Here's Why the BMW M3 E92 Was the Craziest BMW M3

this is a 2013 BMW m3 and it's the craziest m3 BMW ever did you see when the m3 first came out it had a four cylinder and then a couple of them had six cylinders and today the m3 has a turbocharged six cylinder because of emissions and fuel economy regulations but for a few glorious years in there the m3 had a v8 and today I'm going to review the v8 m3 I've borrowed this m3 from a viewer here in Orange County in Southern California and it really is a special car but first a little history now like I mentioned when the m3 first came out back in the 1980s at a four cylinder then BMW made up six cylinder and three and then another six cylinder and three but then they decided to really take things to the next level and that meant a v8 so the 2008 m3 debuted with a four liter v8 that made about 415 horsepower which was a huge increase over its predecessor it was a crazy time in the car world the m3 had a v8 sure but the m5 had a v10 and big naturally aspirated engines were everywhere in the m3 case you could get it with a 6-speed manual or with a dual clutch automatic transmission and it was offered as a sedan a coupe or a convertible BMW is internal code name for the sedan was the e90 while the coupe like this car was the e92 and that is how most enthusiasts refer to this car today this m3 is a little bit more special than most because it's not just an e 92 m3 with the v8 but it's also a competition model which meant different wheels and upgraded suspension and electronics for better handling this m3 also has a six-speed manual transmission which is just cool an m3 with a naturally aspirated v8 and a manual so today I'm going to show you around this car and I'm going to show you what else makes it cool first I'm gonna take you on a the e92 m3 and I'm gonna show you all of its interesting quirks and features then I'm gonna get it out on the road and drive it and then I'm going to give it a dug score alright I'm gonna start the quirks and features of this m3 with getting in and that means taking a quick look at the key and that means taking a look at this leather key pouch just take a look at this thing that key slides out from this BMW logo in the corner that is pride of ownership there's nobody with a Hyundai Accent who's got a key pouch like this and indeed the owner of this car bought it new back in 2013 never modified it it only has 34,000 miles this is a fantastic example of an e 92 m3 the other interesting thing with this key and with all BMW keys from this era there are three buttons on the key the bottom you have the button that opens the trunk it has a picture of a car with a trunk open the middle one is the BMW logo that's the lock button the top one is an arrow pointing up that's the unlock button I'm not sure why BMW ever thought an upwards pointing arrow was a good image to depict unlocking a car but they did it for all BMWs of this era so an entire generation of BMW owners knows that to unlock the car you press the up arrow and next up we climb inside the m3 and R immediately faced with a common problem you have in two-door cars that have back seats and that is the fact that the doors have to be so long to allow rear passengers to get in that it's hard to reach back and get your seat belt but BMW has solved that problem you get inside the m3 sit down turn it on and then there's an automatic electronic seatbelt delivery mechanism that will bring the seat belt forward so it's closer to you so it's easier to reach so that you can put it on and once you put it on that electronic seatbelt delivery system goes back into its hole ready and waiting for its next opportunity when you get in the car so it can deliver you your seatbelt kind of interesting and next up one of the first things you notice when you get into this car is the fact that it doesn't have leather seats these also aren't Alcantara these are cloth seats just fabric seats inside of a six year old BMW m3 that sold new for over 70 grand you might be surprised to see those cloth seats I certainly was but this is the enthusiasts spec you have cloth seats you have no sunroof which helps to lower your center of gravity and lower your overall curb weight and you have the manual transmission and the competition package this is the m3 to get if you want to go racing am next up since this is an enthusiast car there are also a lot of enthusiast touches in here for example in the center console there is a power button you push it for power if you don't push it there is no power so you have to weigh that every time you get in to your m3 next up another interesting quirk in the same vicinity is that power button you have a button that turns off the stability control but this car came from an era where automakers were really worried about people turning off the stability control and then crashing and suing them so when you turn it off you get a warning in the infotainment screen in the center and you also get three separate warnings in the gauge cluster letting you know that your stability control is in fact off so what do you turn it off for individual warnings just to confirm hey it's off its off its off its really off and next up speaking of controls in this car the e92 m3 like other BMWs from this era has these confounding turn signals where you put on the left turn signal to signal left and then it goes on but the signal lever pops back to the center so then you go to turn off the left signal you push it back down and it stays on so then you go to switch on the right turn signal to turn off the left one and then the right turn signal goes on and there's no rational or logical or good way to operate these turn signals unless you spend time learning them BMW tried to use this turn signal design for like a decade before they finally gave it up after oceans of customer complaints and BMW realized that turn signals were not something that ever really needed to be complicated beyond what we all had already learned and next up moving around the interior more another interesting item in here is the center armrest which you can see is into two pieces but it opens as one piece you cannot open those two pieces individually so why split it into two my theory is that BMW did this to prevent arguments your passenger can't complain that you're impeding on his elbow room when there is clearly a line in the middle showing who gets what portion of the center armrest that's a brilliant idea that BMW should integrate into the second and third row of its family SUVs so that parents have like an out-of-bounds line to judge when kids complain that the other one is on their side parent could just look back and go yep on your side sorry you're over the line you gotta move back be brilliant next up another interesting item in here is because of this centre armrest and because of all the other items here in the centre console you'll see there's no cup holder for the driver which of course it's kind of a problem in a luxury car made in the modern era but BMW has a remedy over on the passenger side of the dashboard you have two cupholders on the right you have the passenger cup holder which just pops out of the dashboard pretty simple no surprises there but on the left you have the driver cup holder you push it and then it makes this like arc motion and moves itself into the middle hanging over the center console for easier reach of the driver the problem here of course is that it's high up and over a bunch of electronics and your shift lever and so any liquid that drips down will get all those things sticky and maybe even damage them this cup holder is not really the best solution but there is a driver couple during this car it just begins its journey on the passenger side and next up speaking of the center area in the centre control stank I have to say this car has a lot of plastic in it you get into a modern BMW even a beast 3-series and it has way less plastic and nicer materials and then this car but this body style came out back in 2008 when this sort of thing was more acceptable but when you look at it today you can see it's starting to show its age just based on how much kind of cheap plastic takes the place of all of the centre controls in this car and once again speaking of the centre control stack this car has a feature in the centre I'll stack that is absolutely confounding to me and that would be this dial between the center climate vents with a blue and red box on either side you adjust that dial and it will determine what temperature of air comes out those Center vents now I say this is perplexing to me because right below that you have 14 buttons two dials and a screen devoted to your entire climate control system but that Center blue and red dial will override all of those buttons so you can have your entire climate control system all these buttons and dials set to the warmest possible settings and temperatures but if you have that little dial moved over to cold then it is cold air you will get from those center vents what is the point of all of these climate controls if you can simply override them with a manual dial I've never understood it BMW owners think it's brilliant everyone else I explain it to thinks it's absolutely bizarre but regardless that's what the purpose is of that dial in the middle and next up a couple of items I love in this interior one is on the door panel you have this rather large door pocket in there but you can see there's no real way to access it to put stuff in but it actually opens up so you can put stuff in it and then close it and kind of keep it out of reach or out of sight which is a really good idea that lets you put kind of whatever you want in there without having to worry about it falling out or rattling around something else I love in this car is the fact that the seats have additional thigh support if you pull this little latch under the very front part of the seats you can pull that part out and give yourself better support for your thighs which is nice for tall drivers who may not get that kind of support from the seats in their standard orientation and next up we move on to the infotainment system in this car which is a fairly simple version of I Drive I actually went through this entire infotainment system and there's nothing really particularly interesting or noteworthy about it it's showing its age but relatively usable the only thing I found that was slightly quirky is that if you go into the sound settings there's something called Gong and if you click on it this happens that's the warning chime you hear when you open the door in this car and it allows you to set that chime at whatever volume you want I just love that BMW calls it Gong and next up we move on to another cool aspect of this interior that's in the glovebox it's the original window sticker like I mentioned this car is still owned by its original owner so he preserved this sticker and it's pretty cool you can see the competition package was only $2,500 extra in 2013 that was a bargain and it got you electronic a damper control to improve your suspension for better cornering and you've got different 19-inch wheels that allow you to stand out from the regular m3 owners one other thing I've always loved about BMW window stickers from this era is that they are printed on a picture of what appears to be a forest now if you actually back out and look at the whole sticker you can see it's a winding road through a forest but it's really more forest than road which I never entirely understood and but that's what they went with for their windows sticker picture Ian next up we move on to the backseat in this car and like I mentioned there was a four-door sedan version of the m3 from this era but this is not it and so now I must climb in to the back seat now to do that you pull on this little latch at the top of the front seat and it folds the backrest forward and then you press this button and just sort of wait and wait and wait as the seat automatically moves forward once you finally have it in this position then you can just climb on in as I will do and when you get back here what you discover is that BMW does not care about your rear passengers I say that because of the distinct lack of amenities back here you look in the center console and back and you see a little storage tray I guess for a cell phone you think well that's nice now above that there's a lid which is probably an ashtray and a cigarette lighter you open the lid and will actually no it's just another storage area well okay fine but below that Center storage tray there's another lid and surely that must be cupholders so you open the lid and discover that note just another storage tray so you have just three separate storage trays back here no cigarette lighter no cupholders you do however have a center armrest that folds down from the middle but it's not on a hinge like every other center armrest instead it's only connected with this piece of leather so it can kind of flop around and it doesn't really provide you with all that much support since it could just flop over into the next seat under hard cornering when you look at all this stuff as a total picture and becomes pretty clear that BMWs position at the time probably was if you want people in the backseat of your m3 you buy the sedan and next up we move on to the outside of the e92 m3 where there are several interesting quirks and features worth noting starting with the wheels like I mentioned before the competition models got their own special wheels that were distinct from the regular M threes of this period these are really popular wheels and a lot of regular m3 owners get a set of these to put on their m3s but they came standard on the competition cars next up another interesting item on the side here is the mirror if you look at the side mirrors you can see they have two posts that connect them to the door but if you look really closely you can see that the upper post is fake there's actually a gap there and that second post is just an effect for style so what's the reason for that why is there that little gap there on that fake second mirror post it turns out the answer is that when you go to fold in your mirrors like when you're parked you can see that in order to fold in as far as possible it has to detach from that second post and if they had actually made it have two posts that wouldn't be able to fold in quite as far and so that second post is just for style it's not actually structural holding the mirror in place and next up one other interesting exterior item I mentioned that this car has no sunroof and on the outside you can see what replaces the sunroof and that would be just a full carbon fiber roof panel if you have a sunroof that adds weight but it also raises up your center of gravity because you have a lot of mechanisms that heavy glass panel near the top of the car but this car with its carbon-fiber roof lowers the center of gravity and saves you some weight and next up one other exterior detail that I love in this car I always loved the angel eyes that's what BMW enthusiasts call these little circle headlights that look like halos or indeed angel eyes I always thought it was a really nice touch and a very distinctive uniquely BMW item that they used during this period and next up we move under the hood and there you have it there it is the v8 in the v8 m3 this is BMWs S 65 v8 like I mentioned it's a 4 liter engine with about 415 horsepower and 295 pound-feet of torque and it's amazing that they ever crammed one into an m3 now one thing I like about this car is the hood bulge but one thing I've learned doing this job is that hood bulges are almost always fake they're usually put on cars to signify that it's the high performance version but they're not actually needed well in this car it's needed if you go next to the fender you can clearly see that this v8 is so big that it sticks up past the body lines in this car the hood bulge is actually functional in order to accommodate this massive engine and I always love the fact this engine was so big BMW needed to bulge the hood in order to fit it you rarely see that these days one other cool item down here if you look on the underside of the hood itself you can see that M 3 is actually stamped into the underside of the hood on the driver's side and over on the passenger side that's how you know your car is legit when it breaks down you open up the hood you're all upset but you have a reminder that you have an m3 actually I think the benefit there is to make sure that you know that your hood is actually from an m3 and not a regular 3-series but either way it's interesting to see it there now before I move on I want to say a couple words about reliability I covered the v10 BMW m5 from this era last year and I talked about how it's probably the least reliable modern car this wasn't as bad but it wasn't great the v8 from this car has some similar issues to the v10 from the m5 including the rod bearing problem that can happen basically without warning and destroy the entire engines so it's a little nerve-racking to own this car but otherwise this cars problems were not as significant as the m5 you didn't have that clunky SMG transmission in this car because the automatic was a much more advanced dual clutch and you also didn't have that clunky old-school I Drive infotainment system the I drive in this car is far more advanced and more usable this car wasn't exactly known for being the most reliable but it's not as bad as that m5 still it wasn't great and finally we move on to the trunk of this car and when you open it up you can see that it is not even remotely slightly interesting just a trunk has normal trunk stuff about normal trunk sighs nothing quirky or special back there the only slightly interesting thing is that if you look at the top of the cargo area you have these little plastic latches you pull those and it can release the rear seats so you can fold them down and put something larger back here which is a nice little added bit of practicality but generally speaking just a trunk nothing particularly exciting or interesting and so those are the quirks and features of the e92 BMW m3 now it's time to get it out on the road and see how it drives alright driving the e92 m3 I've driven quite a few of these 92m 3s but never really one this nice on these kind of got pretty cheap and are still getting pretty cheap and so a lot of them have kind of been thrashed used hard not well-maintained this one is in really really excellent shape as these go it's important I think to explain the impact that this car had as the m3 this one 8:46 had 333 horsepower then this thing shows up with 414 it goes up by 81 now the current m4 the one that just is out of production had 425 and only went up by 10 and obviously you could get the competition more but the point is this was massive it was he went up 80 horsepower after all and then it only went up 10 horsepower that kind of shows you how big of a leap this cart oh there now the drawback of this car was and will always be its torque figure this car has 295 pound-feet of torque and it's only really accessible high up in the rev range and so you're driving around a v8 getting v8 gas mileage but you don't really get to experience v8 performance unless you're over 4,000 rpm so how does it drive well just like the e60 m5 from this era love the clutch never love with the shifter always felt a little too nachi a little too rubbery for me um this car I love the acceleration it still feels really fast impressively so does not it by any stretch of the imagination feels slow but part of that is because I'm letting it get deep deep deep up into the rev range and that's really where you start to experience the fun of this car you'll also experience the fun of this car when it comes to cornering it's really a joy to go around corners it corners flat in corners well the steering is very precise does not feel as removed or as over assisted as a modern BMW which is a big deal because the modern BMWs do have that feel and this one feels a lot more precise and a lot sharper and I really like that this car to me was the last m3 m4 whatever that had sort of that original feel you can draw the line from the e30 with each car having a consistent improvement over the original purpose to the e90 and a 92 and with the newer one it has a broader appeal it's faster very impressive car but to me this was still kind of the lightweight possible fun throw it around car it just happened to have evolved to the point where it now had a v8 it has excellent sound really really excellent now you don't get this in a modern one it's just fast and it sounds great and it's fun and yes you do have to go and get the power and that's the big difference well you know it's 4:14 the new ones for 25 but this definitely feels quite a bit slower than the new one but it also feels more engaging and it feels more exciting and it's just small enough that you can kind of throw it around and have fun with it I always really love this car and so that's the e92 bmw m3 my favourite m3 will probably always be the original one the e30 because it's just so beautifully well-balanced but this is a close second because it represents a time when BMW just kind of went crazy in a good way anyway now it's time to give the e92 m3 a dug score starting with the weekend categories and styling the e92 m3 is fine very familiar and not beautiful but good enough and it gets a 6 out of 10 acceleration does 0 to 60 in 4.1 seconds and it gets a 7 out of 10 handling is reasonably sharp good for a four-seater coupe from this era and it gets a 6 out of 10 fun factor is excellent given the sound and the performance and it gets a 7 out of 10 cool factor is lower as these are Buick witness and not really head-turning and it gets a 5 out of 10 for a total weekend score of 31 out of 50 next up are the daily categories and features this car was reasonably well equipped for its time but average now and it gets a 5 out of 10 comfort is about average and it gets a 5 out of 10 quality is mediocre the interior could be better and reliability as suspect it's fine in both areas but not great and it gets only a 5 out of 10 practicality is average for what it is and it gets a 4 out of 10 finally value and these are good values there's special cars that are not especially expensive to buy right now assuming you can afford to maintain one and it gets a 7 out of 10 for a total daily score of 26 out of 50 added up in the dug score is 57 out of 100 which places it here against rivals and other BMWs the e92 m3 stacks up well and it's a great solid car which is why it's such a common choice for people looking for luxury and performance without paying Porsche money just be sure to keep a little money aside for when it breaks which it will [Music]

Channel: Doug DeMuro

Views: 2,139,663

Rating: 4.8398137 out of 5

Keywords: bmw m3, e92 m3, bmw m3 review, e92 m3 review, e92 bmw m3, bmw m3 e92, bmw m3 e90, e90 m3, e90 m3 review, bmw m3 e90 review, doug demuro, m3 review, bmw, demuro, doug de muro

Id: fGDNzMLfSBY

Length: 24min 36sec (1476 seconds)

Published: Mon Dec 30 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/Underdogg13]

Even though the F-chassis M3-4 are beautiful, incredible cars, the E92 is just special in ways no other M3 is.

All the wonderful chassis and handling design that makes BMWs special, and a screaming V8 with a 6 speed to pull it along. It's a wonderful time piece of an era where BMW really just went "Fuck it, more cylinders!" and threw a V8 in the M3 and V10 in the M5/6.

[u/hassassinhm]

My dream car; the high-revving, naturally aspirated V8, the way it sounds, the way it drives, the way it looks. Everything about this car except for the reliability is perfect to me. Hope to own one some day.

[u/ab84fan]

Classic visceral BMW steering + V8 = pure bliss.

Unfortunately the E9X reliability record relegates this to weekend car duties, but otherwise it's the perfect BMW.

[u/shadowofashadow]

A friend of mine has a story he likes to tell about this car. His brother worked as a BMW salesman for many years and had the V8 M3 with a fully upgraded exhaust. It was fast.

He was going to sell it so my friend asked if he could take it for a drive one time to see how it was. Him and his brother get going and on a back road he's cruising in third, his brother tells him to shift down and step on it so he does and the car opens up and starts screaming just as he passes a cop who was hiding down an adjacent road. He looks in his mirror and sure enough the cherries light up and he's already so far down the road that the cop looks tiny, and for a split second he considers running but he stops and waits.

Now my friend is shitting because he got a speeding ticket earlier that day in his personal vehicle. (yeah don't ask me I've only got one in my entire life)

The cops come to him and he opens by apologizing and explaining how it was his brother's car and it was being sold that day and he just didn't realize how fast it was. He also pulled the classic "I could have run but chose to stop" line and they bought it, letting him off with a warning.

Lucky bastard.

[u/nickl630]

Owned an E46, two E92's, and now on my second F80 (CS) and I have to say as many M owners agree... while the F80 is better in every aspect I still miss the NA V8 sound and steering. This car is/will be the next "E46 BMW Fanboy" car. I hope the E60 gets the same love.. the S85 was a monster and easily the best M car I've owned.

[u/acrspeed]

The cool/hot dial is the greatest feature in any BMW. You have to experience it to understand.

[u/xtra_medium]

I just talked a friend of mine out of paying way too much for one of these that needed a “little” work which he was gonna do himself (waaaay above his pay grade.)

“Are rod bearings something that’s hard to fix?”

Dude. Just get a Jeep and bolt stuff on it if you’re desperate for a project.

[u/Bernie_Ecclestone]

The center console is split because the driver’s side can slide forward.

[u/dyonisos911]

This (with DGK and in convertible guise) was the first really fast car I drove by myself while I did an internship at a BMW dealership. This car will always have a special place in my heart.