Oct. 14, 2005 - M3 Sport Evolution: For the purist...
The 1990 E30 M3 Sport Evolution was the pinnacle of E30 M3 development and was produced to satisfy the FIA's demand that 500 example of an evolution had to be produced to satisfy the homologation requirements of Group A. BMW went a step better and produced 600, and I was lucky enough to own one for just over a year.
My particular example was pretty basic, it had no sunroof or air conditioning, and muscle power was required to raise and lower the windows. Just the way it should be! The most obvious differences between the standard M3 and the Sport Evo were the 2.5 litre engine and the aero package which featured adjustable splitter in the front and at the rear the wing had an adjustable flap. The high drag, high downforce setting was referred to, in the owner's manual, as "Nürburgring" and the low drag, low downforce setting, as the "Monza". I forget what they called the intermediate setting.
By today's standards, 238HP seems a bit feeble, but the car was light and it felt like a lot more, just so long as the revs were kept up. Below about 5000rpm it felt absolutely gutless, and on a few occasions, when my concentration lapsed, I found myself getting blown away by rather pedestrian diesels. Whoever specced this car didn't check the torque box! In fact the peak HP was reached at 7000rpm, which meant one really had to keep on top of things.
To be continued...
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