Quote:
Originally Posted by mkoesel
Because everything comes at a cost, and the product planners concluded that the product would be less successful if the price tag were raised commensurately in accordance with the cost associated of developing a special version of the engine for the manual transmission.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by mkoesel
If you look at my second post in this thread, I elaborated more.
The point is, it costs more to develop and produce two different things - especially complex things like engines - than it does one thing. Even small differences (including software differences - if in fact that's all it would be which, as I say, is speculative) add cost, so the more commonality, the easier it is to make the business case. You have to remember that there are probably no shortage of board members or shareholders who would have preferred to see the manual transmission disappear entirely. Why tempt fate by getting fancy and trying to diverge from the what's already being developed for the volume model?
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I think the point is that they still had to re-map the "base" 473hp tune of the S58 to reduce the torque output versus the tune used on the base X3/4M. So why not take the opportunity to raise the redline a tad while doing so.
Quote:
Originally Posted by mkoesel
Speculatively, sure. Regardless of how you get there, you're adding cost to the development of the vehicle. Particularly since the MT car is the entry model, it is absolutely no surprise they would avoid spending any extra money on it.
Also, it can't be said with any certainty that the internal components have been spec'd to handle 7600RPM. While it's not likely that the small increase would cause any harm to the engine (for example, if done via an aftermarket tune), it may still be out-of-spec for some rotating assembly or valve train parts.
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Interestingly, the power/torque chart in the S58 technical document shows values for the S58 up to 7,500rpm. All that being said, BMW certainly had their reasons to keep redline at 7,200rpm for the 6MT.