Reviews
Gallery 1
IT’S easy to think of the Alpina B3 Biturbo Touring as the M3 wagon that BMW never made. Easy, but wrong. The 301kW load lugger instead offers a softer-edged take on going quickly, with the reassuring exclusivity that comes with every Alpina product. You’ll pay for the privilege though…
WHAT IS IT? Alpina has been fettling BMW products for more than half a century, and it’s reasonable to expect the company has become pretty competent at bringing its own look and feel to Munich’s wares. The B3 Biturbo Touring is the fast BMW wagon you’d probably build on a fantasy configurator, brought to life in Buchloe.
WHY WE’RE TESTING IT Having recently spent some seat time in Audi’s RS4 Avant and Mercedes-AMG’s C63 wagon, we were curious to see whether Alpina could bring something new and worthwhile to this fearsomely competitive sector.
MAIN RIVALS Audi RS4 Avant, Mercedes-AMG C63 S Estate, Porsche Macan Turbo
THE WHEELS VERDICT There’s something delightfully old-school about the Alpina B3 Biturbo Touring. Compared with its key rivals, it feels a bit of a throwback, but in a good way. It feels friendly, analogue and predictable and although it’s tough to make a case for at this price, in this market, it’s not impossible. A trickle of takers is all that Alpina needs to tick over output while retaining exclusivity.
PLUS: Prodigious torque; composure; discretion; comfort; practicality MINUS: Silly gear shift buttons; occasionally snatchy transmission calibration; creaky interior; price
THE WHEELS REVIEW EASY power. It’s a term we hear a lot of in sport. George Foreman had it in his prime. Tennis star Nick Kyrgios has it in spades, as does AFL’s Dustin Martin and cricketer Chris Gayle. It’s that effortless ability to land a hammer blow without appearing to break sweat and the Alpina B3 Biturbo Touring majors on it. Yes, you can buy wagons that are quicker, but I can’t think of one that makes going quickly so easy. Is that a good thing? That depends on your point of view and the overall appeal of the Alpina certainly depends on a certain left-field standpoint.
At first, it’s easy to be cynical. The Alpina dress-up kit with stripes, badging and distinctive alloy wheels looks great or gauche (again, standpoint is key), and the interior is all buttery thick leather, build plaques and factory crests of carbs and cranks. The engine is the N55 engine from the 335i, modified with a pair of turbos rather than the single twin-scroll unit it’s usually supplied with. It also gets a specially cast crankcase design that Alpina ships to Munich for installation on the line before the car arrives at Buchloe for final fettling. It’s an open-deck design rather than the closed-deck architecture of BMW’s successor engine, the B58 that’s found in the 340i, so in many ways it’s a bit of a pick’n’mix. A melange it might be, but when teamed with a custom-calibrated ZF eight-speed auto it’s a heck of a combination.
The Akrapovic exhaust adds a few pops and bangs on the overrun in the Sport modes to amp up the aural excitement, and from 5000rpm towards the redline there’s a yowling intensity, with the rear always feeling just on the edge of needing some electronics to rein in the 600Nm in the lower gears. Yep, that’s 50Nm more than an M3 or M4 Competition, so you need to really think twice before doing the long press on the stability control button. Get the B3 sliding and you need to be on your game. The chassis is relatively benign and the steering excellent, but plugging into that Goldilocks zone where there’s just enough torque before the big turbo really gets excited requires a sensitive right clog. On a flowing road, keeping the engine around 4000rpm gives the Alpina a sinewy feel, leaping from apex to braking zone with an addictively elastic muscularity.
The transmission is a sweeter thing at most speeds than the M3’s twin-clutcher, although it does occasionally have the propensity to kick down a bit too sharply when you’re just ambling. The shift buttons on the back of the wheel spokes are a flat-out bad idea. If you’re really jinking through tight corners, you can often find the car running to its redline while you’re fumbling for the dollar-coin sized bumps. Sorry, Alpina, but a set of paddles is just a better execution for shifting on the fly.
There are clearly more conspicuous claims on your $167K than the Alpina B3 Biturbo Touring. It’s an easy car to overlook based purely on numbers, but to do so ignores a blend of talents that Buchloe has spent half a century honing. It’s a lovely thing to drive either quickly or slowly, with Alpina’s nuanced understanding of balanced dynamics giving it the sort of polish that feels anything but the ‘tuner car’ that the uninformed will pigeonhole it as. If anything, the B3 feels a more cohesive proposition than any current 3 Series and one that richly rewards the keen driver.
SPECS Model: Alpina B3 Biturbo Touring Engine: 2979cc in-line six, dohc, 24v, twin turbo Max power: 301kW @ 5500-6250rpm Max torque: 600Nm @ 3000-4000rpm Transmission: 8-speed automatic Weight: 1780kg 0-100km/h: 4.4sec (claimed) Fuel economy: 7.7L/100km Price: $167,727 On sale: Now
GOING, GOING…
As it stands, there are only two Alpina B3 cars left for sale in Australia but that’s actually no great cause for regret. Winging in at the same $167,727 price point is the new Alpina B3 S, packing 323kW and 660Nm. Based on the updated ‘LCI’ version of the latest 3 Series, the B3S cars get new turbochargers, a revised cooling system, fettled suspension and remapped transmission software.
RARE METAL
Mercedes sells more than 4000 AMG models per year in Australia. Alpina? “We’re supply limited,” explains Sales Manager Phil Jeffery. “BMW only allocates Alpina between 1500 and 2000 build slots per year. That’s globally across B3, B4, B5, B6 and B7 lines. If we considered ourselves to be 1 percent of that we’d be extremely fortunate. In real terms, double figures would be good, here in Australia. Twenty sales would be excellent.”
FAST FIVE
If the B3S still seems a bit too pedestrian for your tastes, the next-gen Alpina B5 is due to launch in February/March. Arriving at much the same time as the new M5, the B5 is the product of BMW and Alpina working hand-in-hand with the new G30 Five Series platform. With all-wheel drive, 447kW/800Nm, and 0-100km/h time of 3.5 seconds, the B5 Biturbo Touring will also run on to a top speed of 330km/h, making it the world’s fastest wagon.
