In the not too distant future, BMW South Africa’s factory in Rosslyn will cease production of the 3 Series sedan and instead start building the new X3. And now the German automaker has released the first official images and video of this next-generation X model.
The video shows the new (camouflaged) BMW X3 being put through what the brand describes as “possibly the most severe endurance tests” in the north of Sweden.
“The extensive ice surfaces of frozen lakes and the numerous remote roads with their firmly packed layers of snow offer excellent conditions for fine tuning of the settings activated via the driving experience control function – and hence for the application of maximum driving pleasure and best possible driving safety,” BMW said.
“As a result, engineers are in a position to sense the vehicle’s dynamic behaviour much more accurately and synchronise the control of driver assistant systems such as dynamic stability control (DSC) or dynamic traction control (DTC) even more precisely and to attune it to the vehicle as a whole.
“It is this painstaking development work that later provides the customer with a competently tuned chassis for that typical BMW driving pleasure,” the automaker added.
So, all that drifting isn’t simply for fun, then.
BMW says it has invested some R6-billion in upgrading the Pretoria facility for production of the new X3, although the vehicle will continue to be built in South Carolina, too.
Watch the video below for some sideways action…
