Photo: BMW
It’s true that few people actually care about how much fuel an M3 would eat up but a lot of them care about taxes. Therefore, the ratings the Environmental Protection Agency gave the new M cars might make a difference in your budged.
The previous version, the E92 M3 Coupe, used to return, according to the EPA, around 20 mpg (11.7 l/100 km) and it was considered a gas guzzler. Therefore, the owners had to pay the $1,300 tax for them. With the new models, that’s no longer the case.
The S55 3-liter twin-turbocharged engine was rated by the EPA at 17 mpg (13.8 l/100 km) inside the city (both with the manual and 7-speed DCT gearbox) and 26 mpg (9 l/100 km) on the highway when hooked up to the automatic transmission or 24 mpg (9.8 l/100 km) when working with a manual 6-speed.
Compared to what BMW claims for the two in Europe, the discrepancies are rather big. In the EU test cycle, the Bavarians claim that the S55 engine will return 19 mpg (12 l/100 km) inside the city when fitted with the manual gearbox and 21 mpg (11.1 l/100 km) with the 7-speed DCT.
The difference is even bigger on the highway, where the M3 is rated at 34 mpg (6.9 l/100km) with the manual and 35 mpg (6.7 l/100 km) with the automatic. That gives us a combined fuel consumption of 26.7 mpg (8.8 l/100 km) with the manual and 28.3 mpg (8.3 l/100km) when you have only two pedals to play around with. Compared to the EPA’s numbers of 21.5 mpg (10.9 l/100 km) for the auto and 20.5 mpg (11.4 l/100 km) for the manual you can notice a disparity of up to nearly 20 percent.
Furthermore, the EPA ratings also destroy the claimed 25 percent fuel efficiency claimed by BMW over the naturally aspirated 4-liter V8 engine of the E9x models, as they used to return around 21 mpg (11.2 l/100 km) as well in a combined cycle, according to their measurements. Well, at least you don’t have to pay the gas guzzler tax anymore.
The S55 3-liter twin-turbocharged engine was rated by the EPA at 17 mpg (13.8 l/100 km) inside the city (both with the manual and 7-speed DCT gearbox) and 26 mpg (9 l/100 km) on the highway when hooked up to the automatic transmission or 24 mpg (9.8 l/100 km) when working with a manual 6-speed.
Compared to what BMW claims for the two in Europe, the discrepancies are rather big. In the EU test cycle, the Bavarians claim that the S55 engine will return 19 mpg (12 l/100 km) inside the city when fitted with the manual gearbox and 21 mpg (11.1 l/100 km) with the 7-speed DCT.
The difference is even bigger on the highway, where the M3 is rated at 34 mpg (6.9 l/100km) with the manual and 35 mpg (6.7 l/100 km) with the automatic. That gives us a combined fuel consumption of 26.7 mpg (8.8 l/100 km) with the manual and 28.3 mpg (8.3 l/100km) when you have only two pedals to play around with. Compared to the EPA’s numbers of 21.5 mpg (10.9 l/100 km) for the auto and 20.5 mpg (11.4 l/100 km) for the manual you can notice a disparity of up to nearly 20 percent.
Furthermore, the EPA ratings also destroy the claimed 25 percent fuel efficiency claimed by BMW over the naturally aspirated 4-liter V8 engine of the E9x models, as they used to return around 21 mpg (11.2 l/100 km) as well in a combined cycle, according to their measurements. Well, at least you don’t have to pay the gas guzzler tax anymore.
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