BmW 635CSi
It’s done the ‘status symbol to shed’ cycle. Now this swinging coupé is on its way back up
In the days when money talked as loudly as a yuppie on a brick phone in a champagne bar, the BMW 635CSi shouted to the rest of the world that you’d arrived. It was a ‘loadsamoney’ totem of its time – yet, as times changed, ‘pre-owned’ 635s came to bear the stigma of a sad loser car as they spiralled down the food chain into the hands of those with hopeless aspirations desperate to impress with a bit of cheap flash. In the land of rusty-wheelarch luxury car limbo, the 635CSi had all the cachet of Del Boy’s Reliant Regal three-wheeler.
Foreigners – Europeans and Americans, for example – who are baffled by British class fixations will understand none of this insightful counter-factual commentary. But the point is that a car coveted as a ‘Youngtimer’ classic in Germany – and in other lands where people care less about what others think, ie the rest of the world – is still a social outcast in England. That’s excellent news, for this prodigious machine remains absurdly cheap in the UK… for the time being.
It begins with the 1976 debut of the 6 Series CS coupé generation, penned by that French genius of the light touch, Paul Bracq. This time, quite uncharacteristically, he pressed hard with his pen to create something of predatory belligerence; an intimidating, almost malevolent, machine.
We’ll gloss over the 630 and 633, because the defining two-fingered 6 Series statement is the 635CSi, introduced in 1978. applauded it as: ‘A superbly engineered machine that’s particularly satisfying to drive hard.’ It added: ‘Spoilers, a bigger engine, a five-speed gearbox
and stiffened suspension give the 635CSi more driver appeal than any big BMW since the old CSL.’
We’re talking 218bhp, 0-60mph in less than eight seconds and near-140mph. The 5.3-litre V12 Jaguar XJS was faster, but the 3.5 injected straight-six Beemer outpaced the 4.5 Mercedes-Benz 450SLC and was barely shy of Porsche’s 4.5 928.
Yes, these are all two-plus-two coupés, which, as all readers know, were the motor industry’s instrument for neutering the selfish, free-living, swinging bachelor. In fact, the BMW’s accommodation was better than most, but with its menace and pace there was a good chance ‘wifey’ wouldn’t want to sit in the front, or let the kids in the back, which made the 635CSi the perfect weapon for your average 1980s married misogynist. Today, for those of a ‘classic’ mind-set, it stills stacks up.
And if the 635CSi is not off-message enough, the M635CSi of 1984 does it even better. This one swallowed Viagra in the form of the 286bhp engine from the M1, to give a 0-60mph sprint in 6.5 seconds and a 158mph top end.
With the 6 Series, BMW committed totally to pitching its two-plus-two coupé as the top-priced flagship model; it was considerably costlier than 7 Series luxury saloons. At Mercedes-Benz, Jaguar and others, saloons were the premium-priced flagships. In an age when money talked, the very costly 6 Series shouted loudest. With over 86,000 sold in all guises to 1989, production was more than four times that of the earlier 3.0CS. Basically, the world got the message. Just don’t fit a baby seat.