1991 BMW Z1 2.7 Special

Summary:

Sensational looks - a delight

Faults:

Nothing.

General Comments:

This was an experimental car for BMW. The body was made from various plastics. Several different aerodynamics ideas were built into the car to see what they would be like.

The best bit was the doors - they slide down into the bodywork. It could then be driven with the doors down, very good fun in town and made it feel like a Caterham (from a wind perspective anyway) on the open road.

The car is also beautiful. It is also rare, so not many people know what they are looking at and are very curious (thanks to all the tailgaters...).

This one was a Hartge special, the engine was bored out to 2.7 and tuned to 210 bhp from 170. So, performance, while not fantastic was quick enough to be fun - and about 25 mpg as an average was OK.

It did handle very well - it was a test bed for the BMW z-axle - and at about 100mph it would settle onto the road just that little bit more and felt very stable indeed.

Don't buy one if you don't like attention though, everywhere I went people wanted to talk about it. Driving through parts of London where Ferrari's and Aston's were more common than Fiesta's still attracted a lot of attention.

The standard 2.5 is could probably be a bit frustrating as it doesn't go as fast as its looks suggest, but the 2.7 - well it was a dream car.

I would have kept it - if I hadn't written it off...

...I feel like a murderer now...

Would you buy another car from this manufacturer? Yes

Review Date: 25th March, 2009