I have an 03 E500 since new. No mods whatsoever. Have schooled:
E46 style M3 Convertable:
Suprised me too. Both of us were doing 80mph on an open highway, no traffic involved. Spanked him repeatedly between 80-125mph.
350Z's: I spank these on a regular basis. Usually through traffic though, never had one on an open road.
545i: Last week on the GSP through heavy traffic. I let him catch up repeatedly, he really couldn't drive good though.
Many other's I forgot to mention.

Here are honorable mentions:
00 A6 twin turbo modded. Closed road, Numerous runs = neck to neck runs. Got him every time past 65mph.
00 Mustang (Claimed 500 hp). Late stoplight runs. Open Highway. He spanked me repeatedly by 4+ car legnths. His exhaust spit flames. I just kept runnin' him for entertainment.

 

there is no way you spanked an M3.

 

well if it was a convert. with SMG it would be close ( i think the 0-60 is like 5.5). but a convert witha 6 speed, i have smoked those in the SL Very eassly. its up to the driver when it comes to manuells.

 

Define "spank".

M3 loses breath at high speed... so it could be due to your V8 flatter curve. Still possible considering we don't know anything about the M3... sucky driver?

 

Yea but the 2003 E500 have the old 5 speed and when you get into 4th and 5th gear they are very long gears and are not even close to the pull that you get in 1-3 gear. Plus the M3 has 6 gears and 30 more HP and also about 400-500+ lbs lighter. If I remeber right for every 11lbs you take off the car its give you the same effect of adding 1hp without weight reduciton. The M3 is very quick from 80-120. Mosty likly the M3 driver was in the wrong gear if you are not above 5,000 RPM in the M you are not going anywhere fast.

 

Most likely... (if the story is true at all)

 

I totally agree, some of the quotes here are just plain wrong.

I have a 2002 M3 and I would have to see this to believe it.

1. Convertible M3 do 5.3 sec 0-60.

2. M3's pull very strong all the way to 140 mph from any speed; loosing their breath at high speeds is rubbish.

3. There is little difference between an SMG and a 6 Speed manual M3, and from 80mph there is NO difference at all.

 

my friend has an 05 m3 SMGII coupe, Cold air intake eissemen race exghaust. and i raced him with my 996 Gerret C2 cab. and it was just about equil till 130, then i very very slowly pulled.

 

Well having an SMG I can tell you a 6 speed with a decent driver will kill the SMG car to 60 mph. Even using the LC which sucks in the US sine it wont let us do the Eruo launch at 3,500 RPM. I know personally I could start out faster than an SMG in a 6 speed just because of the fact that I could launch the car at 3,000+ rpm. I hear from a rolling start that the SMG will slightly pull on the 6 speed when the cars have to shift, which makes sense since with SMG you shift perfectly every time and you can shift right at the redline perfect every time.

 

I agree with you, this topic has been beat to death over on the Roadfly M3 forum, which I have been a member of for almost 5 years. That doesn't make the CAR faster, it just means that most drivers can't master a decent launch with SMG. I agree the manual gives you more control over your launch.

 

Believe me...I wouldn't waste my time typing it if it wasn't true. I didn't believe it till I seen it. I was anticipating a spanking when I pulled up next to him (me being a previous e46 owner, and knowing the nature of the beast). I REPEATEDLY pulled away from him. All I know is my E500 pulls strong over 80mph (maybe I got a hot one ).

 

Rubbish? It depends on what car you compare it to... Not sure about E500... but against my E55 & C55, M3 clearly has shorter breath.

And what I meant with shorter breath didn't mean that it doesn't pull anymore... it just has less pull than E55 / C55 at high speed considering M3 has faster 0-60.

Or in simpler words (based on couple races w/ M3's):
From a dig, my C55 lost about 1/2 car length up to around 70-80ish... then I began pulling slowly but surely... by 130+, I got ~1-1.5 car length.

From a roll (40mph), M3 jumped first about 1/2 car length up to around 70-80ish again... and at high speed, same result.

I think a member (sdsilver) also video'd same results. M3 jumps first and then C55 started to walk away.

BTW, I talk stock vs. stock and the M3 is not the convertible one.

 

I think the other M3 owners will support me on this but compared to an AMG car the M is a lot harder car to drive fast. When I say that I am talking about getting the power out of the engine you have to know what you are doing. AMG like a C55 you have about 350HP and about 360+lb TQ out of a 5.5 liter V8, not to mention the AMG has an automatic. In the AMG cars you floor it and your moving in just about any gear because of the huge motor and large amount of TQ. Now the M3 on the other hand has a 3.2 I6 right off the bat the C55 AMG has 2.3 liters on the M3. The M3 has 333Hp (343 depending on how you measure your power) and about 280lb tq.

When you floor you C55 you get immediate power that is very nice and linear. Well when you floor the M3 its starts off slow and as soon as you hit 4,000 RPM you start to pick up and you hit 5,500 RPM the car explodes up to the 8,000 RPM redline. If you are not over 5,500 RPM and you are trying to go fast your not going anywhere fast. Now driving on the street most M3 driver when they meet up with a C55 doing a rolling start are not in the right gear. If I met up with a C55 on the street and we did a rolling start at say 30MPH I would kick it down into 1st at honk number 1 (redline speed in 1st gear is about mmm 35-37 MPG if I remember right) Well in that case I would be making peak power for the last 1,000 RPM or so before I shifted into 2nd and then I would be in the power band. Now if you ran into an inexperience M3 drive most likely they would start out in 2nd gear and be just below the 5,500 RPM sweet spot. And when racing such a car like an AMG that little difference can in power output by the M3 may mean being beat by 2-3 car lengths to 100 or only losing by a car length to 100.

Sorry for the long post but I find that after reading a lot of M3 kill stories it seems to me that a lot of it has to do with the driver, vs and AMG that just about anyone can step into and go fast. One of the reasons I would like to get an AMG is because of the superiority on the street since they have a more useful power band. After all the old saying HP sells cars and torque wins races.

 

Rubbish? It depends on what car you compare it to... Not sure about E500... but against my E55 & C55, M3 clearly has shorter breath. - of course, both those cars have greater HP and Tq numbers to boot. Comparing a 333HP M3 to a 469HP E55 is not even close.

And what I meant with shorter breath didn't mean that it doesn't pull anymore... it just has less pull than E55 / C55 at high speed considering M3 has faster 0-60. - I agree with this, not saying that the C55 is not faster or doesn't pulls harder, just that saying the M3 runs out of breath was not correct. I know for a fact that I have had my M3 at 160+ (with Shark Injector installaed). It pulls pretty strong. Of course, the E55 is a different ballgame all together. M3's don't compete.



[/quote]

 

BTW, my E55 is not the W211 (469hp) one.

But either way, I see what you and Andrew said, and I think we are pretty much in the agreement.

For me 1-1.5 cars don't prove one car is faster than the other.... other than to actual driver himself we don't know the other driver. Since there are a lot more M3's on the NorCal road, there are higher likelihood that people buy M3 just for the image They may not even know how to drive it... So my races could very well be against less-experienced driver who didn't know M3's sweet points. And OP's experience could also be like that.

Even on paper, M3's 1/4 is not far behind C55's (mid vs. low 13's if I'm not mistaken?). So, yes, in real life, it's really a driver's game.

 

Oh one more to add

Once again, I don't mean to trash M3.... M3 is truly a nice car. The reason I believe that M3 has shorter breath than C55 (not necessarily slower, though) was based on results from several people (some of them w/ video). Plus common intuition that bigger displacement and more cylinders typically have better pull at high end.

 

I definitely agree with you on that statement. As it is often said, "there is no replacement for displacement"

All other things not considered of course!

 

RedMongoosE, just curious, do you have some pics of your 996 Gerret C2 cab.? I am dying to see some, have never seen any!!
BTW, very nice smoking an M3 Conv., e46 is still an incredible car!

 

sorry son, its a sleeper, no kit on it. but the engine has the trix.

Mark

 

Is the M3 difficult to drive properly? I've seen many of them getting taken down by slower cars. Hell I raced a brand new M3 vert 6-speed and walked all over it off the line and from a roll. Now I KNOW that was a sucky driver, since he missed the 2-3 shift and bounced off the limiter, but why does that happen to all the M3's?

More car than driver? Or difficult car to drive?

 

Yes I would say its more car than an average driver can handle, I find that the vast majority of M3 drivers know nothing about the car. Its more of a real race car, its power band is what a race cars power band is like vs an AMG which has grunt from any RPM. From a dig unless you have a 6 speed or know how to drive good its very hard to get a good launch. I would say the M3's best acceleration is from 25-130 which matches up with most racing tracks. As I always say if you want the best dam light to light drag racing monster get an AMG, if you go to the track get the M3.

I did test drive 1 6spd M3 and I felt the clutch wasn't that great (I understand that if you take out the clutch delay valve it fixes the problem) But before going I kind of had my mind set on SMG since I heard it was so great. At first SMG is a blast to drive but a year later I wanted a manual, eh I still wish I could drive the car more 2 1/2 years old and only has 8,000 miles on it.... Might just end up taking it to college with me, but my poor ML has had a few random acts vandalism and I know the M would get a lot of crap done to it.

Also another issue I find is if you have an SMG car dont shift when the needle is about to hit the redline. The engine revs so fast that the lag on the needle is a lot, but if you watch the shift lights they account for this lag. When I first started to drive the car I would bounce all over 1st and 2nd gear, and for some reason SMG doesn't like to shift if you are bouncing on the rev limiter. If you have a 6 speed car you are kind of out of luck and it is probably best in 1st and 2nd gear to shift when the needle hits 7,500 RPM .

 

Ah yes, another AMG/M clash, another track/drag clash...okay, now to my point. An AMG or any high powered Mercedes is engineered as an autobahn vehicle - the autobahn is a highway, not a track. So, where these automobiles excel is driving at high speeds on an expressway and being able to easily handle these higher speeds. Personally, I am the type who prefers a torquey motor with a nice low end and midrange punch. The 391 tq rating of the N/A AMG 5.4 Litre automatic with a lower rev limit sounds far more appealing to me than 262 tq and high redline of the M I6 manual. BMW understands the demand for torque, hence the V8 powered next generation M3. Lets see what happens.