M140i: 1 Year of Ownership

In May of last year, I was lucky enough to take delivery of my ‘affordable dream car’. A brand new BMW M140i. Now that just of 1 year has passed, I thought I would take this chance to go over what this car has been like to live with for a year. In that time, I have covered 25,000 miles, completed a couple of laps of The Green Hell, driven to the Lake District, Cheddar Gorge and also been involved in a car crash in it…
In this little ‘review’ of sorts, I will be covering what this car is like to live with, not so much how fast it is etc. I plan to cover; Costs to run the car, Reliability/Dealership Experiences, Comfort on longer journeys, How much attention it gets and How it makes me feel, would I still recommend the car?

How much does running the car cost?

As mentioned above, I’ve managed to get 25,000 miles from 1 year of motoring… Certainly getting my moneys worth, aren’t I? Over the course of those 25 miles, I’ve seen all sorts of fuel milages, so let’s break those down first.

When running the car in, don’t expect anything over 25-28mpg. It just won’t happen, partly because of how you’re meant to ‘run it in’ and partly because the engine is still burning off varnishes, loosening up a little etc.
After the first 1200 miles or so, my fuel mileage is sat at an average of 39mpg. That includes town driving on the weekends, a few long (60 mile) motorway trips in the week and also many late night hooning sessions. I get around 350 miles per tank, at a cost of about £55 per tank (I run the premium 99 Octane fuel). Servicing has been free, thanks to a service pack, and a new front tyre thanks to a pothole cost me £155 fitted.

If you expect this car to be cheap as chips to run because it’s new, then look elsewhere as the fuel bill can be a bit of an eye opener; but at the same time, don’t let the big 3L engine put you off. If you do a lot of motorway miles, you can happily get 40-45mpg out of it.

Reliability

With a lot of new cars these days, there are some teething issues, and the M140i sadly is no exception. After about 20,000 miles the exhaust valve has started to rattle upon startup occassionally, and it had to go back to BMW for a gearbox reset (this however was caused by a crash, so we can’t really blame BMW for this).

Overall though, the exhaust rattle is a minor niggle, and BMW are working on a fix. Some have even managed to get free M-Performance exhausts out of it, so there is a silver lining of sorts. I’ve been the dealers a few times, for servicing and with my father (who also owns a BMW, which does 50k miles a year!!) and each time has been a pleasant experience where we were made to feel welcomed and very comfortable.

Safety

This is the one you hope not to find out about when you own a car… How safe is it?
Well dispite the damage looking fairly bad, considering I was hit at around 20mph, myself and my passenger walked away without any injuries. Slight pains in our necks that went away within a day, but nothing substantial. BMW recovered the vehicle within an hour, called the police and ambulance who promptly attended too, all thanks to their SOS system built into the car. I have to say, as bad as this situation was, it was nice to know that BMW were so helpful and knew exactly what to do. It was genuinly impressive.

Ride Comfort

As I mentioned earlier, I did a lap of the Nurburgring, which meant that I obviously had to drive there. The car was perfectly comfortable sat at home on the lovely smooth motorways on the continent. One moment it was happy to sit at around 80mph, the next it was even happier sitting at 160mph in Germany. We stopped once on the way there, and once on the way back for a quick ‘pitstop’, but had we not needed to use the facilities, I don’t think we would have stopped at all.

In the UK, the car falls a little short. It can be a little ‘crashy’ on the bumpy British roads, which is partly because of a hard suspension setup - as you would expect in a hot hatch of today - but also because I run with RunFlat tyres, which are harder than a brick shi…. you know the rest.

Day to day use, it is perfectly comfortable, but you may become a little tired of the harsher roads that the UK has to offer. This can be made more bearable by either speccing the adaptive suspension, or by going with a whole new setup entirely, with the Birds B1 kit, or one of the many Bilstein kits.

How much attention does it get?

Obviously, as car enthusiasts you want your car to stand out a little (unless it’s a sleeper of course), but I can’t help but feel the Civic Type R, or the A45 AMG look a little too ‘Yobbish’ for my liking. There is something nice about the cars styling being very German and understated. One moment you’re being tailgated by an Audi A3 TDI, the next it’s 1/2 mile behind you, simply because you’ve chosen to blip the throttle.

The other bonus of the car being on the understated side, is that the police don’t tend to look out for it. If it drives past a patrol car, most officers will think it’s a 116d at a glance. It also means you don’t have to worry too much about it being a ‘target’ car for the less desirable members of society.

That being said - other enthusiasts will know what to look out for, and it is nice to be approached by a fellow driver in a petrol station who compliments your car.

How it makes me feel

Although there are some things that still annoy me about the car (see my previous lists), I still get the sense of excitement every time I go out in it. I still look for excuses to drive it anywhere, and it still puts a bit smile on my face whenever I put my foot down.

If you’re in the hot hatch market, please don’t overlook this little beast. With the announcment of the next ‘hot’ 1 series being AWD and having a 4pot, this really is the last of its kind. The last of the dinosaurs, the last of the ‘proper’ hot hatches.

This content was originally posted by a Car Throttle user on our Community platform and was not commissioned or created by the CT editorial team.