The poet—Tennyson, actually—wrote "in the Spring a young man's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love. That may be well and true, unless the young man in question is a BMW engineer, and then his fancy turns pretty heavily to thoughts of Spring model upgrades. Recently, BMW gave us a preview of what changes we might expect in its lineup in a few months.
When it was launched last year, the G11/G12 7 Series Sedan was not only the marque's luxury flagship, but also a rolling showpiece for connectivity, driver assistance, and anything else electronic that BMW had developed to make driving easier, safer, and more comfortable. This Spring, it will be obvious that 7 Series BMWs will be even closer to autonomous driving, with standard and optional features such as Lane Departure Assistant, ActiveAssist Collision Avoidance, Cross-Traffic and Wrong-Way Driving Alert, and the Remote 3D View function.
The Steering and Lane Guidance Assistant can work with the Lane Change Assistant, which, on divided highways, can change lanes with the tap of a turn signal between 42 and 112 miles per hour. The ActiveAssist Collision Avoidance system comes on line when an obstacle requires a rapid lane change, even at speed up to 100 mph. The Cross Traffic Alert function tells the driver with visual and audio alerts if he or she has not noticed that a road with the right of way is coming up. The car may also inform the driver if the car finds itself traveling the wrong way on a one-way street or roundabout or freeway entrances.
Remote 3D View sends three-dimensional live images of the vehicle and its surroundings to the driver's smartphone via BMW Connected.
Starting in March 2017, the 3 Series Sedan and 4 Series Coupe can get the optional Multifunctional instrument display. The fully digital TFT color display uses black panel technology and displays variable driving-related information. The color scheme, graphic representation and choice of contents depend on the driving mode selected with the Driving Experience Control button. This is similar to the personality change that the instrument display on the BMW i8 undergoes when changing from Comfort to Sport mode.
Real Time Traffic Information is nice, but getting to your destination by the quickest route may not guarantee you a parking spot. On-Street Parking is a new BMW feature that networks with navigation Pro, RTTI, and pre-stored data to predict where you might find free, on-street parking and displays it on the nav screen. Unfortunately, unless you are in one of ten German cities, it won't do you much good, but it does portend the future for the rest of us, eventually.
Navigation system Professional displays are going to come with animated buttons arranged as tiles. This feature debuted in the new G30 5 Series but will trickle down—or up—to the 7 Series and 6 Series as well. Probably all nav Pro BMWs will have it before long.
Starting in the spring of 2017, the BMW 6 Series Coupes, Convertibles, and Gran Coupes will have a new paint option: Sonic Speed Blue metallic. If the car has the M Sports package, then it can also get new 20-inch, M two-tone light alloy wheels with an M-specific double spoke design.
Charging your BMW i and iPerformance vehicles will get more efficient if you can utilize the new Digital Charging Service for intelligent charging of the vehicle's high-voltage battery. It helps the owner make use of favorable electricity rates or a proportion of self-generated solar energy during the charging process. The system takes into account any available dynamically varying prices throughout the day, including predetermined high and low prices so that your i or iPerformance car is charged at the lowest rates, if that's what you choose.
When used with the new BMW i Wallbox Connect, the Digital Charging Service can optimize electricity from your solar array, should you have one. The system is smart enough to predict the amount of locally generated solar electricity based on past performance data and the current weather forecast. It can figure when your home's use of the solar power is lowest and charge your vehicle at that time.
Starting this Spring, the BMW X5 M and BMW X6 M will get the navigation package ConnectedDrive as standard equipment, including telephony with wireless charging. Options will include the navigation system Professional, a smartphone holder that supports inductive mobile phone charging, Real Time Traffic Information including On-Street Parking Information, a WiFi hotspot, ConnectedDrive Services, Concierge Services, and Remote Services.
Also for the first time on the regular X5 and X6, 21-inch light alloy wheels previously only available exclusively from the Original BMW Accessory range can be ordered with the vehicle. The M light alloy wheels have a double spoke design and two-tone look with burnished spokes come with mixed tires. These will be available in conjunction with the M Sports Package for all model variants with the exception of the BMW X5 sDrive25d, BMW X5 xDrive25d, and the BMW X5 xDrive40e iPerformance. You may have noticed that two of these exclusions are not available in the U.S. anyway.
Unfortunately, especially with the price of diesel fuel well under that of premium unleaded gasoline, the U.S. market will not see the most efficient G30 5 Series that will be available this spring. The BMW 520d Efficient Dynamics Edition will boast a combined fuel consumption of 60 miles per gallon. Now that's based on European testing and in all probability, its actual real-world miles per gallon figure would be less than that, but it would still be the most efficient 5 Series ever. Economy comes at a performance price. The 520d is powered by a four-cylinder, two-liter BMW TwinPower turbocharged diesel engine that delivers 190 horsepower and 295 pound-feet of torque. That will take the 520d from zero to 62 miles per hour in 7.5 seconds. If 190 horsepower doesn't sound like much, recall that it was not that long ago when E39 5 Series came with six-cylinder M52 engines that produced 190 horsepower and only 210 pound-feet of torque, and we thought that wasn't bad at all.
Some of the features described above will only be available in other markets, like On-Street Parking and the BMW 520d. Other features may start in Europe and eventually work their way into U.S.-bound cars, so look at the standard and optional equipment lists closely and as always, don't make any assumptions unless you see it in writing when you order your new BMW.—Scott Blazey
[Photos courtesy of BMW AG.]
