BMW 135 - The Battery is in the trunk.

If you find yourself stuck with a dead battery and the car parked next to you is a BMW you are in luck. Why? Because on most BMWs, the battery is in the trunk. This can prove quite handy because there are also battery terminals in the front, so you can actually connect jumper cables to either the front or back of a BMW, which is nice because it can save you the hassle of moving your car around in order for jumper cables to reach.

So you are probably asking: "Why on earth would the Germans put the battery back there, were they drinking too much cheap German lager when they were engineering their car?" If you have ever known a German engineer, then you know that these people do everything for a reason, and the trunk is the only place for a battery if you are a BMW engineer, copious amounts of lager notwithstanding. BMW tries to achieve a 50/50 split of weight distribution on their cars, meaning if you were to draw a line exactly in the middle of the car, between the front and rear tires, the weight would be perfectly split between the front and back. In the real world what this translates to is unbelievable handling. By putting the battery in the trunk on the passenger's side, the weight of the driver is counterbalanced thus making the car closer to the 50/50 split. (OK, if you are really into weight distribution then you know that the ideal split is 52/48 because when you accelerate the weight shifts, but BMW just says 50/50 in their marketing material to make things easier to understand.)

Let's get one thing out of the way first, either you are a BMW person or you're not. What I mean is that you when people see you drive a BMW they have one of two reactions, 1) You are someone who is doing well in life and rewards yourself with toys like BMWs or 2) You are an overpaid, obnoxious twit of questionable sexual prowess that makes up for your inadequacy by buying fancy cars. If you are a true BMW person you don't care either way what people think. Those who buy it for prestige will move on to other cars eventually since BMW is the best selling European luxury car and is not as exclusive as a Maserati. If you are obnoxious and lacking prowess in some area of your personal life, you will trade your BMW for a Corvette or Viper because those cars attract the kind of hairspray women you're into, it takes a woman with discriminating taste to know the difference between a 328 and an M3, and a woman intelligent enough to do that is smart enough to know you are an obnoxious twit. If you are a BMW person you bought the car for your own reasons and if everyone else could experience the joy you experience by owning a BMW then they would all drive one too.

When you get into the BMW 1 series (for this review I am referring to the 135i coupe) you are immediately struck by how comfortable the interior is for such a small car. At 6'5" 220 lbs. I fit quite well. It is better to treat this car as a two seater, fitting four adults over five feet tall would prove difficult. The back seat is perfect for groceries or maybe a car seat. I actually preferred the ergonomics of this car to the 3 series, the window switch was easier to get to, the door was easier to close, etc.

On top of the ideal weight distribution this BMW has traction control, stability control, brake assist, and everything else BMW could think of to keep you out of trouble. With all the electronic assistance turned on it is almost impossible to get into any kind of trouble in this car. My wife took a sharp u-turn on a highway at 50 mph and you could actually feel that she could have gone faster, the car and its computer were making all the adjustments to keep the car on the road. The technology is truly remarkable, if you were to try the same maneuver in an M3 from the late nineties the steering wheel would thrash back and forth and you would be fighting it the entire way. (Although it must be said that driving a car that fights you like that can be a great deal of fun.) With the new generation of BMWs there is little chance of you spinning out because you get a little too enthusiastic with your lead foot. Although I have not driven it in snow, I imagine that it would do quite well. The twin-turbo 300 hp engine makes this car perform with the best of them, 5 second 0-60 is easy to achieve. Not to mention that BMW tuner Dinan makes a chip upgrade that gives you 84 more horsepower for $1999, that would make this car a threat to Corvette owners everywhere.

In the US we only have two versions of the 1 series right now, the coupe and the convertible. Overseas they have a five door hatchback which looks similar to the Mazda 3 here in the States, and many critics have called that version of the 1 series ugly, and thus some argue that all the 1 series cars are ugly, but this is not the case. The coupe and convertible are attractive cars, and are similar in size to the old 3 series (1992-1998). If you want to save money go for the leatherette interior, it is comfortable, indestructible and requires little care. If you are an obnoxious twit who needs to take a little blue pill at the end of a date then the red leather is your only choice.