BMW M4 concept revealed

When you’re on a winning formula, don’t change it. With the Concept M4 Coupe, BMW has given its biggest hint yet that the visual formula for its M4 production car won’t be lost in the transition from the M3.

While BMW hasn’t given any details of the mechanical package of the M4, the hottest rumour in town has the engine bay of the Concept M4 Coupe being filled by a twin-turbo 3.0-litre six-cylinder engine instead of the current V8.

BMW sources have confirmed the M3’s replacement, the very first M4, will be have tremendous torque to flesh out its 300-315kW power delivery, but BMW is officially refusing to comment.

Instead, the Bavarian company will use California’s Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance to show the Concept M4 Coupe, essentially a thinly veiled production car.

BMW usually puts the ‘Concept’ moniker on its upcoming models when they’re around six months from an official unveiling, so expect the production M4 to arrive somewhere between the Detroit motor show in January and the Geneva show in March next year.

M division chairman, Dr Friedrich Nitschke, insists the Concept M4 Coupe reflects M’s combination of racing genes and everyday drivability in a “highly emotional overall concept”.

“For four generations, the BMW M3 has put motor racing on the road and the BMW Concept M4 Coupe consistently continues to pursue this idea,” he said.

“The new model designation ‘M4’ refers – like all other BMW M automobiles – to the series on which this concept car is based.”

The production car most closely aligned to the Concept M4 Coupe is the recently released 435i coupe, which is powered by BMW’s classic 225kW in-line six-cylinder engine and the lowest roll centre in the entire BMW model range.

The Concept M4 Coupe sits even lower again, resting its custom-prepared Aurum Dust paintwork on a mean, lean bodyshell that takes the 435i’s core architecture and makes it faster and visibly angrier.

It should be lighter than the 435i, too, though BMW refuses to put a weight figure on a car that it (cough, cough) calls a design study.

Instead, it promises lower weight through a carbon-fibre roof (a la the E46 M3 CSL), a carbon-fibre rear diffuser and a carbon-fibre front splitter.

Visually, it carries the signature four round LED daytime running lights of the 435i, but the collection of vanes, fins and intakes built into the front bumper moulding leave the concept car with a promise of sophisticated aerodynamics.

There is an enormous air intake below the classic BMW double kidney grille. The large horizontal opening doubles as both the air intake for the engine and the main radiator cooling duct. With BMW extolling its variable intake cleverness recently, you can expect that intake’s opening to be electronically managed by a pair of louvered vanes depending on the cooling demands from the engine.

The two wider openings in the bottom half of the bumper also serve a double purpose; simultaneously feeding the intercoolers for the production car’s twin turbochargers and feeding cooling air into the front brakes.

While BMW refuses to confirm it, the production M4 will get most of this design, though the air intakes will have to cool the seven-speed dual-clutch transmission (or the optional six-speed manual) as well.

Still rear-wheel drive, the production M4 will also be offered as a convertible with a folding hard-top roof, but that won’t break cover until at least a year after the M4 Coupe reaches production.

The front bumper’s carbon-fibre front splitter works to reduce aerodynamic lift over the front axle, while each of the side intakes also sport small vanes for added downforce, in an idea pioneered by Ferrari’s 458 Italia.

That’s not the end of the aero fiddles from the front, though, because small vertical slots on the outside of the lower bumper area feed air into the Air Curtain, which smooths the airflow around the front wheels.

The Air Curtain comes from the same batch of aero components as the Air Breather along the Concept M4 Coupe’s front quarter panel, which extracts hot air from the engine bay and directs it precisely along the side of the car.

The light-weight aluminium bonnet boasts the same signature power bulge as the outgoing M3 Coupe, though with greater reason (housing a taller engine) than in the M3.

“At M, design is above all an expression of function,” said BMW Group Design head, Adrian van Hooydonk.

“Each design element is based on the underlying technical demands of the M high performance concept.

“Thanks to this authenticity, the design provides a taste of what can be experienced with each model: an unforgettable driving experience on the racetrack as well as on the road,” he claimed.

Van Hooydonk’s team has taken the low, sleek, beautifully proportioned 435i profile and made it even lower, even if its power bulge stands proud of the bonnet where the full-line production 435i shares the standard 3 Series bonnet.

The Concept M4 Coupe wears more muscular wheel-arches than the standard coupe, while BMW has left a clear coat on the carbon-fibre (CFRP) roof to add a technical element to the car’s look, while helping lower the car’s centre of gravity even further.

While production models are sure to offer a larger optional lip spoiler, BMW has left the rear-end of the Concept M4 Coupe relatively unadorned, with just a tiny lip spoiler interrupting the clean proportions.

The car rides on custom-built 20-inch alloy wheels with a double-spoke design, while two pairs of carbon-fibre exhaust outlets flank the diffuser tasked with cleaning up the airflow from beneath the car. (Yes, like Porsche’s 911 designers, BMW is trying to convince people that a six-cylinder engine needs four exhaust outlets.)

The 435i’s widest point is at its rear wheel-arches and the Concept M4 Coupe takes that muscular stance and enhances it, delivering an even broader rear-end.