2003 BMW E46 CSL - today's tempter

By: Guy Allen, Unique Cars mag

Date: 10.02.2023

2003 BMW E46 CSL - today's tempter

2003 BMW E46 CSL - today's tempter

2003 BMW E46 CSL - today's tempter

2003 BMW E46 CSL - today's tempter

Six-pot screamer

For fans of performance BMWs, this qualifies as one of the 'must have' cars in your dream fleet.

This variant of the E46 built on the marque's long-standing reputation for building sweet inline sixes and took it up a notch.

In a feature on this model, we wrote: "The CSL was developed with a very specific target in mind. It had to get round the Nurburgring in eight minutes. To do this, head of body Hans-Bruno Starke and chassis development engineer Peter Schmidt had four key areas to work on; weight, aerodynamics, suspension and tyres. Power was a secondary concern, although changes to the cams, headers, intakes, exhaust, valves and engine management handily lifted peak power from 252 to 265kW."

Unusually for the time, the CSl was offered with a six-speed sequential transmission.

This example claims 172,000km on the odo and is with Oldtimer in Brisbane. It's on the market for $229,950.

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