CROSS-OVER Will BMW have a winner in the X6?

By Lionel Kong

BMW HAS ANNOUNCED that it will launch its X6 Series in the middle of 2008. The X6 Concept was first unveiled during the 2007 Frankfurt Motor Show and is what BMW calls a ‘Sports Activity Coupe’.

Now, we’re all quite used to the fact that traditional SUVs are built high, tough and rugged to cope with all manner of rough terrain, while coupes are built low, sleek and light for maximum aerodynamic performance and speed. Their designs are very much mutually exclusive.

Still, that didn’t stop BMW from combining the two. The result is the X6, a car that looks somewhat like an X5 with the roofline of a 6 Series. BMW claims that the X6 offers owners the safety and convenience of a commanding driving position with the on-road performance of a sports car, wrapped in the svelte lines of a coupe.

But the fact is it’s hard to get a vehicle that is as big as a small house to look suitably svelte.

Besides the car’s appearance, the other interesting bits about the X6 Series will be the engines. There will be two petrol-powered variants, beginning with the X6 xDrive35i (yes, that is the official name of the car), which is powered by the 3.0-litre, turbocharged in-line six-cylinder engine currently found in the 135i and 335i. It produces 306bhp at 5,800rpm, which will take the four-wheel drive X6 xDrive35i from 0 to 100km/h in just 6.7 seconds.

Next up the line is the X6 xDrive50i. It gets a twin-turbo V8 engine. The 4.4-litre unit will be BMW’s most powerful production V8 to date, producing 404bhp and an earth-shattering 600Nm of torque, good enough to propel the gigantic X6 xDrive50i from 0 to 100km/h in a very quick 5.4 seconds. Top speed is electronically limited to 250km/h.

The BMW engineers managed to fit the large turbocharged V8 engine into the car’s engine compartment through some clever packaging: both turbos and the catalytic converter reside with the vee of the engine, reducing the engine’s overall size and allowing the car’s front double wishbone suspension to work unhindered.

Both the X6 xDrive35i and the X6 xDrive50i will come packed to the gills with BMW’s electronic driver aids including the xDrive four-wheel drive system Dynamic Stability Control+, as well as the new Dynamic Performance Control.

Dynamic Performance Control works on the rear wheels of the car to optimise traction through corners. But rather than braking the inside wheel like almost all other traction-control systems do today, it applies power to the outside wheel to push the car out of the corner.

Both the petrol-powered X6 cars will be heavy drinkers though, with the X6 xDrive50i returning just 8km per litre on the combined cycle and the X6 xDrive35i managing 9.1km per litre. Oh, and the X6 has room only for four people.

The car is likely to arrive in Singapore towards the end of 2008.

Without a smaller petrol engine in the line-up, the X6 is likely to be quite pricey and looks to be geared towards older, more upmarket audiences rather than aspiring executives with young families looking for a sporty lifestyle vehicle.

But if you’re rich enough to afford an X6, you’re probably rich enough to buy a real SUV and a real coupe each anyway rather than a big, mixed-up and confused-looking crossover vehicle.