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Originally Posted by landcruiser123 Great ownership review and amazing pictures as well. Love your writing style; Wish you many miles of smiles and looking forward to a ride in this menacing machine someday. |
Thanks for your wishes and glad you liked the pictures. My style of writing is informal. I leave formality for professional purposes...LOL
You can get a ride in this menacing machine on June 19th. Clocking is ticking so join up !
4000 Miles Update
Been an amazing journey now for about 4.5 months and completed 4200 Miles (6600kms) which is a bit low by my standard as like everyone else my driving has reduced drastically due to Pandemic. Also, it’s rarely I drive from Monday-Thursday.
Friday, All hell breaks loose and I enjoy driving over the weekend for long durations.
I love being in outdoors and travel quite a bit (official/personal) and enjoy visiting new places. We are literally going somewhere every weekend (Pandemic or No Pandemic) as nature and outdoors brings that much needed peace that’s needed to remain calm from all the maddening work pressures.
We were looking forward to our first official holiday in 2021 (Memorial Day-May 31st) so planned a road trip to Upper Michigan which happens to be now my most favorite place in US.
We booked an Airbnb and could have driven directly to that location but, nope I planned to take a detour and drive west and then north along the famous Michigan SR 22 which goes along the coast of Lake Michigan for 120 miles. It was a gorgeous and beautiful drive stopping at quaint little towns, enjoying local food and sinking in the outstanding beauty of nature.
We spent 3 glorious days at Lake Walloon (where we stayed) visited some of the popular vacation and honeymoon destinations of Michigan which are 10-50 miles in distance from Lake Walloon, namely :
Petoskey, Michigan
Charlevoix, Michigan
Elke Rapids, Michigan
Harbor Springs, Michigan
Torch Lake, Michigan
After a long time, we enjoyed such beautiful scenery and was a memorable road trip of 950 miles.
After completing 4000 miles with my Bimmer, I’m slowly but, steadily getting to know her better and thought of sharing a revised
“ What is good & What can be improved”. What is Good
1. Driving this car has changed my perspective of how cars should be. I’m totally in love with entire experience which I never felt for any of cars that I owned previously especially the need to find an excuse to drive it (I used to have similar feeling for motorcycles but, never for cars). I’m now what they call “ Bimmer for Life” and that too only M-Performance.
2. Convenience features is helpful like Gesture Control, HUD Experience, Turning Lights and BMW Navigation and since I have an entire Apple ecosystem, everything works seamless with BMW as Apple have a special relationship with BMW. In fact, Apple is working on nice feature of keyless entry for BMW’s by using Apple Wallet (Coming later in the year).
3. Well, people might snicker but, I like to check my car’s fuel average for “every tankful” and that has been a practice for all 11-12 brand new cars that I owned till date. I am amazed at how good FE is for this car. Btw, all of this on 93 Octane liquid gold.
Sports/Sports + : 18mpg-20mpg ( 4.8kmpl-5.5kmpl)
Comfort Mode : 22-24mpg ( 6kmpl-6.5kmpl)
Ecopro : 29mpg (8kmpl)
4. Power is so addictive that it’s difficult to drive in any other mode other than Comfort and Sports. Sports + is quite extreme for day to day as the accelerator pedal literally has no play and the car lunges forward with an urgency even with feather touch of the foot. Ecopro works wonder not just on fuel average but, overall transformation of a relaxed feel which is needed for long highway drives
5. Handling and Steering wheel is razor sharp and supreme for a SAV. And, this does not feel like driving a SUV at all. It’s light as there is literally no body roll for your day to day driving experience, It is compact, extremely agile and darts across lanes and takes corners like a sedan (and, I have thrown it in corners in some unmentionable speeds and happy with confidence it exudes in such situations).
6. Current 19” wheels don’t fill the wheel wells completely but, are perfect for X3 as I drove the 20” version recently and ride quality was quite harsh. So it’s looks vs. comfort preference.
7. For a compact SAV, there is plenty of space inside and good for 5 adults (we experienced that some weeks ago when my sister’s family visited us).
8. Boot space is comparable to larger sized SAV’s. Happy with space available (and, that fancy trick to open the boot work flawlessly).
What can be improved
1. Moonroof does not open completely until the edge which is bit of a disappointment.
2. It’s not really comfortable for long drives (>300 Miles) for my size (6ft. 1in) primary due to the Seat’s side bolsters which curve upwards and pinch into my thighs and I need to keep adjusting to find a comfortable position. This is the only sore point of my experience. Any way around this situation other than losing weight?
3. Paddle Shifters as well as the turning signal stalks are the only standing out quality
(negatively) features from a luxurious and well appointed interior.
4. I got to know through Bimmer forums-I opted for Carbon Fiber. But, BMW gave my car with piano finish near gear selector console. It should have been Carbon Fiber. They are doing this for many new cars as they are short of that part. I need to visit a local BMW dealership and get that changed. Piano black finish near gear selector attracts lot of dust.
Well, that’s what comes to mind for now. Will keep updating as I grow older with this gorgeous machine
Here are some pictures in no particular order of our Memorial Day trip to Upper Michigan
![2021 BMW X3 M40i - My "Blau Rakete" completes 39,000 miles / 62,500 km in 3.5 Years of ownership-img_8970.jpg](https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/attachments/test-drives-initial-ownership-reports/2166639d1688076188t-2021-bmw-x3-m40i-my-blau-rakete-completes-39-000-miles-62-500-km-3-5-years-ownership-img_8970.jpg)