Cars And Automotive: BMW M5

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BMW M Car Sales Increase by More than 14 Percent in 2010

Sales of BMW's M car series continue to sprout as the Bavarian company's performance division concluded the 2010 business year with a 14.2 percent increase to 16,967 units, despite the phase out of the V10-powered M5 and M6 models.

The M brand's most popular model remained the M3 with 5,729 units of the coupe, 2,544 units of the Convertible and 1,843 Saloons. Worldwide sales of the newly introduced all-wheel drive X5 M and X6 M totaled 2,778 and 3,082 respectively.

The USA was once again the most important single market in 2010 for the performance brand with overall BMW M car sales up by more than 6 percent to 6,821 units. As before, the number two sales region was the German domestic market with sales of 1,716 cars, followed by Britain and Northern Ireland with 1,264 units.

BMW M's division saw its most dynamic growth in China where sales rose by 355 percent to 1,088 units, making the country the fourth-strongest market for the brand. Significant gains were also registered in Brazil (+ 237 percent) and Russia (+ 104 percent).

The German company said that it also recorded a 1 percent increase in sales of the M Sport packages, with 138,800 units in 2010. The main market for M Sport packages was Britain and Northern Ireland, followed by Germany and the USA. The was also a significant jump in the demand for the firm's Individual program, with 24,155 options being ordered in 2010, an increase of 47 percent over 2009.

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G-Power’s BMW M5 HURRICANE GS is the World's Fastest LPG-Powered Car

After the standard BMW M5 and M6 Hurricane editions, BMW tuning specialists G-Power has now released a more eco-friendly iteration of the same package, in the form of the LPG-powered Hurricane M5 GS.

The German firm's engineers performed several modification to the M5 and M6 Hurricane's 5.0-liter bi-supercharged V10 engine which now comes with one fully sequential five-cylinder LPG system per cylinder bank. G-Power says the benefits of LPG fuel are both economical and ecological in nature, as LPG is not only around 50 percent less expensive per liter than petrol, it also reduces CO2 emissions by about 15 percent.

As an added bonus, the V10 is slightly more powerful than its gasoline counterpart producing 660-horsepower (+25HP) and 650Nm of peak torque at 5,500 rpm.

The M5 Hurricane GS can go from standstill to 100 km/h (62 mph) in only 4.6 seconds and reach the 200 km/h (124 mph) mark in 11.4 seconds, while topping out at 333 km/h (207 mph), which, according to the tuning firm, makes it the world’s fastest LPG-powered car.

For improved stability and handling, the sports saloon has been fitted with a G-Power RS coil-over sport suspension, high performance braking system and lighter, 20-inch Silverstone Clubsport alloys, clad in 255/35 front and 285/30 rear tires.

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BMW M6 and V10 Engine Production Come to an End

BMW bid farewell to the current M6 Coupe and Convertible as production of both models came to an end this week. The announcement also signals the death of the Bavarian firm's 507HP 5.0-liter V10 engine that powered the already discontinued fourth-generation M5, as the next iterations of the M6 and M5 models will make use of a new turbocharged V8 powerplant producing somewhere close to 600 ponies.

The Bangle-butted E63/E64 M6 was initially launched as a two-door coupe in 2005 with the soft-top convertible model following the next year. Worldwide, BMW sold a total of 14,152 cars (9,087 coupes and 5,065 convertibles), with the number one market for both models being the US, which recorded sales of 3,528 closed and 3,247 open-top vehicles, followed by Germany (1,183/541 units).

A replacement for the M6 (in both coupe and convertible body styles) based on the next generation of the 6-Series is due in late 2011 or early 2012.