The BMW Z1 was the first of the Z series. It came with unique sliding doors and removable plastic body panels in the 1990s, and it came at the right time. It was the year Mazda rolled out the MX-5 Miata. BMW only produced 8,000 examples between 1989 and 1991. And we have one in metallic green right here.
This 1991 BMW Z1 comes with quite a story. It mostly just sat in the parking lot of a dealership since new until 2021. 30 years in the possession of the dealership, despite its fun-to-drive tag, it only clocked little over 9,000 kilometers (around 5,600 miles).
It was 1985 when the BMW board of directors decided to greenlight the Z1 project, where the Z stood for 'Zukunft,' which is German for 'future.'
It was a car with a unique design: a genuine roadster with doors sliding vertically into the door sills and plastic body panels. Instead of the usual car door design, lead designer Ham Lagaay went for the solution of sliding them into the high door sills, thus enabling driving without the doors necessarily going up. No roadster of the era (or any era, for that matter!) had anything like those.
The windows can be operated independently of the doors. But they do retract automatically once the door is lowered.
Photo: Car and Classic
The BMW Z1 also came with removable plastic body panels built upon a rigid steel monocoque. The side panels and doors are made of Xenoy thermoplastic. Meanwhile, the hood, boot lid, and roof cover are GRP components supplied by Seger + Hoffman AG.
During the launch of the Z1, which took place in March 1987 at the Frankfurt Motor Show, the BMW representatives suggested that owners should buy an additional set of body panels of a different color and change the color of their car every once in a while. Six body paint options were available for the Z, with red being the most common.
The body panels swap would take approximately 40 minutes, they said. But owners who tried the switch claimed that the BMW representatives were overly optimistic. The Z1 roadster could actually be driven with all body panels removed. That was the ultimate top-down, doors-down, all-body-panels-down driving experience.
It is the case for this 1991 BMW Z1 as well. As previously mentioned, it has been in the possession of a dealership in La Spezia, Italy, for over 30 years. Italy was actually the second market for the Z1 after Germany, yet with only 7% of the 8,000 units produced at the Munich plant, all with left-hand drive.
The Z1 that we have here only drove for 9,342 kilometers, which is the equivalent of 5,805 miles, since 1991, the year it drove through the factory gate. Everything on the car is original. Just so you get an idea of how everything was preserved, keep in mind that it still wears the original Pirelli tires, wrapping the 15-inch wheels. The slam-massive-wheels-on-your-sports-car trend was nowhere in sight back then.
The model is painted in metallic green, but some of the thermoplastic / GRP bodywork displays cracks every here and there, and they need to be fixed. There are also minor scratches on the body.
Yet the good news is that the steel monocoque is free from corrosion since the Z1 spent most of its life indoors. The roof operates correctly as well, and the doors slide in and out of the sills with no hiccups.
The model sports a camouflage-effect seat upholstery. There are no modifications in sight, and there is minimal wear on board the 32-year old car that is far from showing its age. A period-correct radio and all the switches and buttons in there work correctly.
The car is powered by a 2.5-liter straight-six petrol engine, the only option available for the Z1 at the time. It generates 168 horsepower (170 metric horsepower) and 164 lb-ft (222 Nm) of torque, all steered to the rear axle via a Getrag-sourced five-speed manual gearbox transplanted from the E30 325i.
BMW had to come up with a solution to be able to use the low hood line: the engine sits tilted at 20 degrees to the right.
In 2023, the engine of the 1991 BMW, as well as all the mechanics, work perfectly, the owner claims, and there are no noises that shouldn't normally be there.
The BMW Z1 was bought by the current owner in 2021, and it is again for sale in an auction on Car and Classic, with just one day left and four bids placed so far. The model comes with the original manual and service booklet and with the Italian registration documentation.
Back in late 1980s, when BMW unveiled the roadster, they originally came up with a price of 80,000 Deutsche Marks. But by the time it hit the market, the model was DM 83,000. The last BMW Z1 rolled off the assembly line in Munich in June 1991. But a second-generation Z, the Z3, only entered production five years later.
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