2000 Bmw Z3 M Roadster 32 L Review
Natural brawn thrillers: Mercedes-Benz SLK32 AMG vs BMW Z3 One thousand Roadster
This German language duo used archetype sports motorcar ingredients, merely did Mercedes-Benz or BMW accept the recipe for success?
The success of the original Mazda MX-5 – conceived in America, based on a British theme and built in Nihon – didn't go unnoticed in Deutschland.
By the middle of the 1990s, both BMW and Mercedes-Benz had added meaty 2-seater sports cars to their line-ups.
But neither the Z3, from BMW, nor Mercedes' SLK delivered the same kind of tactile feedback as the Mazda, nor compensated with the kind of power and performance their premium badges suggested.
Sales were strong, but their epitome among enthusiasts wasn't. When Pierce Brosnan's 007 was shown driving a Z3 in 1995's Goldeneye, it was at the bicycle of a feeble 140bhp 1.nine-litre, the but engine bachelor. Its contrary number at Stuttgart had a supercharger strapped to its 'four', merely saddled with an automatic 'box and dull recirculating-ball steering it was inappreciably more than sporting to drive. Six-cylinder variants of both followed, true, merely so did the hairdresser jibes…
Enter AMG and BMW'south M Division. Household names today, simply back in the tardily 1990s they were all the same fairly niche players building bespoke high-functioning versions of mainstream saloons.
AMG had been modifying Benzes since 1967, and doing it with Mercedes' co-operation from '92. But the Affalterbach firm only became a full member of the Stuttgart family in 1999.
'M' cars, meanwhile, were probably more recognised on UK roads, but inappreciably numerous. Upward until 1995, BMW Motorsport was still hand-building M5s at Garching.
Both badges, though, were about to join the sports automobile mainstream, turning the meek SLK and Z3 into demonic drop-tops that would win over enthusiasts and act as halo cars for the rest of their ranges.
Expensive when new, they're now affordable – you could selection up an example of either for less than £15k – and interest is picking upward.
But before nosotros become on with this Y2K ripped-roadster shootout, let's deal with the Arctic Silver elephant that's very definitely in the room, and not in this test.
We're talking about the Boxster, the game-changing sports car that helped pull Porsche back from the brink of financial collapse. And, equally if we didn't demand a farther reminder, when we pick upward the SLK from the Havant-based Performance Car Company there'south a pristine 3.2 S in the showroom, with fewer miles on the clock than the Benz and upwardly for considerably less greenbacks.
The Boxster should be the default choice today, as it was in mag tests 20 years ago. But let's suppose you don't fancy the Porsche, and in that location are reasons y'all might non.
In that location's the internet-exaggerated fear that the engine will grenade itself, a fondness for the more traditional feel of a forepart-engined, rear-bulldoze sports car, and the fact that the Boxster – fifty-fifty the Southward – only isn't that quick.
Six seconds to 60mph? An impressive feat, commonly, but rendered ordinary by today's pair. Autocar timed both the Thou Roadster and the SLK32 in the fours in a 2001 twin test, the Mercedes taking four.9 secs to reach 60mph, the BMW arriving a 10th sooner.
The Chiliad Roadster, built in the USA similar all Z3s, was also the first to arrive in showrooms, appearing three years earlier the Mercedes in 1998.
The styling is classic cab-backwards roadster, the long bonnet/brusque rear deck combination and those huge M-specific blistered back arches emphasising the front end-engined, rear-bike-drive layout.
The tapering bonnet tips a hat to the 327 and 328 roadsters of the 1930s, while the pinched waist, with its low door and the stylised vent on the front wings, makes a conscious nod to the 1950s 507.
The but thing retro nigh the Benz, meanwhile, is the name: Sport Leicht Kurz (or Sport Light Brusque), which riffs on both the SL that sabbatum above the SLK in Mercedes' model line-upwards and the legendary short-wheelbase, supercharged SSK built between 1928 and '32.
Even today, a full quarter of a century afterwards Mercedes-Benz previewed the production motorcar with 1994's SLK Concept, it looks fresh and modern.
Not sensual or overtly muscular, but elegant and make clean, roof up or downwards, its folding hardtop party piece disappearing below the bootlid (at the expense of nigh of the luggage space) without requiring the driver to do more than toggle a small switch on the console.
And unlike its M reverse number, with its drawing arches and quad exhausts, the AMG's telltales are limited to a single pair of tailpipes, a discreet 'V6 Kompressor' badge on each fly and a handsome ready of 10-spoke wheels.
The SLK'southward façade doesn't give much clue to how much functioning the 32 offers, but it does give a fairly clear indication of how it is delivered.
The engine is essentially the same iii.2-litre, eighteen-valve M112 engine fitted to Mercedes' contemporary Eastward-Form, driving the rear wheels through a conventional five-speed automatic of the Stuttgart business firm's own design.
But the addition of a twin-screw supercharger and intercooler lifts power from effectually 220bhp to virtually 350, and adds a thumping 100lb ft of torque for a lumbar-pummelling 332lb ft.
The power delivery isn't quite as off-idle instant equally in the bigger V8 Kompressor engines being fitted to E-, S- and SL-Course cars at the start of the new millennium, but it feels urgent everywhere.
The dissonance, deep and muscular, with a mixture of frazzle growl and supercharger whine, sounds purposeful and never becomes intrusive.
Merely it'southward also slightly ane-dimensional, sounding much the same when the meat of the ability comes in at 3500rpm as information technology does at the unambitious redline 2500rpm later.
The real beauty in the SLK is how piece of cake that performance is to admission. Mercedes' Speedshift transmission allows manual changes by tipping the lever left and right from the 'D' position, merely in practice you notice yourself relying on the 'box's automated mapping to do the legwork.
As for the driver, the only leg that needs a workout is the right one: just button and go. And the SLK32 really does go, to 100mph in 11.2 secs and on to an artificially limited superlative speed of 155mph.
The 1000 Roadster matches it every step of the manner, but asks for plenty of help from the driver to achieve information technology.
The mandatory manual transmission has a typically BMW longish throw, and the interplay between the throttle and the weighty clutch means even irresolute smoothly between first and second demands spoon-bending levels of concentration for the commencement few goes.
But the Z3 M is the kind of car that makes you want to persevere and put the effort in. With no artificial breathing appliance to fall back on, the BMW's M3 Evolution-derived S50B32 engine can't make as much ability as the Benz, though its incredible 317bhp from three.2 litres is by far the more impressive accomplishment.
The magic 100bhp per litre was no longer the preserve of racing cars with the kind of manners that would make Stig of the Dump look similar a graduate of a Swiss finishing school.
Still, in that location's no getting away from the colossal 74lb ft shortfall in torque. Stab the accelerator at the same 3500rpm that would accept the Benz leaping frontwards and, while the throttle response is instant, the Chiliad doesn't seem to have the same power to emboss the seatback with your spine print.
But keep your foot in and the power builds and builds, and the M keeps on pulling, well past the 6000rpm point where the SLK has thrown in the towel and resorted to another ratio, and all the way upward to 7600rpm, its engine note shifting always so slightly with each spin of the crank until it'south screaming its lungs out.
From 1999, the M Roadster switched to the newer S54 engine that had appeared in the and so-new E46 M3. The impact for Uk buyers was low, merely a couple of horsepower gained and a more sophisticated traction control system thanks to the newer motor'south electronic throttle.
All the same in the USA, where the E36 M3 and Thousand Roadster had sacrificed their private throttle bodies for a single one in the name of emissions, the significance was huge, with the M Roadster gaining more than 70bhp in the switch.
Simply both S50 and S54 engines were stuck with a 5-speed manual gearbox, lacking the floorpan infinite to take the half dozen-speed that backed the aforementioned engine in the M3.
And while much of the componentry came from BMW's gimmicky – and critically acclaimed – E36 3-Series, the Z3 didn't get that car's multi-link 'Z' axle, making do instead with the semi-trailing-arm set-up from the three-Serial Meaty and older BMWs.
If having that at one end, and something that is not a million miles away from half a McLaren F1 engine at the other, sounds like a recipe for the kind of oversteer fifty-fifty the Hoonigan himself Ken Block would struggle to contain, the reality is quite different.
Unless y'all're ham-footed the M is predominantly an understeerer, and even then only when pushed, meaning that you can drive it hard in safety. At least in the dry out.
No, the Yard Roadster's dynamic disappointments happen at the other end of the chassis. Like most BMWs of the time it could practice with more on-centre steering feel and, just like the classic 1960s roadsters it apes, a whole lot more structural stiffening.
The SLK32'due south body feels far more rigid, and the driving experience vastly more modern as a result. It feels much less like a depression-volume hot rod and more than of the polished manufactory-built performance car it is.
Just you don't experience much of anything in the SLK32, whether you're ambling through boondocks or stroking it forth at a lick.
In contrast to the BMW'south TR-way, elbow-on-the-door driving position, the AMG has you hunkered right down below the window line. Y'all ought to experience more connected to the car, but the steering doesn't deliver the sort of communication yous crave from a sports automobile, even a luxury-biased one such as this, and yous don't feel the hunger to push it.
Which isn't to say that the picayune AMG isn't capable. With so much torque bachelor, it'southward easy to fix the traction-command low-cal strobing, but the treatment feels secure through corners – both fast and slow – and the stiff-legged ride is marginally less jarring than the BMW's.
As is the interior. It's the usual sober 1990s Merc stuff: acres of sturdy blackness plastic; lashings of shiny wood trim; steering bicycle so big you experience like Vitruvian Man.
But while it might lack excitement, it does experience suitably expensive. The clever folding roof that kick-started the coupé-cabrio craze is beautifully lined, helps the SLK pull off a perfect impression of a tin-top when upwardly, and glides into the kicking at the motion picture of a switch without the driver having to exercise and so much as disengage a latch on the header rails.
The M Roadster's soft-acme is electric, too, but the exposed hood frame visible from the driver'southward seat, the two header-track catches you accept to unclip before the roof can retract, and the fiddly tonneau encompass you have to wrestle with when yous exercise, underline just how different these cars are in both graphic symbol and proposition.
When Autocar pitted them against each other on the AMG's arrival in 2001, it was the SLK that triumphed.
But today, when you're far more likely to be buying either to use on high days and holidays, it's hard to side confronting the BMW.
Despite its wobbly structure and the slightly disappointing steering, there's a raw, TVR-like excitement to the way the BMW goes that just encourages you to bulldoze it harder and longer.
The SLK is just as fast, and certainly as capable, only doesn't invite the aforementioned kind of driving. Its urge is for longer journeys at a more measured – but even so mighty – pace.
It'due south the kind of car you could persuade your pregnant other to take for a weekend away without having to promise the earth in render. And of the ii, it's the i yous'd concluded upwardly doing more miles in because it'due south a more versatile, more than rounded auto. The M was a throwback to the past; the SLK was an indicator of where convertibles were heading.
But not all convertibles. Handing back the keys, information technology'southward incommunicable to resist taking another look at that Boxster in the corner of the showroom: 59,000 miles, stunning paint and only £x,000.
The SLK32 is upward for £12,500 and the Z3 for £16k. You can make a case for either the BMW or the Mercedes over its rival.
However today, just as back in 2001, rationalising choosing ane over the Porsche is another thing.
Images: Will Williams
Cheers to James Paul Machine Sales for the BMW and Functioning Car Company for the Mercedes-Benz
FACTFILES
MERCEDES-BENZ SLK32 AMG
- Sold/number built 2001-'04/4333
- Construction steel monocoque
- Engine all-alloy, sohc-per-bank 3199cc V6, with electronic fuel injection and supercharger
- Max power 349bhp @ 6100rpm
- Max torque 332lb ft @ 4400rpm
- Manual v-speed automated, RWD
- Interruption independent, at front end by double wishbones rear multi-link; scroll springs telescopic dampers, anti-coil bar f/r
- Steering power-assisted recirculating brawl
- Brakes discs, with servo and anti-lock
- Length 13ft 1in (3995mm)
- Width 5ft 8in (1715mm)
- Peak 4ft 3in (1289mm)
- Wheelbase 7ft 10in (2400mm)
- Weight 3296lb (1495kg)
- 0-60mph 4.9 secs
- Top speed 155mph
- Mpg 18.2
- Price new £43,000
- Price now £13,000
BMW Z3 Chiliad ROADSTER
- Sold/number congenital 1998-2002/15,000
- Construction steel monocoque
- Engine fe-block, alloy-head, dohc 3201cc 24v straight-six, electronic fuel injection
- Max power 317bhp @ 7400rpm
- Max torque 258lb ft @ 3250rpm
- Transmission five-speed manual, RWD
- Suspension independent, at front past MacPherson struts rear semi-abaft arms, scroll springs, telescopic dampers; anti-curlicue bar f/r
- Steering power-assisted rack and pinion
- Brakes discs, with servo and anti-lock
- Length 13ft 2½in (4025mm)
- Width 5ft 8½in (1306mm)
- Height 4ft 3½in (1306mm)
- Wheelbase 8ft 2¾in (2459mm)
- Weight 3090lb (1402kg)
- 0-60mph 4.viii secs
- Top speed 155mph
- Mpg 20.iv
- Price new £40,570
- Price now £16,000
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Source: https://www.classicandsportscar.com/features/natural-brawn-thrillers-mercedes-benz-slk32-amg-vs-bmw-z3-m-roadster
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