BMW 6 Series Gran Coupe slated for production in 2012

As previous reported the writing was on the wall that BMW was going to be producing the Gran Coupe concept. At the recently staged BMW Design Night at the Welt in Munich BMW confirmed that concept will enter production as a 6 series gran coupe.

We are fighting our urges to call this a sedan. After all four doors means it is a sedan, right?...well not anymore. Now German car companies are building four-door cars, but because of their swooping coupe-like lines, they don't dare call these vehicles "sedans". Mercedes started the craze with the CLS, and the VW Group has three in its lineup: Volkswagen CC, Audi A7 (later this year), and Porsche Panamera (they even flirted with giving Lamborghini one with the Estoque until the market bottomed out.)

BMW can't risk its customers migrating to another brand just because their sedan (oops, we used the "S" word) has sleeker lines. So earlier this week at its Design Night press event in Munich, BMW's design chief, Klaus Draeger confirmed it will add a second set of doors to the next 6-Series coupe.

There's only one problem, doesn't BMW have a long-established four-door around this size? (HINT: it's called the 5-Series) BMW says that the roofline on the 6 Gran Coupe is about four inches lower, and the tailgate area on the Gran Coupe is much smaller than a 5-Series. Just like the 5-Series, the Gran Coupe has a hybrid version rumored to be in the works.

BMW says don't expect the Gran Coupe to hit the market until at least 2012.



Thanks to Motobullet.com for some of the details

Read more news about the BMW Gran Coupe

Thanks Tim! That car certainly has my attention.

thanx for sharing

thats intrigueing

cool.... BUT...

ok, i get the 6 series, built on the 550 platfrom, same engine, same trasmision same guts of the car, where as the 550 is more gear towards utility/family, the 650 is gear towards a more sport look with the same preformance.

take off two doors of the 550 reshape and call a 650
now strech it 6 inches add two doors to the 650 and call it the grand coupe


i dont know, i like it and all but its not really going to offer anything more then the 550 outside of a lower roof line

Originally Posted by m4hk33

cool.... BUT...

i dont know, i like it and all but its not really going to offer anything more then the 550 outside of a lower roof line

Front page of Bimmerfest today... "BMW CEO Plans Big Model Push to Fend Off Audi, Mercedes".

Mercedes already has a "4 door coupe" version of their 5-series competitor (E-class) called the CLS, and Audi has announced an A7 which will be a 4-door coupe version of the A6. Clearly BMW is playing catch-up here, even if those models seem superfluous.

wonder how much this thing is gonna cost im def interested

I saw it on display at BMW Welt during a European Delivery. The car was absolutely gorgeous!

I leased my F10 550i this year because I am hoping to swap it out for the Gran Coupe once it's out....I just hope BMW keeps the production model lines reasonably close to the concept model which I thought was stunning!

Absolutely.

I am on the fence about buying a Panamera s or turbo... The GC looks very appealing, and I understand the BMW brand. Dealer network in my neighborhood is so much better than the small Porsche one. I'm attempting patience here.

Agreed. I took a long look at the Panamera before picking up my F10 and it just didn't float my boat. The drive was also just marginally better than the F10, once I summed all the puts and takes.

Porsche is taking a hard run at the sedan market and their next interesting entrant looks like the Pajun targeted for 2016. So am thinking of swapping into the Gran Coupe in 2014, and then maybe the Pajun in 2017. I will not buy a first-model-year again...with the technology content and shortened development cycles in today's cars I just don't think it's worth the schmuck risk.

That's a great summary of where I'm probably going to end up. F10 is a great car ( and your build looks awesome!), I was just looking for something different ... the only problem with that difference is cost and the PITA factor of the dealer is 330 miles away from where I normally reside!

Originally Posted by schraderade

Agreed. I took a long look at the Panamera before picking up my F10 and it just didn't float my boat. The drive was also just marginally better than the F10, once I summed all the puts and takes.

Porsche is taking a hard run at the sedan market and their next interesting entrant looks like the Pajun targeted for 2016. So am thinking of swapping into the Gran Coupe in 2014, and then maybe the Pajun in 2017. I will not buy a first-model-year again...with the technology content and shortened development cycles in today's cars I just don't think it's worth the schmuck risk.