It’s funny how time goes by. It seems like just yesterday BMW launched the E46 3 Series model, a car that looks good even today, 16 years later!
Yes, that’s how much passed since the E46 3 Series was originally launched back in 1998. It’s pretty hard to believe, right? We remember that back then everyone was taken back by what the new car offered and how it looked like, introducing a new interior design and an appearance that would withstand the test of time with grace.
Other cars haven’t been that fortunate though and one of them was the Z3, an automobile that shared the same platform as the 3 Series but had an ‘unfortunate’ design that won it various nicknames, one more ridiculous than other.
It was also back then when a certain S54 engine used to write the book on performance driving. That unit developed by the M division was used in the E46 M3 and the Z3 M, both brilliant fun cars.
Such cars couldn’t have been missed out on by the icons of the presses back then, including the famous Richard Hammond that was just starting to gain traction back then, thanks to a TV channel called Men&Motors.
He was young, he was expressive and he actually did good work back then, talking about the actual cars and how the felt instead of just screaming and doing slow-motion drifts as the Top Gear crew does these days.
Talking about the Z3 M Coupe, Richard doesn’t fail to mention the brilliant 6-cylinder engine under the bonnet that makes ‘a lot of power’ (not by today’s standards) and the fact that it’s lighter than its M3 brother and, therefore faster. Check out his thoughts on the matter, in the video below.
Google News