BMW’s compact kings: 2002 tii & new M2 CS
Above all else, it’s the noise that strikes you first. The badge is the same, the general layout the same, but the soundtracks could not be more different. The Malaga Red 2002 tii and the Hockenheim Silver M2 CS on these pages are separated by more than 45 years of automotive history and evolution. And where the older car is a sometimes jarring mix of roar, whine and rattle, the new one growls with serious power.
But despite the aural disconnect, and a 316bhp power difference, the BMW’s dinky sports DNA has not changed much between the reigns of chancellors Schmidt and Merkel. Rear-wheel drive still prevails, as do manual transmissions, independent suspension, four disc brakes, circular instruments and a four-seat, two-door, notch-back body style.
The 1974 128bhp 2002 is my own; the new 444bhp M2 CS ours for this test. It’s the ultimate M2; the most powerful and the end of the current M2. The greatest too? We’re about to find out, along with just how much of that magic genetic code remains.
I bought this 2002 tii from a friendly Californian BMW collector who found me a sound if neglected model and had its body and mechanicals fixed in his workshop before shipping it to Amsterdam. The car passed the German MoT with flying colours and ran faultlessly for about 5000 miles before, without warning, it started pung white smoke through a crack in the cylinder head. Fixing that involved a best-forgotten cheque.
It’s not my first tii. Way back when, I briefly owned the range-topping 2002 Turbo. Today, nice Turbos change hands for more than £80,000, about the same as a new M2 CS with the optional carbon-ceramic brakes. But the tii is the sweeter 2002. The Turbo was fast but rough, not particularly reliable, accordingly expensive to run and Jekyll-and-Hyde-ish in character, because of its massive turbo lag. Just in time, before the ’charger went into seizure, I bought a 2000 tii Touring instead – in rare Reseda Green metallic with an even rarer electric sunroof – and I loved it. Perhaps you recall reading about it in CAR 40-odd years ago. Looking back, the Touring was one of several cars I should never have sold.
During its time with us, the Kachers settled for painted orange crates instead of cupboards, sat on third-hand Ikea chairs and cooked meals on a camping stove to ensure there was always enough spare dough to buy a set of urgently required Ronal alloys, Scheel bucket seats or Alpina chassis upgrades for the Touring.
When the 1600 ti kicked off BMW’s first attempt to bring performance ⊲
THE TURBO WAS FAST BUT ROUGH. THE Tii IS THE SWEETER 2002
fireworks to a relatively mainstream group of buyers, the extra horses were still keenly priced. Those days are long gone: the M2 CS costs a hefty £23k over the M2 Competition (the only other M2 variant still on sale). In return you get an extra 40bhp, lighter body panels, special wheels and upgraded spec. The top-of-the-line 2-series is thus even more expensive than the outgoing M4 and the M550i xDrive, and close to the 503bhp X3 M Competition – that’s a lot of money for a compact car.
Although BMW won’t have the production capacity to build the CS beyond summer 2021, it’s not a limited edition as such. But you can imagine sales being modest, given the value-for-money calculation potential buyers will do. The problem is virtually identical performance across the range. Fitted with the M Driver’s Package (standard on the CS, optional on the Competition) both M2s are governed at 174mph, so the only quantifiable difference is the 0.2sec advantage the CS has between 0-62mph: 4.2sec versus 4.4 for the six-speed manuals; 4.0sec plays 4.2 for the seven-speed dual-clutch autos. A limited-slip differential is standard on both.
So if the Competition version is effectively just as fast, if the 369bhp M340i xDrive comes close to the CS’s acceleration, and if the M240i offers 75 per cent of the fun at a 45 per cent discount, why bother? Because numbers seldom tell the full story. The CS can out-M even the M4 in terms of thrills and entertainment.
You need to be fully focused to enjoy driving the CS. On poor or wet surfaces with its semi-slick tyres, directional stability can be somewhere between flighty and Russian roulette. The handling attitude is playful, with little room for error. With the stability control halfway off in M Dynamic Mode, rapid cornering is an explosive mix of initially nose-heavy and then eternally tail-happy; even more so with it switched off entirely.
The CS changes direction swiftly and accurately. Although the steering feels somewhat under-geared and heavy at first, when you become attuned it will relay the road to your palms in 3D. The brakes are fantastic even with the standard steel rotors, although the pedal feels unusually heavy over the final 50 yards. The carbon-ceramic discs are a £6250 option.
The above description applies more or less to everything that’s ever worn an M2 badge. What makes the CS special is the manner in which it deploys its outputs. The engine spreads the same peak torque over a wider rev range than the powerhouse of the Competition, and the extra grunt has an afterburner effect on midrange in-gear sprints. Unleash everything in fourth and even short straights shrink fast enough for at least one more unforeseen upshift. The engine’s broader muscle keeps the fire burning in fifth and even in sixth. We saw an indicated 186mph at 7000rpm, which still felt somewhat restrained and a couple of clicks off the beast’s real limit, despite plenty of aural vroom and boom (and the supposed speed limiter).
Nail the accelerator when the tra¢c lights change, and trust the trick M diff and the electronic supervisors to prevent the Pirellis from smoking in public. There is, however, no escaping the visual impact of the CS’s bespoke duotone alloys, yawning extra bonnet vents, and its shiny carbonfibre splitters and gurney flaps, all of which shout ‘catch me if you can’.
Hop from crystal to claret and you find the 2002 tii is a notably more docile and better-behaved machine; a driving device from a gentler age. But first you must get it started. Luck is involved, or possibly divine intervention, if you’re to fire it up before the plugs drown in petrol. While the rev-hungry 110bhp twin-carb 1600 ti was a very sweet 02, and the 119bhp 2002 ti will forever be the darling of the round-tail-light faction, the 128bhp 2002 tii used the mechanical Kugelfischer fuel injection system, which was capricious at best and impossible to adjust at worst, with gremlins queueing all the way from the petrol pump in the boot to the injector box under the bonnet. ⊲
THE EXTRA GRUNT HAS AN AFTERBURNER EFFECT ON MIDRANGE IN GEAR SPRINTS
The guttural exhaust note is accompanied by an intake rasp and a high-pitched whine from the no-name radials. The wind rattles at the solitary chrome mirror and tries to pull out the frameless windows while the gearbox offers a mechanical harmony. Recently fitted with fresh valves and that laser-welded cylinder head, the engine’s voluntary rev limit is currently just under 4000rpm, where it sounds rather dull, bass-heavy and nothing like the famously smooth and vocal sixes.
But the controls still feel special. The 2002 is totally analogue from the twist-and-hope front quarter lights through the stubborn steel sunroof to the unassisted steering, which can be a chore in tight spaces but offers a smorgasbord of finger food on the move. The ABS-less brakes are almost as prompt as an aircraft carrier’s arrestor cable, although the heavily spring-loaded clutch has seen better days and is about as progressive as a light switch.
Covered in fake leather that must be at least half an inch thick and feels indestructible, the seats are large and quite comfortable, but for optimum lateral support it’s safer to straighten up or lean against the
B-pillar. The perfectly legible dials are, in the facelifted cars, de-valued by a fake woodgrain application which looks as naff as the standard black plastic steering wheel – the latter had to go, to make room for a leather-wrapped three-spoke Nardi; much better. The push-button radio can only receive certain stations, the single speaker makes everyone sound croaky, and the manual aerial attached to the A-post splits its services between jamming stations and receiving obscure LW/MW services from Serbia or the Middle East.
The three fan settings are noisy, loud and deafening; the wipers fail to clean the screen; and the dim H4 headlamps are only one step up from rolling the dice. Maintenance is not rocket science (Herr Kugelfischer’s invention excepted), but corrosion can make your bank balance melt like ice in the sun.
The maximum torque of 130lb ft coincides with 4000rpm, and on a downhill stretch the top speed of 119mph keeps shaking hands with the rev limiter. My maroon specimen is much better off than 95 per cent of its stablemates because it came equipped with the optional but rarely specified five-speed Borg-Warner
gearbox, which is a priceless bonus on today’s autobahn battlefield. Consumption? I have seen 30mpg, but 25mpg is the rule and 20mpg a not uncommon exception to it. Although the M2 CS turns out to be a little thirstier overall, it can better 30mpg when the driver goes gently.
The tii and CS are united by their evocative handling attitudes, driver involvement and randomly accessible tail-happy antics. They’re divided by a vast difference in performance, sophistication and convenience. The most obvious contrasts concern power and torque, refinement, safety and quality. Devoid of a diff lock (although it was an option when new) and electronic traction control, the tii freely spins its rear wheels. But it only does so in first, and second, and then only in the wet. Unlike its steroid-stuffed successor, the lean and light 02 simply cannot summon the energy needed to burn rubber at 40mph-plus. Instead, it indulges in various stages of mild oversteer and feinted drifts, the body language meandering between slalom and giant slalom, the narrow three-box saloon whirling through bends with the elegance of a ballet dancer. For the blink of an eye, the tii very occasionally lifts the inside front wheel, like John Whitmore at the limit in his Lotus Cortina.
Swap back into the M2 CS and be prepared to enter a different realm. It’s not the highly advanced set-up employed in the M5, where the driver ⊲
THE 2002 IS TOTALLY ANALOGUE, FROM THE STUBBORN SUNROOF TO THE UNASSISTED STEERING
can choose between all- and rear-wheel-drive, but it’s still impressively competent. This is a level of talent to trouble the outgoing M4.
Even so, the CS’s score card also shows some misses. The steering is as meaty as its thick-rimmed helm, and although one can select from three different calibrations (Comfort, Sport and Sport Plus), the variation is primarily in weight rather than feel. The adaptive dampers cover the same spectrum, doing little to soften pothole-induced hits amplified by the car’s broad-shouldered, grip-is-everything tyres in Sport Plus. The throttle response is impatient, while the light clutch action is anonymous like a Golf’s and thus out of place in a car of this calibre. All things considered, I’m leaning towards the two-pedal DCT configuration. The manual ’box is ambitiously spaced and pleasantly old-fashioned, but the sluggish shift action can dent progress.
The direct forerunner of the M2 CS was the 1-series M Coupe. I hated that car when it first came out because of the treacherous high-speed stability, an issue later fixed with a retro-fit aero kit. The same confidence-diminishing attribute returned recently in the M235i Gran Coupe and the Mini GP, but it is thankfully absent in the CS. Its steering has enough play to compensate for surface irregularities, its gearing is calmer and the feedback remains intact irrespective of lock and turn-in speed. This reassuring interface is absolutely essential in a powerful car which mixes a very wide track and a very short wheelbase to an explosive whole best kept on a short leash.
Like the 1M Coupe, the CS prefers clear terms and conditions before committing itself. Tight bends are fine, but less so when dotted with split-grip tarmac, puddles and crossgrooves. Fast corners are easy-peasy, but ideally not when paired with quilted surfaces and deep aquaplaning ruts. High-speed autobahn esses can be a thrill, but not when interspersed with sudden lift-off or braking manoeuvres, ill-timed gearshifts or kamikaze lane changes.
Although M2 and 2002 operate in two separate speed and tech orbits, what unites them both is the fine art of flow, the high school of bonding with the driver. Not quite half a century after that first tii, the M2 CS has once again made my heart beat up to the Adam’s apple, re-ignited dormant fires and brought testosterone leftovers to the boil.
While the M2 CS can set the tarmac on fire whenever you are up for it, the tii is more of a slow-mo, bow-and-arrow type of a car. To fully satisfy, it needs a matching mix of revs and ratio; it piggybacks on momentum rather than horsepower, and it certainly is not a fan of excessive steering angles and dramatic throttle openings. The older BMW needs to be worked harder, but it pays you back in strong Deutschmarks not virtual Bitcoins (the currency of the CS, protected as it is by four airbags and several dozen electronic controllers).
While the tii marks the ultimate development of BMW’s first affordable post-war icon, the top-ofthe-range M2 is not the most compelling current M product – that remains the M5 Competition. Having said that, I still prefer the CS by a small margin over the not-long-for-this-world M4 (a new M4 is imminent) because it uncages the tiger inside with such a ballsy, shameless and gloriously vulgar coolness.
ALTHOUGH M2 AND 2002 OPERATE IN SEPARATE SPEED AND TECH ORBITS, THE SENSATION IS BOTH MARKEDLY DIFFERENT AND WIDELY COMPATIBLE