S.F. Auto Show Impressions

[Scott Miller <sdmiller@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

"I'm sorry, I don't do impressions, my expertise is in the area of
psychiatry." - The court appointed, expert witness in the court case
evaluating Striker's mental state in Airplane 2, but I've digressed
already, and I've just started.

A group of us Bimmerheads in the S.F. Bay Area went to the S.F.
International Auto Show Saturday night, waiting until the last day of
the show just because all the other times and days didn't work for most
of us.  We started at the BMW exhibit (what else?), where they had an M
Roadster, an M Coupe, an M3 Convertible, a couple of E39 5 series
Tourings (a 540i and a 528i), a couple of new E46 sedans, and a couple
of big cars.

Having first decided that I could easily live with it's looks, I sat in
the M Coupe and felt right at home.  The roof, where it curves down to
the top of the door opening, seemed a bit close for helmet wearers like
me.  I'm only 5' 8" tall, and proportionately more of my height is in my
legs.  I assume the seat can be lowered somewhat, but of course the Auto
Show car had no power.  Has anyone of my proportions sat in an M Coupe
with a helmet on?  Any problems?

The M Roadster, while absolutely gorgeous, is not practical for me,
since I would have to leave it parked at the BART (local mass transit
system) station during the day, and the county jail is a mile away. 
(They release prisoners, when appropriate, and send them to BART to get
back to other parts of Alameda County.  I'm sure some of them must look
over all the cars in the lot on there way over, just to see if any are
interesting.  Soft tops seem out of place in this environment.)

Several in our group already own E36 M3s, and while looking at the M3
convertible, commented that the M3 is just too run-of-the-mill these
days.  Has it come to that?  (I'll still take mine in Estoril Blue.)

One thing we didn't like on any BMW except maybe the V12:  Under the
hood, all you see is a lot of plastic panels covering everything. 
Clean, yes, but totally uninspiring.  Last I checked, the "M" in BMW
stands for Motor, but you don't see the motor, you just see plastic
covers.  BMW needs to work on making the motors look like the fine
mechanical devices that they are.  (At the opposite end of the spectrum
are the Nissans and Infinities, where you see all kinds of exposed
hoses, cables, tubing, wires, and maybe somewhere in there is an engine
attached to all that stuff.)

The new Jaguars are beautiful.  Ferraris are, well, Ferraris.  Their
display included a 1980 F1 car, but no F40 or F50 or F anything. 
Porsche had 2 each Carrera Coupes, Carrera Cabrios and Boxters.  The
Boxters optioned out at over $50K.  At the Mercedes display, an SLK was
rigged to run about once a minute through it's top up / top down
routine.  That was quite an engineering feat to figure out how to
automate that whole process, where the trunk lid opens at the front
edge, the top folds over in the middle, and all kinds of panels and
covers open, fold, and the re-close.  But, quite frankly, the top was
the most interesting part of the whole car.  Oh, a Mercedes V6 engine (I
think that's where we saw this) had an electrical device mounted on top
at the front of the engine.  We couldn't figure out what it was, but
maybe Mark K. has struck a deal with Mercedes?  Just a guess...

The Mazda RX7 and Nissan 300ZX are gone.  The closest thing to a really
fun car from Japan would seem to be the Acura NSX, and the price is up
to...  well, we couldn't actually read it from a distance, and the car
was roped off.  But I'd bet it's around $80K.  From the U.S, there's the
Corvette.  OK, maybe also the Viper, if you're into that kind of thing. 
Nothing else from the U.S. or Japan really interested our little group.

So, in a price range where I might eventually, some day, be able to
afford one, the only cars worth considering are, pretty much, Bimmers! 
My faith is confirmed, guess I joined the right club.

OK, enough Auto Show reporting, back to this week's flame wars and
wob's.

Scott Miller
Golden Gate Chapter
BMW CCA #44977

------------------------------