruled out the idea of partnership engines as
a viable option. The aluminium crankcase would have become too
expensive and technical development revealed that a crossflow
cylinder head with valves in a V arrangement and overhead camshaft
would be necessary. The new engine was badged M530 and had an output
of 75 – 80 hp. To house the engine the bodyshop developed a
prototype BMW 530, a two or four-door saloon which shared a radiator
design with the BMW 507 and whose trapezoidal lines lent it a strong
likeness to the later 1500. Taking shape at the same time was an
extremely elegant coupé boasting design references to the BMW 503
and an increase in engine capacity from 1.6 litres to 1900 cc to
give a claimed output of 100 hp. The saloon and engine were
scheduled to go into series production at the turn of the year
1958/1959, and the development process was duly wrapped up. However,
with the financial situation becoming increasingly dire, a lack of
resources forced BMW to pull the plug on the project in late 1958.
Starting again with a BMW 1300
prototype.
With the company's
financial fortunes staging a revival, a mid-size car reappeared on
the radar. The conception process was re-launched with a clean
slate, which meant a re-evaluation of all existing engine concepts.
As the project demanded a powerplant that was as lightweight and
compact as possible, the leading candidate was a unit originally
intended to power a small car. The 0.9-litre engine was plumped up
into a 1,300 cc unit developing 65 hp in its grey-cast iron version
and 62 hp in aluminium guise. It was given the designation M113, and
the BMW 1300 prototype built in 1961 was therefore known as the BMW
113.
The 93-millimetre
distance between the engine's cylinders meant the scope for
enlarging the four-cylinder unit, if required, was limited. This
distance was therefore increased to 100 millimetres, creating the
M115 with capacity of 1,499 cc. The M115 was to become the
forefather of all BMW four-cylinder engines produced up to 1990.
And even the company's later, legendary six-cylinder in-line units
inherited some of its characteristics, including the 100 millimetres
between the cylinders.
The same dedication to
perfection was shared by the body development experts in the design
of the mid-size car from the wheels up. Stung by their experience
with the BMW 530 – whose body possessed insufficient torsional
stiffness to deliver the sporting capability desired – they
conducted a series of load tests. One example involved fitting a BMW
700 with a high-performance engine and sending the test drivers out
on a mission of speed. The small cars were hounded over motorways
and country roads alike at up to 170 km/h until their bodies could
take no more. The areas of weakness were subsequently remodelled and
improved to the point where, rather than snapping under the loads,
they would, at most, bend. All of which laid the foundations for the
exemplary rigidity of the BMW 1500, recipient of such high praise
after its launch in June 1962.
Lack of skilled workers causes
quality issues.
Production of the 1500
began on schedule in September 1962, after the pre-production series
of test and demonstration cars had rolled off the assembly line late
that spring. Exports to Japan and the USA were also quickly up and
running. However, the growing production numbers were accompanied by
an increase in the fault count, due in part to the large number of
unskilled personnel and “guest workers” employed by the company in
the manufacturing halls to aid the rapid growth in production. Given
considerable time pressure, there was no option but to train these
employees “on the job” once production had already begun. It was not
long before the public got wind of these shortcomings, which
threatened to cause lasting damage to the reputation of the 1500 and
of BMW as a whole. This led production management to introduce a
multi-layered system of quality control mid-way through the
production run. By the middle of 1963 this had led to rapid
improvements in the production quality of the cars.
The 1500 saw BMW finally identify the missing link between the small
and large cars in its model range. Where BMW had previously been
goaded with taunts that it only made “cars for bank managers and
day-labourers,” the new mid-size fulfilled its brief of appealing to
a new customer base. While only 14 per cent of all BMW 700 and BMW
LS customers were self-employed, 76 per cent of early orders for the
BMW 1500 came from buyers with their own business.
The BMW 1800 turns the “neue
Klasse” into the “Neue Klasse”.
In was not long after
its introduction in 1962 that BMW advertising had billed the 1500
the “new class”. Its nickname initially had to make do with lower
case, but stepped up to full block capital status a few months later
and finally settled for the middle ground: “New Class” it was. BMW
confidently argued that it had dreamt up a distinctive and
unrivalled new class of car with its sporty new mid-size saloons.
Clever marketing indeed, as the “only child” 1500 was to become part
of a small family in autumn 1963; with the arrival of the BMW 1800
and 1800 ti at the IAA show in Frankfurt, the leading cars in the
class were now also the smallest.
The concept for the BMW
1800 was a textbook exercise in modular construction. A longer
stroke and larger bore gave the engine displacement of 1.8 litres
and higher output – 90 hp, as it turned out. The body remained
practically unchanged, but specification had certainly improved.
From the outside the 1800 differed only in its nameplate and the
addition of two chrome strips. In return for their DM 9,985, 500
marks than BMW asked for the 1500, customers were given a car that
could sprint from 0 to 100 km/h in 13.2 seconds and hit 160 km/h.
Its outstanding chassis needed no modification, having been designed
from the outset to handle far higher speeds. Only the
rubber-insulated fixed rear axle subframe was altered, two short
supporting struts anchoring it even more securely to the floorpan.
This was an additional safety feature, also included in the BMW
1500.
Its greater performance earned the 1800 a Mastervac brake booster,
which helped the actuating forces to be vastly reduced. The
company's advertising at the time summed up what the new car was all
about: “The BMW 1800 develops 90 horsepower. At 120 km/h it needs
only 40 hp. The remaining 50 hp are on hand for accelerating,
overtaking and driving at 160 km/h.”
The car also boasted
extensively updated fixtures and fittings. The backrests of the
front seats in the 1500 were adjustable, but its big brother's seats
also came with a reclining function. The colours of the seat and
side panel trim reflected the new exterior paint shades and were
available in a Skaiflor artificial leather / cloth combination or in
Skaiflor only. There were two pockets in the front seat backrests to
swallow up newspapers, maps and small items for the journey ahead.
The rear-view mirror could be dimmed.
For the sporting driver: the BMW
1800 TI.
At the end of the day,
though, the highlight of the new models on show at the 1963 IAA was
the new BMW 1800 TI. The two letters stood for Turismo
Internazionale and were added to denote one of the fastest and most
successful racing touring cars of the 1960s. The 10,960-mark
road-trim 1800 TI was aimed at “an international clientele looking
for an extremely fast car with luxurious fixtures and fittings.” The
engine's compression ratio was raised to 1:9.5 for the New Class'
sportiest representative yet, while two Solex twin-barrel
carburettors – helped by a huge air filter – provided outstanding
cylinder charge. Larger intake valves and stiffer valve springs, a
camshaft with longer duration and higher cams teamed up with the
other modifications to push the output of the 1.8-litre unit up to
110 hp at 5,800 rpm. Meanwhile, a heavily ribbed light-alloy oil
sump – with larger five-litre capacity – ensured effective oil
cooling.
A close-ratio sports
transmission, whose first and fourth gear were only 1:2.819 apart,
enabled an extremely sporty driving style. The steering ratio was
also faster, allowing the driver to tackle high-speed corner
sequences with even greater precision.
The front anti-roll bar was backed up by a second item for the rear
wheels, while the springs themselves were shorter and harnessed by
stiffer shock absorbers. The 1800 TI displayed a breathtaking turn
of speed for the time, sending the needle on the exceptionally clear
circular speedometer spinning past the 100 km/h mark in just 11
seconds. Only at 170 km/h did the acceleration come to an end.
The “hot version” for serious
drivers: the BMW 1800 TISA.
But that was not all.
“For those dreaming of sporting glory and looking to take part in
races or rallies, an even hotter version of the 1800 TI is also
available,” BMW announced to perspective owners. This “special
edition for competition” brought bucket seats for the driver and
front passenger, stiffer front springs which lowered the car by six
millimetres and stiffer or adjustable shock absorbers. Customers
could choose between a four-speed gearbox with sport ratio and a
five-speed transmission, as well as four different final drive
ratios. Also included in the equipment list were a limited-slip
differential, racing linings and additional cooling for the disc
brakes, a tank holding 105 litres of fuel and an electric fuel pump.
The racing tweaks also extended to the engine. Specially formed
four-ring pistons raised the compression ratio to 1:10.5, and a
camshaft with longer and higher cams operated larger inlet valves
with stiffer valve springs. A supply point was planned to attach an
additional oil cooler. The engine, whose power had been raised to
130 hp by the above upgrades, expelled its exhaust gases through a
sports exhaust system. In 1965 BMW released a further developed
motor sport version of the 1800 TI – in a small series limited to
200 examples – to comply with homologation requirements. It was
christened 1800 TISA, the last two letters standing for
“Sonderausführung” (special edition). The 13,500-mark machine was
sold exclusively to licensed racing and sports drivers in Europe and
the USA, and was capable of speeds of up to 192 km/h (depending on
the car's gearing).
Assembly of the BMW 1800 began in November 1963, but it was not
until spring 1964 that the BMW 1800 TI went into production. BMW
lacked the capacity to deliver the New Class models in sufficient
numbers to meet demand. As a result, it brought production of its
large saloons to a halt in 1963; of the company's eight-cylinder
model, only the 3200 CS survived the cull. “We were forced into this
decision by the necessity to free up all available manufacturing
capacity for mid-size car production,” was the explanation given in
the 1963 Annual Report. “Overseas exports had to be reigned in as we
continued to limit our export quota due to the limited production
capacity caused by the manpower shortage. The total export quota
stood at 32.5%.” The shift in emphasis to mid-size car production
saw BMW's revenues grow significantly faster than the production
numbers themselves, rising an impressive 47 per cent from their 1962
levels to 433 million marks. The New Class accounted for 46 per cent
of that figure.
Motor sport icons of the 1960s:
the 1800 TI and 2000 TI
While the BMW 1800 had
soared to sales success in the blink of an eye, the 1800 TI was busy
racking up a string of honours in race competition. The car's
success was inextricably linked with the name of one man: Hubert
Hahne. In 1964, his first year of competitive action with the new
BMW touring car, Hahne established an easy domination over his
rivals. He recorded 14 victories in 16 races on the way to being
crowned German circuit racing champion. The Hahne/BMW double act was
also the partnership to beat in endurance racing and the European
touring car championship. For example, in 1964 Hahne swept to
overall victory in the 12-hour race for touring cars at the
Nürburgring. His fastest lap – the quickest of anyone – was clocked
at 126.6 km/h, and his overall average speed stood at 120.9 km/h.
However, his finest years were still to come. During a support race
for the German Grand Prix on 6 August 1966, Hahne – driving the
raised-capacity BMW 2000 Ti – became the first man to lap the
Nürburgring-Nordschleife circuit in under ten minutes in a touring
car. Indeed, his lap time of 9.58 minutes caused a genuine
sensation.
Then, in 1966, he teamed up with Jacky Ickx to win the 24-hour race
at Spa-Francorchamps, and the pairing went on to secure second place
at Snetterton, England.
In 1967 Helmut Bein won
eight out of ten rounds of the German car rally championship in a
BMW 1600 and ended the year champion in all classes. The 1968 Rallye
Monte Carlo then saw the Bachmann/Strunz pairing drive their 2000 TI
to victory in the class for production touring cars with up to
2-litre displacement. It was not only in touring car racing that the
four-cylinder engine in the New Class proved to be a
championship-winning recipe. First up came success in the Lola
Formula 2 racing car, and over subsequent years the high-output BMW
engines were all but unbeatable. This was an era characterised by
countless BMW race wins and European championship titles.
However, it was to be over 20 years after it had first gone into
production that the four-cylinder celebrated its crowning glory. In
the early 1980s the expert team headed by engine guru Paul Rosche
squeezed an incredible 800 hp from a 1.5-litre turbocharged power
unit based on used engine blocks for an assault on the Formula One
World Championship. Success duly followed in 1983 when Brazilian
Nelson Piquet won the drivers' title in a Brabham BMW just 630 days
after the engine's debut race.
A broad target group: from
“woman’s car” to road-going sports car.
Rewind to 1964, and the
new 1.8-litre models were basking in universal acclaim from
customers and press alike. “There is also widespread consensus that
this is the most effective and indeed the best everyday car the
market currently has to offer,” commented observers of the 1800 at
the time. The advertising for the car focused on its all all-round
qualities and presented the BMW 1800 as a model for the ladies as
well under the strapline “A car not only for men”. “As well as the
luxury and comfort of a large touring saloon, the BMW 1800 also
offers the performance and driving properties of a true sports car.
This is therefore a car that will be driven with equal enthusiasm by
women and men – either in appreciation of its high comfort levels or
for the sheer driving pleasure it provides." For the record, the
elegantly attired lady in the advert was still standing next to the
open passenger-side door.
The BMW 1800 TI, meanwhile, set about whipping up storms of
excitement wherever it went. The road test headlines ranged from
“Absolute world class” and “A proper driver's car for family men” to
“A missile in sheep's clothing”. “Anyone who knows anything about
cars, who not only drives a car but can also judge the merits of
one, and who likes to drive safely and unproblematically,” read one
Austrian article, “will agree that the BMW 1800 TI is one of the
world's leading cars at this moment in time.” The adverts painted a
picture of the car as “a sports car for five” and, in 1965,
whispered under the headline “Suspicious”: “If you think a BMW 1500
has just overtaken you at 170 km/h, your eyes may in fact be
deceiving you; it could well be a BMW 1800 TI „in disguise'. Demand
at 1500 levels indicates that there are a lot of them around.”
By this time, though,
the BMW 1500 was already a car from a previous era. In December 1964
production of the archetypal New Class model was brought to a halt.
Its successor as entry-level model was the BMW 1600, which had been
in production since spring 1964. Expanded to 1,573 cc, the
four-cylinder engine – with its new carburettor – now developed 83
hp and was capable of 155 km/h. However, the 1.8-litre model
remained the customers' favourite, prompting BMW to pull the 1600
back out of the range after two years in production.
1965: New Class production hits
100,000, the BMW 2000 celebrates its premiere.
On 18 August 1965, no
more than four years after the start of production, the workforce
celebrated the arrival of the 100,000th New Class car. And yet BMW
still had one more card to play: the 2-litre version.
Series production of the new range-topping model (100 hp, top speed:
almost 170 km/h, price: 11,260 marks) duly got underway at the end
of January 1966. Visually, the BMW 2000 stood out with its new face
featuring rectangular headlights in place of circular items. A trim
strip running all the way around the bonnet and flowing into the
waistline lent emphasis to the new front end. Also newly designed,
the rear came across as particularly broad and tidily arranged with
its large-surface rear lights with four lamp chambers. The B-pillar
was given chrome trim, allowing it to underscore the regal elegance
of the 2-litre version. And, with its wood veneer dashboard, the
interior of the four-door saloon added even more comfort-oriented
details. The engine was a further development of the 1800, boasting
a new combustion chamber geometry – the “sphere swirl pan” created
out of the basic swirl pan. Plus, the 5-bearing crankshaft had eight
counterweights instead of four, which ensured outstanding smoothness
and impressively low vibrations.
The BMW 2000 stood apart
from the lower-capacity models in more than its engine alone. The
racing experience gained with the 1800 TI also led to extensive
optimisation of the chassis. This knowledge from race competition
was reflected in reinforced kingpins and front mountings, while the
rear springs (moved closer to the centre of the wheel), modified
rubber mounting for the rear axle subframe and new shock absorber
tuning helped to enhance comfort.
Having enjoyed a
positive experience with sporting variants of the 1800, BMW decided
to offer a more focused version of the new touring saloon from the
outset – the 2000 TI. A pair of twin-barrel carburettors took the
place of the standard 2000's four-barrel carburettor, and the
compression ratio rose from 8.5 to 9.3. The result was another 20
hp, which gave the 2000 TI the muscle to deliver a top speed of 180
km/h. The TI saw BMW once again cultivating an understated feel, and
it began life with the body design of the 1800.
Only the model badge on the front grille and boot lid pointed to
what was now the most powerful and – at 11,750 marks – also the most
expensive road-going New Class model.
It quickly became clear
that, although customers had developed a taste for the extra
performance of the 2000 TI, they were not keen to forego the comfort
and more imposing appearance of the basic 2-litre model. BMW quickly
realised this and wasted no time in adding the 2000 tilux to the
range in July 1966, its model designation presented in lower case
for the first time. For a premium of exactly one thousand marks over
the 2000 TI customers could now have the best of both worlds:
Turismo Internazionale and luxury, neatly summed up in a single
badge.
1969: one last major upgrade.
The most significant
modifications in the 1969 model enhancement package were applied to
the BMW 1800. The exterior tweaks immediately identified it as a
1969 model. The grille had a fresh look, its kidney element brought
slightly further forward. The interior was given a complete refresh
and made to comply with the more stringent safety standards
stipulated in the US. Updates included a new, set-back three-spoke
steering wheel with large impact plate and controls in an elastic
material, which were now set into a recessed strip in the dashboard.
And all the other levers, buttons, cranks and handles – not to
mention the armrests – were now made of a more yielding material.
Like the dashboard, the instrument cluster was also padded.
Under the bonnet was a
new engine based on the block from the BMW 2000. The 2000's pistons
gave the engine a 71-millimetre stroke and displacement of roughly
1.8 litres, from which the 1800 produced an unchanged output of 90
hp. The extremely short-stroke engine boasted impressive smoothness
and increased output at higher revs. A step up in active safety,
meanwhile, was provided by the new circuit braking with brake
booster.
The interior of the 2000 and 2000 tilux 2-litre models also
benefited from the new safety-enhancing features and improved
brakes.
A fitting finale: the BMW 2000 tii
with fuel injection.
The most cutting-edge
technology of all was showcased in the New Class' new flagship model
introduced in 1969, the BMW 2000 tii. The second “i” stood for
“injection” and announced the arrival of the most powerful (130 hp)
four-door mid-size BMW on the scene. The powerplant was mounted
underneath a body showing no changes from the tilux, and the chassis
was also identical to its sister model.
The Kugelfischer
mechanical fuel injection system had been tested successfully by BMW
over the years in race action, developing output of 205 hp. And so
it was a logical next step to transfer this technology to the
standard-spec sporty BMW saloon for the first time with the aim of
gradually building up its power output. In keeping with BMW's
principle of controlled progress, the output of the 2-litre engine
was boosted from 120 hp at 5,500 rpm to 130 hp at 5,800 rpm. Added
to which, the increase in output was spread over the full rev range.
Another ingredient in this power diet was a rise in the compression
ratio from 9.3 to 10, a measure which could be carried out without
fear of an increased knocking tendency thanks to the improved fuel
distribution. Specific fuel consumption was around five to eight per
cent lower across the rev range than that of the already economical
four-barrel carburettor engine. Top speed was also up, from 180 km/h
to 185 km/h, and a half a second was shaved off the 0 – 100 km/h
time, which now stood at 10.4 seconds. However, what made driving
with this BMW 2000 tii particularly pleasing was the lag-free
acceleration; no other car could beat it for accelerator response.
The direct injection system had celebrated an undeniably successful
debut and was very soon also made available for the BMW 02 range.
At 14,290 marks,
customers would have to fork out a princely sum for the new
range-topping model. But today, with fewer than 2,000 examples ever
built, it is one of the most coveted New Class rarities. The
flagship car was granted another three years in production before
BMW brought the curtain down on the New Class generation with a
total of 350,729 cars having left the factory. The mid-size range
was succeeded in 1972 by the first BMW 5 Series, which continues the
New Class success story into the future.
