Hello there,
Yesterday I've attended the closed-door presentation of the new 5er, the G30. Allow me to share my experience with you guys.
First thing I'd like to point out is that no cell phones were allowed, therefore I won't be able to share any real-life photos of the G30 with you today. The presentation itself was held in Riga (Latvia) throughout two days, with small groups of people being invited at the interval of 2 hours.
At first we were greeted with a short introduction to the 5 series history, sales numbers, and some other facts, followed by some teasers, and then they finally unveiled the wraps off this beast.
We've had a 540i with M-Sport package installed on show. Color was some new shade of silver, and a lot of options were ticked and on display. I've been rather skeptical about the new 5er, especially after seeing the updated E-Klasse's interior, which looked like a scaled down S-Klasse. Well, here I am, happy to report that 5er's interior is sort of baby 7er without the chrome nonsense.
But first things first. The front. The render below is 100% accurate representation of production car with M-Sport package (I think we've even had the same 20" wheels on our unit):
Attachment 1501662
There are no nonsense LED lights like on the 7er, everything is extremely aggressive, balanced. I've noticed how the hood was going as a single piece all until the headlights without that previous generation pedestrian safety cut-out line. They've shown us active air vents (the grills), I guess they come as standard now. I've also heard that they will ditch xenon lights altogether and instead offer either halogen as standard or LED as an option (this could vary in different markets). Oh, and car alarm will be standard. Yippie!
Car's profile (also seen in the render) was rather balanced, great-looking. The rear is something that I could not find the proper render of. It had something of 7er, but without that awful rear chrome line. Overall taillights looked awesome, there was a power trunk button present (not sure if that's been on F10). The car is said to be 100kg lighter thanks to the new OKL platform and use of carbon fiber (but you knew that already).
Now the interior was on par with 7 series. Our sample even hard the rear infotainment system, same as 7er. Ambient lighting was present as well, and new top of the line audio system will come from Bowers & Wilkens. I've heard talks of M550d and M550i (!!) models coming up in the near future (first production cars should roll out around February, so I guess M Performance models will come around Summer), and there was a mention of 4 turbos
. I've also heard some bits about MXXX cars featuring quad pipes, just like the true M cars. Sure hope it's just a rumor. Speaking of the M car, again, with a grain of salt, but there was a rumor talk of having two versions (RWD/AWD), with AWD actually being the superior performance model.
iDrive (all them gestures and touch screen stuff) and instrument cluster were basically taken out of G11 and put into G30. I guess it's a good thing. I noticed that the center-console has been more driver-oriented than before.
I believe you already know that that advanced key fob from 7er is also coming to the 5er, carrying all those options, such as remote parking.
Overall, I came out impressed and satisfied with what I saw. This will be a solid car that a lot of people will like. They took what made 7er cool, improved the styling (I just hate those "aftermarket" looking LEDs on the front), and upgraded the interior. This is all I care about, really.
I believe World Premiere will be around Paris Autoshow, so there's not much time left for you all to see the actual car.