Still the benchmark after all these years.
Driving Impressions
BMW's 3 Series has always been about the driving. It has many of the attributes of a sports car with the practicality of a sedan. It offers rear-wheel drive and manual transmissions in a class increasingly dominated by front-wheel drive and automatics. Driving has never been much better than the 3 Series, or at least not with seating for five, decent mileage and a high level of all-season comfort.
BMW's x-Drive permanent all-wheel-drive system greatly enhances all-season capability, not a traditional strength of these cars. The x-Drive delivers most of the power to the rear wheels most of the time, maintaining the sporting feel associated with rear-wheel drive.
The 2007 3 Series sedans are true to their predecessors, with a couple of caveats, in our view. The typical BMW buyer will likely appreciate the technology built into the new 3, and particularly the electronic skid-control wizardry. Enthusiasts, however, may pine that the 3 Series' purity has been lost.
The heart of any BMW is its engine, and those in the new 3 Series are first rate. They remain true to BMW's commitment to straight or inline six-cylinders, as other manufacturers have switched almost exclusively to V6s. The straight six presents more packaging challenges, but its unique performance characteristics and smoothness make it a favorite among enthusiast drivers.
In both the 328i and 335i sedans, the engine is fantastic. No one will feel short-changed on performance if they make the more economical choice of the 328i. Either engine delivers quick acceleration by any standard: 0-60 mph times of 6.3 seconds for the 328i and 5.4 seconds for the 335i when equipped with manual transmissions, according to BMW.
We found the 328i fun to drive, with good throttle response that made us feel a class above other cars in traffic. Our bright red 328i sedan had the manual, which was smooth and precise, easy and enjoyable to flick between gears. It was also quick and easy shifting from first to reverse and back when parking. Clutch pedal effort made taking off easy, without having to think about it. Shifting was so easy that the clutch didn't need to be fully depressed.
The 335i is, however, particularly enjoyable, with an engine that's stronger than any 3 Series engine before, short of the limited production M3s. What's best is its linear quality, or the steady supply of acceleration-producing torque at any speed. There's more torque down low than before, but the new engine pulls like a sprinter all the way to its 6800-rpm redline and never misses a step. Moreover, the joy of a straight six isn't hidden under the high tech. It sounds great, with an emphasis on clean mechanical noise from the engine bay rather than the tone of the muffler.
The manual transmission is great, too. The shifter seems to have slightly shorter throws between the gears than before, and its operation is appropriate to a world-class sports sedan. The sixth gear adds even more flexibility to the 335i's power band and lowers engine revs at cruising speeds.
The automatic we liked a bit less, but it's hardly disappointing. With six speeds, the same advantages apply here as with the manual. The automatic can be a bit slow to react with an appropriate gear change in Normal mode, but leaving it Sport mode pretty much solves the problem, with a slight payback in more abrupt shifting. Then there is the Steptronic manual mode, which allows manual gear selection by toggling the shift lever to the left. No problem with shift response when you do it yourself.
The other half of the 3 Series equation has always been ride and handling. This is the prototypical sports sedan, or about as close as you can get to sports car driving dynamics in a practical sedan. For 40 years, the 3 Series had defined that mix: rear-wheel drive, great steering feel and balance between the front and rear axles. Moreover, the 3 had always delivered an impressive balance between ride and handling. The fun never comes at the expense of beating up the passengers inside.
The 328i and 335i sedans ultimately hold true to this heritage, as we first discovered on a slick race track in rural Spain. The perfect balance front to rear, the right touch of suspension compliance, the smooth torque delivery is all there, and for the better part of an afternoon we clipped apexes and managed power slides and just had a ball. We had to turn off all the gizmos to do it, however.
The 3 Series suspension layout is borrowed from the larger 5 Series sedan, with double-joint aluminum control arms in front and a five-link fully independent system in the rear. This is trick stuff, but it's nothing compared to the electronics that manage everything. The 3 has BMW's most advanced Dynamic Stability Control chassis electronics yet, with more sensors measuring more things than ever before. It also more aggressively integrates BMW's Active Steering into the skid-control scheme.
Active Steering is designed to eliminate the compromises inherent in conventional fixed-ratio rack-and-pinion steering. Active Steering speeds the steering up to reduce steering input, or sawing on the wheel, at low speeds, and slows it down at high speeds so a sneeze or twitch doesn't dramatically turn the wheels and send the car drifting toward a concrete abutment. BMW's active system has an electrically operated transmission on the steering shaft. It reduces steering wheel movement from three turns lock-to-lock in the old 3 Series sedan to 1.66 turns in the new one.
But there's more to the active steering story. The motor that varies the steering ratio is wired into DSC, which measures a bunch of things, including road speed, wheel rotational speed, steering angle, yaw rate and lateral acceleration, as it thinks about what it should do. If something is amiss, say if DSC senses that a particular wheel is losing traction, it will react by applying the brake at that wheel or reducing engine power in an effort to keep the car going in the intended direction. With Active Steering in the new 3 Series, DSC also can change the steering angle. Not only does it make it easier to park at Macy's or help manage the risks of an arm twitch at autobahn speed. It also helps drive the car by making fairly significant steering corrections without driver input, or even driver awareness, or perceptible feedback on the steering wheel.
All that understood, we still would noautomatic: With fob in pocket, the doors unlock automatically as the driver approaches, and the seats are waiting in their proper position. The driver just pushes the start button, and pushes it again when it's time to get out. These systems are not our favorite feature and sometimes seem like the answer to a question no one is asking.
Seats have long been 3 Series strength, and the new ones are better than ever. Even the standard-trim front buckets provide excellent support without feeling too hard. The manual adjustments work great, though we recommend using them when the car is parked. The 335i gets power adjustments with three memory positions and they are coded to the key. The power seats that come with the Sport Package are outstanding. Additional back and bottom bolstering make them a bit harder to slide into, but we'd rather have them during a spirited drive.
The instrument panels have a pronounced horizontal format, with more community and less driver orientation than before. There are actually two: The standard setup has a single bubble, or hood, over the instrument cluster, while the optional navigation system has a dash that accommodates the system with a second hood.
The front door panels are different on each side, as well. The passenger side has a sdered slamming on the brakes. The pads also lightly sweep the rotors every few seconds if it's raining, just to be sure there is no significant moisture build up.
Bottom line, the 3 Series sedans are great performers, impressive cars and technological tours de force. If price is remotely an issue, don't have a second thought about choosing the 328i. It has as much power as most drivers will ever need, and it delivers the same inherent goodness as the 335i, without much less really useful stuff. Indeed, we wouldn't recommend options such as Active Steering or Active Cruise Control except to die-hard fanatics for the latest technology.
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