Finally, I took the car to a tire shop, where they found out I had a hairline crack all the way through the 18-inch alloy wheels, though the run-flat tire itself seemed undamaged. Strange all around. But the press fleet guys drove up a prebalanced tire and rim that afternoon, and the shop (Firestone in Greenfield -- thanks, Heath!) bolted it on with a quickness. I had the car back the next morning after breakfast.
In the meantime, I was at the mercy of my in-laws' Ford Focus four-door sedan -- a great car for the money, with good gas mileage to boot. But oh, how I missed the comfort setting on the BMW 750i on the notoriously bumpy streets of Milwaukee. Every strip of tar, every chunk of missing concrete, went straight from the suspension into my spine.
Glad to have the leather-wrapped wheel of 750i back in my hands, I did have to drive it back to Chicago and return it to the fleet. With four perfect wheels and light traffic, the 750i made short work of the trip, even rerouting the nav system around construction and traffic jams when necessary.
If you're thinking of buying a BMW to impress the masses, you can get away more cheaply. Car nuts who know what the BMW 750i is capable of will be impressed with it when they see it, but the average non-car-type will see a BMW badge and be impressed no matter what series it may be. While the 7-series is the utmost in BMW luxury and performance, there's no shame in a 3-series.
Key Facts
- 2009 BMW 750i
- 4.4-liter 32-valve turbocharged direct-injected V8 engine
- 6-speed automatic transmission with manual shift mode
- ABS, stability control, dynamic traction control, dynamic brake control
- Double-wishbone front suspension, multilink rear suspension
- iDrive to control HD radio, satellite radio, on-board computer, nav system
- Expanded Check Control vehicle monitoring system
- Rear and side-view cameras, park distance control, lane departure warning, blind spot detection
- Heated front and rear seats, heated steering wheel, front ventilated seats
No comments:
Post a Comment