BMWs aren’t supposed to be affordable. It is a luxury brand, after all. However, prices have crept up over the last few decades, rendering the cars unobtanium for the younger crowd. The cheapest model available in the United States starts at $40,000 for the 2 Series Gran Coupe. At home in Germany, even a 1 Series with a puny three-cylinder engine costs from €33,600. The alternative? Buying used, like an E46 or an even older E30.
But what if Munich were to address the lack of a cheap model instead of redirecting customers to MINI? Enter the BMW Outlaw, a hypothetical entry-level car centered around keeping production costs to a minimum. It even has a very unofficial internal codename: E27. BMWBLOG fan Hakan Atasalan sent us his renderings of a virtual concept that would ideally cost as little as €20,000.
While studying at the Munich University of Applied Sciences, he worked on his bachelor’s thesis at the BMW Research and Innovation Center (FIZ) in Munich. After spending time alongside professionals in the Advanced Design department, he picked up a thing or two about how today’s cars are developed. Lessons learned within BMW helped him draw the Outlaw with an emphasis on slashing costs wherever possible.
For example, both front and rear bumpers share identical geometry, making them interchangeable. The headlights and taillights have the exact same shape and size. Additionally, the front kidneys also double as exhaust outlets at the back. The doors are also identical, made possible by moving the hinges to the front and rotating them 180 degrees on the passenger side. That’s why the imaginary E27 has a suicide door on the right side.
BMW itself considered a similar approach, although not nearly as extreme, during the 1990s. Remember the 3 Series Compact (E36/5)? It was followed by the E46/5 generation in the early 2000s. Even though these cars didn’t achieve the commercial success Bavaria had hoped for, BMW launched the 1 Series in 2004, a decade after it pulled the plug on the Compact. There was even a 1 Series Sedan in a few markets before BMW decided to focus solely on the 2 Series Gran Coupe as its base sedan.
Of course, Outlaw is all a pipe dream, but such an interesting idea nonetheless. In today’s regulation-obsessed car industry, it’s a real struggle to engineer an affordable car and still make money on it. Having to pass safety, emissions, and noise regulations is a never-ending process, further complicated by rising costs in securing raw materials and parts.
A back-to-basics BMW won’t ever happen again. It’s safe to say the era of simple cars is well and truly over.
[Photos & Information by Hakan Atasalan @hkn.atsln]