Cabo San Lucas, Mexico – To launch the tertiary-generation vi Serial Convertible, BMW chose Mexico'southward about luxurious and famous resort town: Cabo San Lucas. Cabo is a city at the southern tip of the Baja California peninsula, known for the sandy beaches, world-class scuba diving locations, glamorous life and high-class resorts. In a nutshell, the kind of habitat where the new BMW 650i Convertible would feel at home.

But Cabo is simply an oasis of luxury in the heart of a world where poverty, livestock and unexpected speed bumps contrast heavily with the luxurious prototype of the new 6er. Despite all of these apparent shortcomings, truth is that this area offers a variety of amazing scenery and twisty roads, combined with plenty of straight lines where the car can be pushed to its limits. And y'all tin certainly bet on the fact that we took the new 650i Convertible to its limits.

To explore the newly redesigned, highly highly-seasoned and re-engineered 2012 half dozen Series Convertible, we fix upon a 6-hr course that took us from Cabo to La Paz and dorsum. From the many color choices laid out in front of our eyes, we picked a beautiful and classy Black Sapphire 650i with Cinnamon Brown Nappa Leather and optional contrast stitching, and a black acme.

2012 bmw 650i convertible test drive 19 655x412 Before we leap into the driving feel, allow's take a pace back and ascertain the demographic for this car, along with the new design linguistic communication. Based on BMW's enquiry, the typical U.S. buyer of a 6 Serial Convertible is in their l'due south, predominately female and living mostly in sunny and warm states. Furthermore, same market research says this is their third or fourth car sitting currently in the garage. To cater to such customers, BMW had to focus first and foremost on style and luxury.

Styled by Nader Faghihzadeh, the 2012 650i Convertible has the allure of an athlete, combined with svelteness and archetype looks. The typical long sweeping hood and short overhangs are surrounded by a muscular profile. The aforementioned BMW designer says he found inspiration in the move of waves as the shark nose pierces the h2o. The curved surfaces of the trunk give the car a sporty allure as well, with character lines running from the front end to the rear-end, harmoniously combining some of the cues in the new BMW pattern language. Thankfully, the 6 Series shark nose is still there and a first for 6 Series are the full LED headlights. The kidney grilles are lower and wider on the 6er and the vertical grille slats break backwards two thirds of the way up in the grille opening.

BMW 6 series Cabos 091 655x438

BMW says the 2012 650i Convertible and Coupe are at core two different vehicles. Contrary to expectations, BMW did not simply remove the Coupe's top and replaced information technology with a soft retractable top, merely rather the 2 high-terminate half dozen Series models were engineered separately. The new 650i Convertible is longer, wider and sits lower than its predecessor, and continues to feature a soft top. This has allowed for a more optimal rear seat dorsum angle and sightly more room. In talking to talking to Adrian van Hooydonk at Detroit Car Show, he explained that the customers of the half dozen Series take multiple cars, basically one for every occasion, and the need for a hard roof was not necessary. It opens in xix seconds and closes in 24 seconds while the vehicle is moving upwardly to 25 mph. The fabric height was made esthetically possible thanks to the ' shark fin', the buttress supports on either side of the roof, that allowed it to be a 'fast' shape. The soft top then can follow the same shape equally the coupe.

Inside, the new customers will fall in love once again with the new, refreshed BMW interior design. Compared to the erstwhile 6er, the high-end convertible has a more driver-oriented interior and a comfortable seating position for the commuter and passenger. Even though the 650i was built every bit a 4-passenger car, the rear legroom as you lot would expect is limited, making information technology comfortable for a short drive before starting a riot in the car.

The dashboard was lowered and features for the kickoff time a freestanding ten.2-inch display. Soft-bear upon fabrics and high-quality trim are abound, the famous BMW seats continue to be house and wrapped effectually your body, and then we accept the classy stitch-work that says yous're now in a $100,000 premium vehicle.

Style and luxury? Checked. Appealing design? Checked. But does the new 2012 BMW 650i Convertible carry on the "Ultimate Driving Machine" slogan?

Over 500 kilometers of both cruising and ambitious driving, nosotros came to the decision that this is the existent 1000 Touring BMW to convey ii people and their impedimenta chop-chop and comfortably over inter-urban center B roads and Alpine passes. Only let's start with the beginning and work our way to the conclusion.

At launch fourth dimension this month, the BMW 6 Serial Convertible will be offered with the 650i badge. The ii+2 Chiliad Tourer is powered past the N62 4.4-liter V8 TwinTurbo engine that produces 400 horsepower and a whooping 450 pound-feet of torque, plenty to take the 4,531 lbs convertible to 62 mph in only 4.9 seconds. The engine is disordered to the superb 8-speed ZF automatic transmission that offers smooth shifting and improved fuel consumption. Even though BMW will continue to cater to enthusiasts with a six-speed manual, we believe the eight-speed gearbox is well suited for this auto.

As we mentioned earlier, the road from Cabo to La Paz offered us both the opportunity to drive fast in direct lines, simply more important, to test the machine's agility through these curvy roads and extremely abrupt corners. Mexican'southward motoring populace was a model of courtesy, with most drivers indicating when information technology is safe to laissez passer and then we rarely felt trapped behind slower traffic on unmarried-lane roads. First impression, the power delivery is linear and almost lag free, as long as you ride in the Sport and Sport+ modes as office of the Driving Dynamics Control organisation. Toggling between the settings alters the throttle map, suspension compactness, transmission shift schedule and steering effort. Nosotros're inclined to believe that many customers will opt for the Comfort and Normal settings that better suit the demographic, just we would dearest to be wrong in our assumption since the motorcar can evangelize so much more with a push button of a button. The Condolement fashion is, in our stance, likewise soft, giving the car a bit of a "float feeling", just luckily the Normal setting offers the perfect residual.

Regardless of the DDC way, the 650i lives upwards to the expectations, and easily conquered the challenging Mexican roads. Merely as the enthusiast and BMW gearheads, that we are, we spent a big portion of our driving in manual way while grabbing the well-placed pull-pull paddles. At present we're talking…

This is when the 650i Convertible actually won our hearts, even though we are fully enlightened not many customers volition resume to this type of driving. Cornering became even more fun, the exhaust note with the elevation downwards was more than we expected, and just put: rewarding. I and my driving partner were quite happy to bulldoze behind the other cars in the caravan while enjoying some pleasant acoustics.  In a few direct lines, we pushed the car to a speed that not many would dare to drive in the U.Southward., and the responsiveness of the auto along with once more the exhaust note, made for a good shot of adrenaline. The shift paddles and immediate response from the viii-Speed made us before long forget a manual transmission is available. But the sporty driving came with a price: a combined 17 mpg.

Despite its size, the 650i Convertible has minimal torso roll and offers great road grip, inspiring confidence at fast speeds and driving pleasure when cruising down the rustic Mexican routes. We take spent equal fourth dimension with the acme down and up, just then we can get a better feel of the noise ratio. With the top affixed, the multi-layer sail kept exterior dissonance largely at bay. Putting the top down, the dissonance level was kept in check past the vertical power heated rear window that allowed u.s. to maintain a fluent conversation without raising our voices.

With the catchy Mexican speed bumps at large, the braking system was put to test several times and the lightweight floating-caliper brakes with vented discs have proven to be efficient and effective. The DSC (Dynamic Stability Control) system in the 650i Convertible brings together applied science such as the Anti-lock Braking Arrangement (ABS), Dynamic Traction Command (DTC), Cornering Restriction Control (CBC), Dynamic Restriction Command (DBC), the Start-off Banana, the automated Brake Drying function and Brake Fade Compensation. All of these sound impressive also as reassuring.

And then yes, the lack of steering feedback when the car runs in Condolement DDC setting will come upwardly in other reviews as well, but overall, with confidence, we say that the 2012 BMW 650i Convertible has the "Ultimate Driving Machine" Deoxyribonucleic acid embedded within, at a substantial premium price.

Our communication is this: if you're a BMW gearhead or simply looking for driving pleasance, put the peak downwards, select Sport+, even run in manual, and enjoy the lifestyle yous've surrounded yourself with. If you fit the market place demographic, then y'all have cipher to worry nigh, the 650i Convertible will deliver on your expectations and the engineers and designers accounted for all of your needs in the build process.

The 6er Convertible volition attain the local dealerships as you read this review, and the starting time price is $91,375. The Coupe and xDrive variants will arrive this fall, previewing the introduction of the new BMW M6 and 6er Gran Coupe in 2012, when the new 6 Series family is united and extended.

The usual competition comes from Mercedes-Benz SL550, a 2-seater high-end convertible that appeals to the demographic. The second luxury convertible comes from Jaguar, the XK, with a naturally aspirated  V8 engine that gains more traction in the luxury market. Since we have not had a take a chance to drive the two vehicles nevertheless, nosotros will have to refrain from comparing the driving feel, but stay tuned for a future comparison review.

Disclaimer: BMW flew us out to Cabo San Lucas for the N American launch of the 2012 650i Convertible, dined us and put us upwards in a cute hotel. Even got a tequila bottle that was confiscated by the airport security folks.