Yesterday I managed to hit 1000 km during my trip to Berlin while running in the car... You all might know what that means if you have stretches of unlimited Autobahn in front of you.
I decided to do a number of full throttle spurts from 70/80 kmh in 3rd and 4th to 170 kmh shifting at around 5000 rpm. I ran through the different modes and the outcome of my tests was
.
I did the tests since my car is going to Akrapovic next week and this would have been the last time on summer tires in Germany before the end of the year and March next year when I swap back to summers on the new BBS wheels. I would therefore not drive this set up anymore on the highway any time soon.
The outcome is not positive. Even though that the ASD is not as loud as in the OG M2 (in all modes!), it is still there and masks any outside noise. I have not heard my exhaust in the cabin yet, not one time... No burbles or anything. Instead I hear the dump valve / wastegate release noise in front of me when I release the throttle at lower revs with the radio off. I kid you not... ASD masks it all! The sound of my EU spec M2C is horrible, what a disgrace.
Now lets move to the engine and gearbox combo. The set up is a fail in my opinion. Throttle response in efficient (Yes, efficient not comfort) and Sport is not good enough. In Sport plus it is decent in lower speeds and lower gears, but as soon as you are in a gear too high it is pretty crap. Overall, it has a lazy behavior all around. Same as I experienced on the press trip in the manual. Same shit, different toilet.
The gearbox has hardly any feedback on throttle loaded shifts. On full throttle and shifts at 5K rpm the shifts are so seamless I feel like I am driving a McLaren or a Nissan GT R. Epic if you have a Supercar with a decent speed potential, but this is pretty rubbish.
The problem is now that since there is no sound whatsoever on full throttle, no interesting gearbox feedback and no engagement you focus on how fast or shall I say how slow the M2C is. You are like it is fast, but mwah this is not really fast. Speed climbed nicely and the engine wants to rev but the experience is one of the most boring I have ever had in a M product.
If it is seamless than it needs to be lightning fast, if it is not lightning fast then it needs to be engaging. The M2C is neither of this and therefore it is in my opinion pretty damn boring in this spec. Yes, the handling is better and it steers better, but I am talking about the engine, gearbox and exhaust combo.
I am pretty much stunned how crap it is. Never thought it would be this bad in the DCT, but it is horrible. This car needs a massive tune, exhaust and maybe even downpipes to make it engaging to drive. Right now it feels immensely linear, seamless and all the engine/shifting fun we had in the OG M2 and the ferocious behavior from the M4 is completely gone.
Damn it
MR