BMW people: Thoughts on Dark Graphite with Cognac leather?
 

I was all set with Phytonic and Cognac (after building it for a year), but my Estoril 2 has made me less inclined to repeat a similar color. Plus, the X3 looks a little juvenile in that blue, for some reason.

Any other color combos I should consider?

We had Mineral Green and Terra (or whatever the Cognac-similar color was called at the time), and it was great.

Ha! We have our own archive. The color was Saddle Brown:
http://forums.carmudgeons.com/showthread.php?t=122060

I just went to build my own to see what the options were. What the fuck? Those are all of the choices? Only one actual color plus various blacks and whites and grays?

Anyway, I’d choose the blue every time and if I couldn’t, I’d go for Carbon Black

The blue is very good—probably the best of those limited colors. Just feel like I’ve had that for the last three years...

Yeah those colors are weak sauce. I agree with Dan, Phytonic and then carbon black.

We love our carbon black / tartufo (fartolo) combo. I think any of the colors mentioned here (gray / CB / phytonic) would all look great with with cognac. Can you get the comfort seats in an X3?

Edit: I just built an X3 M40i too. It feels like a lot of car for the money. No comfort seats but the sport seats look great.

Yep. No comfort seats, but if the sport seats are like my 2 (or, likely, better), they'll be just fine. They look similar to the sport seats we had in our E70.

I think the Grapnite exterior would look really good with the Cognac interior, whatever you do don’t get silver :ack: my brother has it on his X3 M40 and it doesn’t do anything for the car.

Note on seat ventilation - it makes the seats VERY hard. I'd skip it based on my couple days with it on the X3 loaner I had. The ventilation wasn't very effective and the change in seat comfort vs normal BMW sports seats was unacceptable.

I do like the blue on the x3. Much darker than estoril and fits the car well. I also like the graphite. Carbon is pretty but takes a lot of work to keep looking nice. I don't imagine you're going to want to spend time detailing an x3 in carbon to keep it looking as nice as it can.

I think graphite & cognac would be a nice color combo. I just poked through some listings on autotrader couldn’t find one in that combo but I’ve seen the dark grey w/ medium brown many times over the years and it always looked great.

Good to know. I've never had a silver BMW, so I was thinking a bit about that--given how hot it gets down here.

I've read that about the seats. Thank you! And totally agree on Carbon. Phytonic is a good bit darker in person than Estoril, but not as dark as navy. What was the E46 dark blue called? I forget now.

Gracias! I am leaning to that combo.

Orient Blue was the dark blue
Topaz Blue was similar to Phytonic from what I can tell in pics

Orient! That's it.

We had a Topaz Z3 and a Topaz 325xiT. Loved that color.

Did the loaner have the massaging feature? I have the multi contour seats in the 540 with both the vented and massaging seats, I had read the massaging feature makes them harder, the other day I sat in a 5er without the massaging feature but it did have the vented and they were softer then mine.

One quick note on the vented seats, I have them in 4 of my cars, the BMWs version is beyond ridiculous, my only complaint about my car ... you feel nothing !! I pointed it out when I had a service and they said it was fine and they did a paper test, basically put paper on the seat to see if it moves and they said it passed. I tried it when I got home and the paper doesn’t budge.

No massaging feature on the X3.

+1

I think it’s just the seats in the X3. The sport seat with ventilation is very flat (you can immediately see the difference in the side bolsters in a side-by-side pic) and there are a lot of posts online about the ventilated seat being very firm and less comfortable.

On the 5/6/7+ models the ventilated seat option requires comfort seats and those are generally fine. Though still have issue of BMW seat ventilation being weak.

Porsche is supposed to be much better in that regard.

But, frankly, with a messy teenage boy (and his friends), I'd like to avoid any kind of perforated seats.

Every reason you give for wanting this car makes me think you really should get something adequate and cheap and keep the 2. Or just can the whole thing and keep the 2.

Yeah, there's a possible house purchase in the mix, too. If I can find something decent...

Current plan is to figure out a way to keep the 2. At least in the near term.

Still need to drive some more moderately priced cars before pulling the trigger on an X3 order.

its not.
Porsche ventilation (I believe) works the same way as BMW where it pulls air into the seat, as opposed to 'blowing' cold air on you.

My ex has it in her car. And I frankly have never really felt anything from it...

I like the porsche ventilation in the boxster, works quite well. It was ok in the JGC as well.

My 991.1 the air definitely blows pretty good, the Cayman is good but not as good as the 911 ...

The Q7 is decent, much better than the BMW but not quite as good as the 911.

Here you go:

https://bringatrailer.com/listing/20...-speed-manual/

Ha!

I was actually looking at this:

https://www.unitedbmw.com/inventory/...wx7c38h0w39984

Lmao ... only on this board would someone post about a manual SUV ... cracks me up :lol:

There are some manual X5s out there, too...And Porsche Cayennes!

Edit: To wit, a friend of mine is still driving her manual Ford Explorer...

Not a crazy idea if you’re keeping the convertible - roughly 1/2 the price of a new X3 M40

I've driven a 1st gen x5 manual 3.0 once. It was terrible, 1st gear nearly unusable, the whole thing an afterthought (Sarafil indicated as much in advance).

I've driven an x3 of that vintage with a manual. Also really quite bad. Ride/handling far from resolved; not saved by the manual.

The only good manual SUV I've driven is the 2011+ Cayenne, that was quite ok. The particular car wasn't right for a few reasons, but it was a good machine.

Yea, the X5 manual was an unusually bad driving experience. 1st gear was basically a granny gear so you’d realistically start out in 2nd. The rest of the gearing was a mess too. Fine for a large truck I guess, but not what you expect for a luxury SUV.

The manual X3 isn’t as memorable to me, so I guess that means it was just “meh”. Not bad but also not very exciting. The 1st gen X3 had a lot of shortcomings in general too. My parents had a first year (2004 - when they had the grey plastic bumpers - ugly but it was a REALLY cheap lease deal so they didn’t care) and a later 2009 model that had some of the LCI upgrades but still felt cheap. The 2nd gen X3 was a massive upgrade in fit & finish. Current gen took it up another level.

Not sure what the incentives are for a new X3 these days, but figure a nice “new” X3 M40 is low-60’s and a good deal on a new BMW is 10-11% off MSRP before rebates. On a purchase you’d probably get $1000-2000 APR credit if you finance and maybe $500 or $1000 loyalty. Plus $500 BMW CCA if you’re a member. So call it $52-53k range + tax.

Compare that to the 3 year old 2017 X3 35i at $30-32k CPO.

If going for new, I’d personally lease - shoot for payment in the 1% range w/ good incentives and if you look at numbers above you’ll see total cost of lease is in same ballpark as the delta between buying new vs. CPO. And you get the benefit of not tying up the $$ for 3 years, ability to walk away if it’s a problem, or can buyout at end if you like it.

I do feel like we’re coming full circle though as I recall talking about this before. 😄

Definitely need to hire you as my buyer’s broker!

And, you are correct—we have come full circle! No lease for me until I secure a mortgage (lenders only care about income not assets, and leases hit you harder because there’s no asset there and they presume the debt will continue on because you’ll lease again).

:loveme::yaya:
From back in June:

It has made for fun threads though.

Ha!

(The recent one has seat heaters :lol:)

Have you checked out a clubman? What's still on the test drive list, just the CX-5?

I look at them from time to time. It just seems like it would be too small. Part of the goal is to have a road trip vehicle as well--and that argues for an SUV or wagon, in my mind.

+1 to all of this. I'd also add that, atleast with BMW leases, you may find that the cost to lease a new one is even comparable to buying a CPO one and keeping it for 3-5 years.

Went into build your own and think the dark graphite with cognac leather looks good, provided that you get the wood trim.

Do not like the interior at all with that color and aluminum.

Yep. The matte wood. Thanks for the opinion!

Seems like they're the same size at the Jetta Wagon you've been considering. I haven't driven a new one, but I have always loved the driving experience on past mini's I've spent time with. The new clubman now has 4 real doors, AWD availability and the double swing out rear doors for ease of dog loading.
I went crazy with a JCW (300hp AWD) build basically checking every box and got to $48k. On the one hand that's A LOT for a mini, on the other it's $10k less than most of your other new options you're considering and it would have every option you'd ever want.

http://s3.motoringfile.com.s3.amazon...e-1024x507.png

You are like a crack dealer. LOL. OK, I will look!