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BMW Car Clubs
BMW is a German car manufacturer which produces a large range of high quality vehicles and is well known throughout the world both for its on road and racing heritage. The company’s founder Karl Friedrich Rapp was an aircraft engineer from Munich who set up ‘Rapp motoren werke’ in 1913 to build aircraft engines, three years later when Rapp won a large contract the company was merged and became ‘Bayerische Flugzeug-Werke’, (Bavarian aircraft works in English). This name was later changed to ‘Bayerische Motoren Werke’ or BMW for short. Rapp left the company soon after and Franz-Josef Popp became the company director. It was also at this time that the now famous blue and white BMW logo, known as the ‘Roundel’, was introduced. BMW continued building aircraft engines, followed in 1923 by their first motorbike and finally in 1928 their first car called the ‘Dixi’ was built under licence from Austin. The first ‘in-house’ car made by BMW was the ‘BMW AM4’ a 20hp saloon made in 1932. This was followed by the ‘328’ which won the 1938 mille miglia race in Italy and set a precedent for the company’s motorsport pedigree. At the end of World War II a three year ban on production, combined with the destruction of many factories by allied bombers, saw the company reach its lowest point and it wasn’t until 1955 that BMW finally found its feet again with the introduction of the ’Isetta 250’, a mini-car with a motorcycle engine which despite being built under licence to an Italian company managed to restart BMW’s sales in the car market. A year later the ‘507’ sportscar was launched and became a famous design, indeed this model became the inspiration for today’s ‘Z’ series of BMW’s. One of the most important BMW models arrived in 1962, the ‘1500’ was the first to feature a styling feature known as the ‘Hofmeister kink’ which has been a feature of BMW designs ever since. A growing range of models based on the ‘1500’ soon followed and became the foundations for the 1972 model known as the ‘E12’. The ‘E’code stood for ‘Entwicklung’-german for ‘Development’, and this model became the basis of the ‘5 Series’. BMW launched the ’3 Series’ in 1975 and the ‘7 Series’ followed in 1977. In more recent years BMW bought the Rover group, comprising of Rover, Land Rover and Mini as well as the inactive Austin, Morris, Riley, Triumph and Wolseley brands. The company later sold off the Rover and Land Rover rights and finally, after a long battle with Volkswagen, bought Rolls Royce. BMW now produce a vast model line up including 3,5 and 7 series, Motorsport or ‘M’ series, the four wheel drive ’X’ series and the ‘Z‘ series of sportscars. The company boasts a huge fan base and many dedicated owners, many of whom are members of the car clubs listed in this directory including the ‘BMW Owners Club’ car club and the ‘BMW Car Club’. |
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