Comparison Test from 1988: BMW 525i, Rover Vitesse and Alfa Romeo 164 V6

A tough test: Rover’s best car meets its closest rivals from the excellent new BMW 5-series range, and the 164 – on sale soon – the best modern-era car that Alfa Romeo has produced.

Less than a year ago, the Lancia Thema Turbo was the best executive car you could buy (see Top Ten 1988, CAR January). But, in the past six months, the Thema has been buried under a three-pronged assault: first from BMW’s excellent new 5-series, and shortly after from Rover, whose new 800 Vitesse is the most impressive sports saloon the Midlands maker has ever built. And, within weeks, the final bullet will be fired at the Thema’s heart from an internecine rival: Alfa Romeo. Its new 164 goes on sale in Britain in early October, fresh from plaudits and a popular reception in mainland Europe.

The 5-series, the Vitesse and the 164 are quite comfortably the best sports saloons you can buy in the £20,000 bracket. The Audi 100, long-time favourite around here, is now too old and too flaccid. The Mercedes W124, fine car though it is, is too leaden in its £20,000 guise: that sort of money will buy you a mere 230E, paralysed by four-cylinder performance. The Thema, although still spectacular value, cannot match the six- cylinder refinement of this new trio, and it doesn’t have their solidity, either.

Neither the Vitesse nor the 164 offer an engine choice in Britain; in both cases they run only lusty V6s. The new Alfa gets a transversely mounted version of the superb unit which gave the GTV6 coupe such muscle, and such music. The Rover gets the revised 2.7litre Honda V6 - the engine that, in 2.5litre form, was harshly criticised for poor low-end pick-up. Those additional 200cc, and various other ameliorations, have turned the smooth- but-senile unit into a silken powerhouse. It’s the best engine Rover has ever used, and by a fair margin. The Vitesse, dressed in the recently launched Fastback body, comes in at £20,443. Alfa in Britain isn’t announcing prices for the 164 until early October: the top-line model, said to have an extraordinarily high level of standard equipment, is likely to cost almost identical money.

Choosing the right 5-series, in a £20,000 comparison test, was a little more difficult. The mid-size executive-class German comes with engines ranging from 2.0litres, to 3.5, and prices that cover a span of more than £10,000. We chose the 525i SE (for Special Equipment). At £20,525, it is less than £100 more than the Rover. And the SE model, with its standard low-profile tyres and alloy wheels, better fulfils the sports saloon role than the regular, £19,240 525i.

STYLING, ENGINEERING

Nestling under the snouts of these executive cars are the three finest six-cylinder production engines you can buy. The Alfa’s V6, of 3.0litres capacity, is the biggest, and also the most powerful (192bhp) and torque (1811b ft). It is the familiar, magical, single-overhead-cam- per-bank device that injects such a sting into the performance of the top-line 75. For the first time it is mounted transversely. And, for the first time, it is used in a car that was specifically designed to house it. The 164 as a whole almost matches the magnificence of the V6, in a way that the antiquated GTV and 75 never could.

The V6 sends its drive into an end-on five-speed gearbox, ingeniously mounted in the front sub-frame, and anchored by hydraulically damped mounts: this combination is said to reduce noise and vibration. The change action is excellent. The drive then proceeds to the front wheels - the first big Alfa so propelled.  Alfa’s only other front-drive cars are the Sud and the 33, both Escort-sized.

The chassis is essentially that of the Lancia Thema - but better. Like the Thema - one of the Type Four family of cars that also sired the 164, the Fiat Croma and the Saab 9000 - the Alfa uses MacPherson struts all round. Improvements over the Thema include repositioning the lower front strut mounting - to increase suspension travel, and help give the 164 a lower bonnet line and significantly greater body stiffness. The  Alfa 164 feels substantially more solid than a Lancia Thema (or Saab 9000 or Fiat Croma).

There may be nothing exceptional about the chassis of the 164. There is nothing in any way ordinary about the styling, however. The 164 is one of Pininfarina’s greatest designs. In a world increasingly stifled by government legislation that encourages styling uniformity, and increasingly dominated by conservative marketing men who fear that to be different is to court disaster, the 164 is refreshingly unusual. It looks good from every angle, and cuts the air with a sharp blade: the Cd is 0.30. It is short for its class: at 179in almost seven inches shorter than the BMW; and at only 28671b, it’s more than 3001b lighter than the BMW.

It goes without saying that the BMW has a magnificent engine. The Bavarian firm is Europe’s most able, with the possible exception of Ferrari, engine builder. Every member of its straight-six family is a paragon of smoothness and latent energy. The 2.5litre unit, used in the 525i, is a member of the ‘small six’ family that also includes the 2.0litre. Maximum power of the 525i is 170bhp; maximum torque 1641b ft at 4300rpm. In long-standing BMW tradition, drive is sent to the rear wheels through a five-speed gearbox. 

Also traditional, and less satisfactory, is BMW’s continuing use of semi-trailing arm rear suspension. This used to be the main reason BMWs often had an unwelcome 'sting in their tails; as the semi- trailing arms moved through their arc so the toe-in and camber of the rear wheels changed. BMWs had rear-end steering well before Honda and Mazda started to brag about it. Nowadays, to quell the disobedience, semi-trailing arms fitted to most BMWs (including the new 5-series) have auxiliary arms that try to keep the rear wheels pointing straight ahead. The front suspension  uses coil sprung struts. Gas dampers are used front and rear.

The BMW looks wonderful. The Alfa may look more unusual, but the achievement of the BMW’s designers is only marginally less praiseworthy. They have come up with a car that looks new and fresh, and yet one that quite clearly has the BMW family stamp. At 0.30, the Cd is identical to the Alfa’s. Mass is not only higher than that of the 164, it's , also greater than the old 5-series. BMW’s excuse for- this apparently retrograde step is that solidity is more important to the executive car class than weight paring in pursuit of a few extra mpg or mph. Predictably, the BMW feels the most solid and best-assembled car in this comparison.

The Vitesse - the top-of-the-range model in the Rover 800 Fastback series launched at the beginning of summer - runs the latest and best Honda 24-valve V6. It pumps out 177bhp and 1681b ft of torque. If anything, it's even smoother than the Alfa and BMW units. It's mated to a Honda five-speed gearbox, situated at the end of the transversely mounted V6. Like the others in this comparison, the Honda engine uses electronically controlled fuel injection and valves that are operated by a single overhead camshaft.

Front-wheel drive is part of the Vitesse brew; so are front wishbones and rear struts - very much a Honda, rather than Rover, suspension set-up. The speed- proportional power steering is also Honda-sourced. All three cars have ABS anti-lock brakes, as standard.

Like its opponents, the Vitesse is a handsome car. In the sense that it has a large tail spoiler and a fairly deep chin spoiler as well, it is the most overtly sport-ing looking car of the bunch. It is a clean, neat piece of design, no doubt. And it cleaves the air just as sharply as its rivals: 0.30 Cd. Yet the Roy Axe design is rather nondescript, less distinguished in this company. It lacks the individuality and freshness of the BMW and Alfa.

The Vitesse is an inch shorter than the BMW, has an almost identical wheelbase, and weighs 521b less. Which makes the Alfa not only the smallest car in this company but easily the lightest.

PERFOMANCE

The power-to-weight ratios  suggest it; Millbrook proving ground in Bedfordshire proved it. The Alfa and the Rover have substantially more performance than the heavier, less powerful BMW. You’d need to move up to the £24,235 BMW E34 535is before BMW gives you the sort of acceleration that the Alfa and Rover produce.

The Alfa - the lightest car, and the most powerful - sprints the hardest. It gets to 60mph from rest in 8.0sec - 0.3sec faster than the Rover, and 1.3sec faster than the BMW. By 100mph, the gap has widened to 1.4sec and 5.3sec respectively. The in-gear acceleration times tell much the same story, although the Rover runs the Alfa even closer. That's largely a function of the Rover’s shorter gearing, but also the superb low-down flexibility of its engine; indeed, the Vitesse goes harder than the Alfa from the 20-40 to 70-90mph ranges in fourth gear. At higher speeds, when the extra strength of the Italian engine starts to overcome the car’s longer legs, the Alfa catches up. In fourth gear acceleration tests, the BMW is comprehensively outgunned. And, in the revealing 30-80mph acceleration run - using optimum gears - the Alfa is almost three seconds quicker than the BMW. The Rover is 0.8sec slower than the Italian.

On the road, the extra urgency of the Alfa and Rover are immediately obvious. Jump out of the Alfa or Rover, into the Bavarian car, and the performance seems comparatively leaden. That crisp response to throttle variations; that eagerness to go when the command is given: both are missing in the BMW, burdened as it is by extra weight and a smaller engine than its rivals. Crucial, too, is the fact that the BMW's engine and its gear ratios seem oddly incompatible. To stir the 525i along, you have to change down a gear regularly; in either of the other cars you simply depress the right pedal.

The top speed statistics tell a similar story. The Alfa is quickest, at 139mph on the two-mile Millbrook high-speed bowl. The Rover scored 138, the BMW 131. All are comparatively quiet at such high speeds; at 130mph, the BMW is marginally the least noisy. At that speed, the Rover is the least stable - there is a little bucking and bobbing as the car is affected by side winds and the sheer speed. Twice the Alfa jumped out of fifth gear, at full chat. There was no apparent reason.

The bald facts are one thing; the manner in which an engine delivers its performance quite another. In this area, all three cars are superb. Even the BMW, the most sluggish, has a silkiness and a fluency to its performance which sets it on a different plane from cars that use turbocharged four-cylinder units. True, if you’re in a hurry, you need to use the gears to stir things along. But if you’re patient the engine will deliver you the promised performance with a turbinelike smoothness. There are no flat spots, just a steady unleashing of energy that becomes more urgent as the revs rise.

The engines of the Rover and the Alfa are probably even better. The Honda motor in the nose of the Rover is the smoothest and least obtrusive of the trio, (when was the last time an Austin Rover product had a better engine than the equivalent BMW?), and pulls over the widest rev band. It is perfectly comfortable being driven at 10mph in fourth, and pulls eagerly from that speed. It is quite easy to think you’re in fifth gear, but find you're actually in third, so smooth, so silent, is the power unit. Like the BMW, the Honda engine has no flat spots, no bands of discomfort.

The Alfa’s engine is far less happy at low speeds in high gears than the Rover’s. Yet it does offer noticeably more urge when the revs rise above 4000rpm; it also offers a far more enticing engine note. It’s the best noise you’ll hear this side of a Ferrari’s exhaust.

On the motorway, all three cars are superb and unfussed. You can cruise comfortably, easily, for mile after mile at 90mph. Part of our test took in a particularly blowy stretch of the A1, just south of Scotch Corner; all three tracked as straight as William Tell’s arrow.

Normally aspirated, beautifully engineered six-cylinder engines not only bestow refinement and performance advantages over turbocharged versions of ill-bred four-cylinder units; they usually oblige with fuel economy benefits, too. We reckoned the 26.2mpg that the Vitesse scored was quite exceptional for a big 140mph machine. And who could complain about the 24.6mpg of both the 164 and the BMW?

ROADHOLDING, HANDLING

Wide, low-profile tyres and tightly reined suspension, are features of these cars. As a result, so too is good handling and roadholding. The Alfa - the smallest and lightest, and the car which has the least overhang - is the wieldiest, and most responsive. It feels like a Golf GTi blessed with lots more power. It feels small, and tight, and sharp; not at all like an executive car that, in theory, lives in the same class as Granadas and Volvos and other wallowing four-wheeled barges. It cries out for hard, enthusiastic treatment, and rewards the driver beautifully with its quick responses.

The Alfa’s act is helped by having the fastest, least power-assisted steering. It’s also helped by that superbly throttle- responsive engine: in the best Italian tradition, you steer this car almost as much on the throttle as you do with the steering wheel. Back off, and the nose tightens its line into the apex of the bend; power on, and there is just a hint of controllable understeer.

On a winding, undulating road, the Alfa is also the most entertaining, and the fastest. Its suspension always feels firmer, more taut, than any of its rivals'. At low speed this can produce a slightly annoying patter. Wind up the speed, though, and the suspension starts to form a closer bond with the road surface. You can tear along deserted moorland roads at extraordinarily high speeds, and in absolute safety, in this Alfa. Yet for all that, the BMW has slightly better roadholding. This is due, in no small way, to its bigger tyres - 225/ 60VR15s are standard on the 525i SE, whereas both the Rover and the Alfa wear 205s - and its greater neutrality at very high speeds. Push these three cars, very hard, on 90deg bends, and the Rover and the Alfa will both be travelling crosscountry before the BMW. Their determination to understeer, or go nose first off the road, is greater than the BMW’s urge to execute final, tail-out oversteer. Even at milder speeds, the understeer characteristics of the two front-drive cars are more pronounced than the BMW's oversteer. In most situations, the BMW feels deliciously neutral. Yet it always feels heavier than the Alfa, less inclined to change direction quickly or obediently. It floats more, too, on fast undulating roads.

The Rover’s composure on wavy moorland roads will come as a revelation t6 anyone unfortunate enough to have sampled one of the early Rover 800 saloons in such conditions. The saloon’s perpetual floating and bottoming, is gone. In its place is a pleasing conjunction between road and car, and superbly tuned damping. At medium to high speed, on undulating roads, the Rover is probably the best car of the trio: it floats less than the BMW, and has less patter than the Alfa. Its shortcomings include a tendency to lift an inside front wheel on tighter bends because suspension travel is inadequate. The Honda power steering is also hopeless, blunting the feeling of intimacy that should exist between you and the beautifully damped suspension. It hurts the car’s manoeuvrability, and thus its handling.

There are a few other blackspots to these cars - the Alfa can get its tail out when you back off in extremis, which can be tricky to catch; the Rover often understeers quite acutely on tight bends; the BMW’s steering could be a little higher geared, to aid handling. Yet the bald fact is that these three cars handle very well, better than anything else in this class. They are executive cars that most definitely will not bore board directors, and offer more fun than some sports cars.

ACCOMODATION, COMFORT

If you want spaciousness, and top drawer levels of comfort, then you’d better look elsewhere in the executive car class. A Granada has more room and a more supple ride.

In comfort terms, the BMW wins a narrow victory, It has good heating and ventilation (unlike the Rover, whose cockpit gets inordinately stuffy), and a pleasingly supple ride (amazing, because it doesn’t lean much, and grips tenaciously at high speed). The 525i absorbs broken city roads with ease, and softens the inconsistencies of uneven A-roads. It lacks the magic carpet ride of a Citroen CX or a Granada; it doesn’t mask the fact that there are bumps and irregularities under foot. You know that the BMW is fighting a battle with poorly laid tarmac, yet you also know that the 525i is winning the contest easily. In a CX, you’re unaware of any conflict.

The Rover rides as well as the BMW on A-roads, yet hurts more at low speed, in town. Horizontal ridges jar in the Rover; in the BMW and Alfa they pass by, unnoticed. The Alfa rides much better than the Rover in town, but out on the open road its wheels patter over uneven surfaces, as though the damping cannot quite control the springs. In terms of overall chassis refinement, then, the BMW is the clear victor.

The Rover enjoys marginally the most comfortable seats, beautifully upholstered in cloth (not leather). Lumbar, height and rake adjustment (all manual, not electric) are standard on the front chairs. Its ventilation, though, is abysmal: on a warm day, open the electric sunroof (standard) or an electric window (standard) - or stifle. The Alfa and BMW both deliver excellent heating and ventilation, the German car having the important advantage of easily understood (and compactly housed) controls. The Alfa’s ventilation controls are disastrous: a vast block of the centre part of the dash, consisting of a series of push buttons, is devoted to a task that the BMW manages with three circular controls and three simple slides.

All three cars are quiet at speed; they effectively suppress road noise, wind noise and mechanical din. The Rover emits marginally the most wind noise, the BMW the most road noise (although it’s far better than the intrusive hum normally emitted  by German cars), and the Alfa the most mechanical noise (although since it’s coming from that V6 engine, mechanical music is a better description).

Standard equipment levels are generous - even in the BMW. The Bavarians, once notorious for giving you four wheels and a painted body, then expecting you to pay extra for just about everything else, have quietly been making amends recently. The 525i SE comes, as standard, with ABS brakes, a sports steering wheel, alloy wheels, low-profile rubber, electric sunroof, rear head restraints, heated exterior mirrors and driver’s door lock, central locking and power windows. To that list Rover can add only infra-red remote door locking, burr walnut inserts on the dash and door caps, and remote- control releases for the boot and fuel filler flap. The standard specification of the Alfa was unavailable at the time of going to press, but word is that the 164 is likely to be the best-equipped executive car that £20,000 can buy.

None of these cars is particularly roomy. Although you can sit quite comfortably in the rear, six footers sitting behind similarly sized front seat occupants will find precious little space between their knees and the back of the front seats. Headroom for such folk is just adequate. The Rover has marginally the most rear legroom; the BMW fractionally the most rear headroom. The Alfa has the widest cabin, and is best able to accommodate three people sitting abreast in the rear. In every internal dimension, the cars are surprisingly evenly matched, however.

In terms of luggage space, the Rover has the important advantage of being a versatile hatchback, complete with folding rear seat - although, and most amazing, the £20,000 Vitesse lacks the split rear squab that a £5000 Metro enjoys. The BMW has easily the smallest boot, largely because it is the shallowest (a corollary of the rear-drive). The Alfa’s problem is its high sill.

Both the Continental cars offer generous’ interior stowage space. The British car has an absurdly small glovebox, and its door pockets are rendered next-to-useless by protuberant speakers sited just above them; you cannot carry tall items. There is no large central storage bin, either.

DRIVER  APPEAL

A win fot the Alfa. Its deliciously sharp steering, its engine's eagerness, and its communicative chassis, seal the victory. Other strong points include a light, short-throw gearchange - the best of the trio - and the nicest clutch, throttle and brake pedal weightings. The pedals are also sited close together, to facilitate heel and toe gearchanging. Naturally, being an Alfa, there's a proper foot brace on the left. A less welcome Alfa trait is the slightly unusual driving position; King Kong won’t feel quite as much at home behind the wheel of this car as he did when he drove earlier Alfas, but he’ll still welcome pedals that ensure humans have to bend their knees quite acutely, and a steering wheel placement that ensures a long stretch for normally proportioned homosapiens. You and I won’t find the driving position uncomfortable- just different, and mildly irritating.

More than mildly irritating is the torque steer that plagues the 164 V6 when you're accelerating hard from rest, or quickly up a steep hill; the steering wheel writhes like an insect in its death throes. Tram- lining is also a problem when you brake hard on a cambered road.

The Rover avoids this torque steer problem, but largely because its steering system is so anaesthetised that it kills just about every other form of feedback as well. The steering is limp, over-light and lifeless around town. It firms up at speed, but never does much of a job of communicating with the driver. Also light and lifeless are the clutch and, to a lesser extent, the throttle pedal. The Rover’s brakes, similarly, also have a rather lifeless feel; they are also easily the most inclined to fade. The gearchange (another Honda legacy with which Rover is stuck) is light and short of throw, but also vague and notchy - and easily the least pleasing of the bunch.

Like the Alfa, the Rover enjoys comprehensive instrumentation, and has a voltmeter and oil pressure gauge on top of the usual complement. Yet those awful Austin Rover instrument graphics, which look like a ’50s leftover, are at odds with the otherwise attractive dashboard (the architecture of which wins top marks).

The switchgear is similarly at odds with its surroundings; cheap, fiddly little plastic switches sit uneasily with classy burr walnut. The Alfa doesn’t win many switchgear points, either. On the whole, its controls feel flimsy.

This is where the BMW is so dominant. Although its cabin does not look the most luxurious, there is a thoroughness and thoughtfulness to the BMW’s cabin that leaves the other two trailing. The controls feel strong, durable. They are well-sited. They blend in well. The instruments are not as comprehensive as the rival efforts, but they are attractive, well-proportioned white-on-black gauges that, for sheer simplicity and legibility, could not be bettered. The column stalks feel strong and durable, too. The BMW's driving position is excellent. And the steering, although perhaps not quite as sharp as it should be, is free from the effect of driveshafts running parallel to steering arms. Rear drive may not be as fashionable as front drive, but it still makes more sense if driving enjoyment is paramount.

CONCLUSIONS

Anyone who values driving entertainment  and engineering excellence would be happy with any of these cars. They are fun, and fast. They have superb engines whose refinement is on a different plane from the groaning, grunting wheezers usually dished up by car makers in this class. They are comfortable, despite their true positioning as sports saloons. And they are roomy enough - just.

If you’ve got £20,000 to spend, and must buy British, then the Rover Vitesse is a vastly superior alternative to top-line Granadas and Senators. It is the best saloon Royer makes, and by a big margin; it is a fine blend of speed and luxury. Yet it cannot match either the Alfa or the BMW. Its abilities are too uneven; its drawbacks too telling. It is let down, quite dreadfully, by controls that lack sensitivity (most notably, the steering). Its chassis, although a  huge improvement over the initial, sad, Rover 800 saloon’s, lacks the class of the BMW’s. And the build quality and solidity are still some way short of the BMW 5-series’. It lacks the brio and inspiration of the Alfa - even though it matches, and sometimes beats, the Italian in other areas. Finally, the Vitesse cannot hide its humble breeding: it is the top-line version of the regular Rover Fastback - starting price £12,640. As Honda, Rover’s Japanese bedmate, is responsible for many of these shortcomings, it is only fair to credit it with the Vitesse’s greatest asset: that superb V6, the best engine this side of a Jag V12 ever fitted to a British car (a pity it’s not British).

Choosing between the Alfa and the BMW is trickier. Which qualities are more important? The BMW’s all-round ability or the Alfa’s speed? The BMW’s ride or the Alfa’s sharpness and responsiveness? No question, the BMW is the more complete car, more thoroughly engineered. It is the better car in that it has far fewer faults.

But given that £20,000 will buy you only a 525i, and given the large margin of superiority the more powerful yet similarly priced Alfa offers in both performance and sheer exhilaration, we’d take the Italian car. We’d put up with its chassis foibles, and its torque steer, and its crummy switchgear - and revel in the un¬bridled stimulation that magnificent engine offers, the sports-car responses, that quite gorgeous styling. And be happy in the knowledge that nobody else out there is going to have more fun in a £20,000 saloon.