The BMW M5 is available in India at a price of Rs. 98.90 lakhs (ex-Delhi).

What you’ll like:

• 560 BHP in a spacious 4-door sedan. Racetrack & family on weekends, office on weekdays
• The F10's universally pleasing exteriors look extra sweet with the ///M kit
• Individually adjustable settings for throttle, steering, suspension and gear-shifts
• Brilliant 7-speed dual-clutch transmission with a superb manual-shift mode
• Excellent dynamics; rides like it's on rails and holds flat around corners
• Optional 5 year / 100,000 kms service & maintenance package

What you won’t:

• Steering has minor vibrations at times. Lacks the involvement & feedback of the E60 steering
• No longer a high-revving, naturally aspirated V10. Enthusiasts will find the exhaust note quite
muted
• No manual transmission offered on the RHD version sold in India
• Lack of spare tyre. No run-flats either
• Steep CBU pricing takes the onroad tag to well over Rs. 1 crore
• Requires an understanding of what buttons to press to get the desired performance levels
NOTE: Click any picture to open a larger high-res version in a new window.

This is BMW’s latest generation of its ultimate 'Ultimate Driving Machine'.

Internationally, the M5 has only a handful of true competitors. Cadillac’s Corvette-engined CTS-V
stands out as rather impressive, the mind-hammering GTR is the performance king of the hill (but
you can’t really count it as a 4-seater), the barking mad Mercedes E63 AMG has a few grey hairs
now, and the ghost of Audi’s RS6 is in the process of being resurrected, but only as a wagon it seems.

The M5’s 4.4 liter V8 Twin-turbo is at the heart of this muscled up 5-series. What’s different for this
generation M5 is the presence of twin-turbos feeding it air. That's a first; every other M5 before has
been naturally aspirated. Remember the E60? It set the bar high with a 5.0L V10 that revved up to a
staggering 8,250 rpm. The BMW Sauber F1 team had a part to play in that.

Let’s compare the stats on paper. The F10 M5 has 10% more peak power, 30% more max torque and
uses 30% less fuel than the E60 - thanks to the ever tightening environmental laws. Peak power is a
very respectable 560 hp @ 6,000 - 7,000 rpm. More impressive yet is the width of the torque band;
680 Nm @ 1,500 - 5,750 rpm! The V8 redlines at 7,200 rpm and, needless to say, it has direct
injection and variable valve control too. Engine for engine, it’s an apples to pears comparison – but
the newer gen is more powerful and faster, although most feel that it loses out to the singing V10
when it comes to rhapsody.

The M5 has a twin-scroll, twin-turbo setup, meaning there are in fact 2 turbos, each of which uses
the twin-scroll technology (enhanced turbo performance at low rpms). There’s even a cross-pipe
across both banks to reduce turbo lag, and water cooled intercoolers to bump up the power output.
0-100 kph comes up in a claimed 4.4 seconds.

I started off this test drive a little reluctantly for a few reasons. Firstly, size-wise, I think of the new 5-
series as a bit of a boat. I wasn’t sure of taking it up a 2-way narrow mountain road for fear of
someone else getting too close. Secondly, 560 BHP - that’s a fair deal in a rear wheel drive car when
climbing a tempting ghat with open drops at many places. Lastly, no spare tyre! I saved BMW’s
roadside assistance number on my phone to help with that one. However, I’ll admit that after driving
the car for a day, I completely grew into it. I felt comfortable with the M5 and, with the right button
presses, the car seemed to shrink around me and lose half its weight too. These were all non-issues.

Monte Carlo blue looks absolutely stunning on the car. Everyone from elementary school kids to old
ladies shopping in the Panchgani market was giving it a second look. It’s gorgeous. Even the pictures
don’t do this shade justice. The more car-inclined will notice the subtle differences that this sleeper
of a 5-series has over its less endowed siblings. Rippling muscle creates prominent lines on the
bonnet. The front bumper is more aggressive, the side gills with the M5 badge hint at something
special, and of course the four pipes at the rear which emit most of that throaty roar.

The M5 has 117 mm of ground clearance. Don’t go purely by the numbers, a lot of this has to do
with where exactly the lowest components are placed on the underside of the car. Thankfully,
ground clearance was never an issue across all kinds of roads in Maharashtra. We obviously took a
lot of care with the 1-crore monster, but that doesn’t mean we didn’t drive her through some very
broken stretches too (carefully).

Suggested tyre pressures range from 36 – 48 psi, depending on load and tyre size. We ran the review
at 42 psi on the 20”ers. The double 5-spoke wheels are fairly airy, and put on display the 15.7” discs
with their 6-piston brake calipers. Let me rephrase that for thought. Just the discs are bigger than
the wheels you typically see on hatchbacks and C & D segment sedans in India!
It's quite a long car, yet dimensions will be forgotten once you get in the driver seat:
A tight rear end with quad pipes - this view is probably the most reminiscent of its predecessors:
The long muscular hood with a bit of a power-bulge:
Bi-Xenon projectors:
A true wolf in sheep's clothing:
L-shaped tail-lamps, just like the regular 5 & 7 series:
Don't miss the Team-BHP stickers on the front air-dam. Neat placement eh?
Cosmetic modifications make the M5 look a lot sharper at the front than any other 5-series:
The optional 20" wheels are huge, yet the view is mostly taken up by the massive brake discs:
15.7" discs at the front. 15.6" at the rear. Note the tiny video camera on the front of the wheel-arch.
More on that in a while:
The duality of the M5 is excellent. It's at home in crawling city traffic as well as on the open
racetrack:
Noopster's Swift next to the M5 provides an interesting size comparison (for the cars and the wheels
too!):
LED Corona rings at work after a hard day of playing:

Grab the keys to the M5 and you’ll notice that the key fob feels rather plasticy. Nothing about it says
///M either. Would have been nice to have a sporty key fob with the M logo on it. On the center
console, just between the cup holders, there’s a little nook designed for you to dock the key-fob
into. Neat.

When you close the door, you’ll notice the soft-closing function at work. You only need to move the
door to the closed position (without slamming it shut forcefully) and you’ll hear electric motors
whirring to pull the door in and shut it tight. I can’t say I think this feature is particularly useful, but it
sure is nice to never re-open and shut an improperly closed door.

Switch the car on. Not only does the steering move slightly down into position, even the side-
bolsters of the seats move inwards to hug you in place. The steering is fairly chunky. Small hands just
barely manage to wrap around it. It’s quite a deep rim, and the gear paddles are mounted very close
to the back of it. If you try to hold just the wheel at the 9 o`clock & 3 o`clock positions (without
interacting with the paddles), they will foul with your fingertips. You need to put your fingers behind
the paddles instead. Once you accept this, it is very natural. Paired with the beautiful gearbox, it’s a
plus for any enthusiast. The paddles are perfectly positioned if you want to use them all the time.
The horn is reachable and can be operated with just a firm thumb, unlike a lot of German cars. The
only complaint I have here is that, when gripping the wheel firmly during extended periods of
enthusiastic driving, my palms got a tad sweaty due to the material used on the steering.

The 12-way adjustable seats are the best I’ve ever sat on. I have a pretty bad lower back problem
and sitting in a car for even an hour is usually a painful challenge. However, after spending 6 hours
and 300+ kms in the M5 on day 1, my back actually felt better than when I first got into the car! The
passenger seat has exactly the same adjustments and has 2 memory positions as well. Both the front
seats are ventilated.

Despite the supremely comfortable seats, note that the firmer suspension and constant road noise
(20” wheels) can induce fatigue for passengers on long trips. On concreted roads, there is a lot of
tyre noise and a surprising amount of wind noise too. Even if you’re in top gear at 1,100 rpm in the
M5, there’s something "busy" about it. Probably a combination of the engine note and road noise.
This is an area in which the diesel powered BMW 530d beats the M5 - it's a much more relaxing car
to long distance cruise in, and its just 2 seconds slower in the 0-100 dash. It costs about half as much
as well. Naturally a lot of enthusiast-customers who just want a quick 5-series will find that the 530d
covers almost all their needs.

Visibility is excellent. Some neck-craning is required on winding roads, but that’s expected. On the
unlit and winding mountain roads, I wished that the demo car came equipped with the optional
“Adaptive Headlights”. These are worth ordering if you do a lot of night driving on curvy roads, as
they point the headlight beams toward the direction in which the car is turning. The M gets a fairly
boat-like 12.6 meter turning circle (6.3 m turning radius). That’s noticeably wider than the regular 5-
Series’ 11.95 meters. This is because the steering system is set up to accommodate much wider
wheels on the M5, thereby restricting the amount they can turn at full lock. It will not do your
standard 2-lane road to 2-lane road U-turn in one shot, unless you go wide on the entry.

The audio system is good, but only after you cross a certain volume. Below that, it’s ordinary. The
driver can scroll through songs on the MID whilst the passenger plays with something else on the
iDrive.

Strangely enough, one of the most commonly found things in a car is one of the M5's biggest
advantages. The rear seat. Simply because it has one. It's not just for kids, it's the full fledged 5-
series back seat which has decent head and leg room. A rare find in a 550+ bhp car.

Switching off the M5 is one of the more complicated operations. It’s just not intuitive and lacks
proper feedback from the car. More often than not, you’ll be faced with a “Gearbox position P not
engaged” error message on the MID. This is ironic, since the gear lever doesn’t have any mention of
a “P” position at all! What you need to do is take your foot OFF the brake pedal and press the
start/stop button to turn off the engine. This is stupid because the car will roll if you’re on an incline,
so you need to activate the handbrake first. It's a very roundabout procedure.

Another sore point is the lack of a spare tyre. As I mentioned earlier, the first thing I did in
preparation for the Mahabaleshwar trip was to save BMW’s Roadside Assistance number in my
phonebook. Late nights, bad roads and highways will be the M5's natural habitat in India – and it’s
always a risk when there’s no spare tyre on board.
Meaty steering wheel:

The bottom 1/3rd of the speedo and tacho is a colour LCD display ("Black Panel Display"). I really like
its versatility:
Note the "M1" and "M2" memory buttons for quickly switching into your saved driving profiles:
The chunky paddles sit very close to the steering rim:
Push the little ///M gearshift to the right to engage sequential manual mode. It doesn't have a park
position or button!
Brilliant 12-way seats. Sorry they're a bit dirty. The backrest can tilt forward and back in two
individual parts:
Missing a pedal, but I won't complain too much. I'm glad that the brake isn't one of those massive
oversized pedals:
Cameras on the front wheel arches give you a perpendicular view to the left and right. Useful when
you want to look out for traffic whilst pulling out of a driveway. The yellow line marks the front edge
of the car:

Buttons to close the motorized boot lid. The second one closes the boot and locks the car.
Convenient after you're done unloading:
No spare tyre. I hope you like walking:

\
The Nerve-Center:

If you ever plan to get behind the wheel of an F10 M5, you should probably read this. The
personality of the M5 comes down to 5 little buttons which make a night and day difference
to the car’s behaviour. Each one has roughly 3 settings, resulting in 486 possible
permutations of behavior. Sure, even if you discount the several combinations that are nearly
identical, you’re still left with enough vastly different combinations to give the M5 a handful
of very distinct personalities. It’s the kind of multiple personality disorder you’ll enjoy
experiencing. If you don’t press the right buttons, you may as well be taking your Dad’s E250
out for a spin. Choose the right settings and you have granular control over the Throttle,
Steering, Suspension, Driver Assist and Gearbox behavior. It took me more than a day to
figure out exactly what settings I liked for a particular driving condition, but once I found
them, I truly began enjoying the car.

Luckily, there are two “M” buttons on the steering wheel where you can save your chosen
combination of settings. Set the car up the way you want and long press “M1” or “M2” to
store those settings to that button – it’s just like the memory seat function. To activate, short
press the M1 or M2 steering button to switch into that setup. If you want to switch back to the
default comfort settings quickly, press the same M button again. You can even save settings
with the ESP turned down, if you’re naughty like me. However, to switch to a profile with a
reduced ESP setting, you’ll be required to press the chosen M button twice in order to
confirm at the “Are you sure?” MID prompt. Probably a good thing, as you don’t want to
accidentally press the button and have a surprise by dancing sideways off a mountain road.

Throttle:
Efficient : You can’t really have any fun in this setting, even though your car is an M5. It’s
purely for laid-back cruising. Even the occasionally spirited overtaking move in traffic seems
dull. I’d suggest never going lower than 'Sport mode' throttle in the city when you’re driving
yourself. This is chauffeur mode.

Sport : Feels more like an M5 now. You get all the benefits and a fair deal of throttle
response without the extreme sensitivity of Sport+.

Sport+ : The A-pedal gets a lot more sharp and quick with its responses, which can induce a
bit of jerkiness if you’re trying to modulate the accelerator at slower speeds. Not
recommended for traffic. This is for driving enthusiastically on an open road.
Suspension
Comfort : They call it comfort, but it's still very firm...significantly firmer than the regular
F10 5-series. That said, it’s not a bone jarring ride at all. The ride is actually quite impressive
for a car riding on 20" wheels.

Sport : This is a good in-between. The ride, though firm, is nothing to complain about, even
on 20” wheels. Body roll gets noticeably reduced. Enough for you to push this barge into
corners and have her stay as flat as a go-kart. Traction is more reliable too (see below).

Sport+ : Too choppy for Indian conditions. On a road like the Bandra-Worli Sea Link, it had
me feeling a bit sick with the sharp vertical movements on the road’s expansion joints. In this
setting, the traction control light will come on more frequently as well. Why? Because the
very firm suspension tends to do a poorer job of keeping the tyres pressed firmly over rough
patches on the road. On our less than perfect Indian roads, even mild disturbances in the
surface will break traction, and you’ll feel the ESP cut the throttle for a split second or so.
Save this setting for those rare patches of meandering black silk. It’ll be worth it then! The
car feels 500 kilos lighter when you switch to this setting, body roll is extinguished and the
M5 feels incredibly eager to turn-in to corners.
Steering
Comfort : Naturally the lightest setting. I’d probably pick this one for my daily drive in the
city. The only difference I could tell between all the steering settings was steering weight.
There was no difference in response or feedback. I’m a fan of light steerings and there’s
nothing wrong with this light setting during spirited driving. However, in this case, I chose
something a little heavier just to mirror the car’s true attributes!

Sport : A nice level of weight. No noticeable change in feedback. Yet again, a good middle of
the road option.

Sport+ : Becomes very heavy. Too heavy for in-city driving for most people. It’s almost like
the 3-series E90 hydraulic with a larger diameter steering wheel. Once in motion, it’s nice,
but probably better for flowing corners than roads with very quick left-rights.
Gearbox
Auto 1 : Sloppy and oh-so-boring. I didn’t really use this setting. I guess you could switch
into this mode if you’re using the M5 to bring your new born child home from the hospital.

Auto 2 : More like your typical auto-box, but with silky smooth dual-clutch (DCT) shifts you
won’t even notice. It will go to the redline, but only on kick-down. Good for day to day stuff.

Auto 3 : This is like the “sport” mode you find in some sporty cars with A/Ts. It will hold the
lowest possible gear right up to the redline. It does a great job of it too. When you want to
concentrate a 100% on your throttle, braking and steering only – this will get the job done.

Manual 1 : I didn’t use this much. I guess it’s for people who want to shift this auto-box
manually even during more relaxed driving. Didn’t make a lot of sense to me. If I’m going
manual, I’m stepping up the shift-aggression setting and putting some heart into it!

Manual 2 & 3 : Difference is that, in 2 there is more of a gradual revv-match, in 3 it’s a super
fast shift. Make no mistake, “gradual” is a relative term as both modes are extremely fast and
responsive by any measure. These are the settings I’d highly recommend to an enthusiast.
The gearbox is brilliant…more on this later.
ESP
On : This is the default every time you switch the car on, and most drivers should stick to it.
Even though the yellow ESP light rarely comes on, the system is still constantly working in
small unobtrusive ways.

MDM : Stands for “M Dynamic Mode”. Short press the ESP button and a persistent yellow
“MDM” lights up on the instrument cluster. This mode lets you break traction and work in
some oversteer if you’re heavy on the throttle whilst cornering. It’s a fun mode, and even
though it does eventually rein you in at a higher threshold, it’s best not used by inexperienced
drivers or on busy public roads. I switched to this mode on an empty stretch of twisties - and
it was extremely easy to get the tail out. Interestingly, when I tried it on a desolate straight
line stretch, acceleration felt quicker too, especially near the redline (since there’s less
interference from the ESP).

ESP Off : You need to switch into this mode to activate launch control. More on launch
control later in the review, but even with ESP OFF, there’s no way the car is being allowed to
put down full power in the lower gears. Use this mode if you’re on a deserted and very-wide
stretch of tarmac, or around corners if you want to claim insurance and buy a Mercedes E63
instead.
After driving for a day, these are the settings that I eventually settled on:
M1 : (A milder setup) Throttle: S+, Suspension: Sport (not plus), Steering: Sport+, Gearbox:
Manual + Medium shifts.
M2 : (For short bursts of fun where the situation allowed it) Same as above, except Gearbox:
Manual + Aggressive shifts & ESP: ///M Dynamic Mode (MDM).
* When I found some silky smooth roads, I switched the M1 profile’s suspension over to
Sport+ to see what it was all about.
** These M buttons are really useful and cool.
Steering

For the first few kilometers, the steering didn't impress me. There were high frequency
vibrations coming through the wheel when going straight down a well-kept concrete road at
Bandra reclamation. This happened even with the steering set to comfort mode. It can get
irritating (think vibrating massager making your hands numb). However, after day 1, I didn’t
notice the vibration issue again - probably because I wasn't driving on concrete roads after
that. Despite these tiny vibrations having made their way through at times, it’s surprisingly
not the most communicative steering. Yes, the steering is a hydraulic unit (unlike the plain
jane 5-series which has EPS), but there’s still something artificial about it. Most people
would guess that it was an EPS. Just like the rest of the car, a lot of the “feedback” has been
somewhat dampened out. It's a luxury sedan at the end of the day.

The steering doesn’t really feel quick on-center, but it’s a variable ratio, so I never once had
to shuffle my hands whilst coming up a twisty ghat section (barring the few times I had to
dial in some opposite lock around a corner whilst in MDM mode!). What started off as a
rather unimpressive steering (perhaps due to high expectations) eventually gelled well with
the whole package. It wasn't full of life, but it was direct, responsive and quick enough. I had
no complaints by the end of it.

Engine & Transmission

Even if you’re in “D” mode, the car will not move forward until you step on the gas. This is
unlike conventional automatics where the car will lug forward as soon as you release the
brakes. Being a dual-clutch transmission, it doesn’t begin to engage the clutch till the
accelerator pedal is pressed. The downside of this is that the car will roll backward if you are
on an incline (hill hold only stays active for a second or two after you release the brake
pedal). Don’t make the mistake of thinking you are in Neutral and try to revv her up – you’ll
probably end up bolting into the car in front of you.

To truly enjoy the M5, you have to either be in the most aggressive “D” mode gearshift
setting, or in any of the manual gearshift modes. There’s just no other way to have fun with
the M5.

Have you ever downshifted 5 consecutive times at 95 kph without busting your transmission?
The M5’s 7-speed box lets you do this - from top gear to 2nd without a fuss. The 7,200 rpm
redline helps. You feel like doing 60 kph in 7th gear instead? No problem, thanks to the super
spread of torque from the V8. Even though there’s a lot of torque low down in the RPM
range, it’s around 2,700 - 3,000 rpm where you feel the twin-turbos really begin to spool up
and the M5 starts to pull like a train. When you get to 6,000 rpm, that’s when things get
extreme. The road gets slurped under the big hood, and you need to remember to keep
looking ahead. The car needs a lot of space to be let loose like this (hard to get on most
Indian roads). With this kind of monster power and limited traction, I’m fairly sure 1st gear is
highly crippled by the traction control system. It tops out at 55 kph, so it’s a fairly short ratio
too. There’s no way all the power is being let through in 1st gear, even when the ESP is
‘completely turned off’. 2nd and 3rd gear are a lot more thrilling, especially near the redline.

2nd gear was by far my favourite. It’s usable from 4 kph all the way to 105 kph! Switch into
third and you’ll be doing silly speeds before you know it. I stuck to 2nd on most hill climbs
and descents. It was like having an in-built speed limiter; useful, as it’s pretty easy to lose
track of what speed you’re doing in this car. Occasionally, even though I didn’t have to, I
popped it into 1st for some extra kick in the slowest of corners, and momentarily slipped into
3rd as the road opened up on a few occasions. I’m the kind of guy who would rather do 60 in
a corner than 160 in a straight line. I’m not a huge fan of high speeds. 2nd gear was perfect. It
let me hug the racing line, flirt with the turbo-zone and kiss the redline on many a deserted
stretch.

For more relaxed driving, this engine + gearbox combination is incredibly versatile too. Once
you cross 20 kph, you can shift into 3rd. Slow speed cruising at 30 - 50 kph is easily managed
in 4th & 5th gear, with the engine ticking over lazily at <1,500 rpm. 42 kph can get you into
5th. Note that the transmission will always downshift at these speeds too, regardless of what
gearbox mode you’re in. This includes 1st gear, which is only engaged at speeds lower than
<5 kph. The M5 actually doesn’t like shifting into 1st. Maybe it’s a longer shift pattern for
the DCT, or maybe the engineers thought they’d save the drivetrain the stress of all that
torque being multiplied by the 1st gear’s low ratio.

In manual gearshift mode with throttle on its most sensitive setting, lifting off the pedal
produces a significant amount of deceleration, especially in 1st and 2nd gears. You don’t get
this kind of directness with slushbox automatics. This also makes holding a gear when going
downhill brilliant. There’s a nice pop from the exhaust when you lift off the throttle suddenly
in Sport+ mode. Almost like a small well-damped valve closing. Unlike the E60, this M5
doesn’t like to scream. In fact, the exhaust note is fairly muted since two big turbos sit right
along the path of the exhaust gases. The semi-muted rumble and grunt is the closest to a vocal
conversation you’ll have with the F10. It seems that the car was even quieter before BMW
played some tricks. In somewhat of a controversial move, the boys at Bavaria decided to use
a pre-recorded audio track of the M5 engine and pipe it through the car’s audio system at
times of need! Yep, you heard me right. Some of the sound you hear in the cabin is actually
coming from the music system. I’m not a huge fan of this move. Surely there’s a more honest
and true way to do it. That said, I couldn’t pinpoint any noise that sounded suspect.

Fuel cost might not be a big concern for people who spend crores on cars, but tank range
definitely is. Nobody wants to keep stopping at the pump every hour, especially when good
quality + high octane fuel are hard to find. As a result of its thirst, the M5 has a fuel tank that
is 10 liters bigger (than the regular 5-series) to give it that little extra range.

As much of a hardcore true manual-transmission fan that I am, there is no denying the huge
advantages the DCT provides. Being able to shift gears without ever having to take your
second hand off the wheel for one. The paddles become second nature for sequential manual
mode and before you know it, you’re downshifting without having to think about it. Some
people might complain that the manual M5 isn’t being offered in India – the purists, y’know.
But then, think about it, what about this super tech-loaded, extremely bi-polar, twin-turbo’d
M5 is ‘purist’, other than the name?

///M View HUD

One of the add-ons that comes with the ///M badge is the “M-View” HUD. It’s the same
impressive and useful colour HUD hardware that you see on other top-end BMWs. However,
the M5 gets a different enthusiast oriented display layout. There’s a large gear number
readout in the center and a small speed indicator beside it. Arching above is a set of two arcs,
one for the RPM sweep and the other a set of 8 shift-lights. The animated digital sweep of the
RPM meter is not something I ever took notice of while driving. The car keeps you busy
enough with other things when you’re trying to work your way through the exhilarating
turbo-zone right up to the redline. However, the shift lights on the HUD are excellent and
useful. They grab your attention and give you enough forewarning as the 6 orange boxes light
up one after the other. You need to pull that right paddle soon, or else the final two red boxes
light up, the ECM cuts fuel reluctantly and the exhaust bumbles-grumbles in protest, you
amateur.

The M-view heads up display is SUPERB when shifting gears manually. Without it, you
really wouldn’t have a clue as to which one of the 7 gears you’re in. It’s really the perfect
complement to manual-shift mode. I only wish that the HUD on/off setting could also be
stored in the steering wheel M button profiles, as the HUD button itself is hard to get to. The
settings led me to believe this might be possible, but I couldn’t get the same to work.

Suspension & Handling

1,945 kgs. Oh man, what a fatty. Why couldn’t I be driving the M3 instead? Beggars can’t be
choosers, but surely those with good fortune can wish for even better fortune, right?

Well, I was wrong. Never judge a car by its spec sheet. The M5 can do ballet. Not because it
was born to do it, but because of some incredibly talented engineers and a touch of legacy
too. The electro-hydraulic dampers completely transform the car. No doubt BMW’s ‘sorted’
chassis dynamics form a great starting point too. Switch to the firmer suspension settings and
her personality changes. Every corner will have her full devotion. No more cordial turn-ins
with some relaxed body roll. The body shell stays flat and the M5 begins to react to turning
instructions before you can complete your sentences.

As you’d expect from a car like this, road holding is excellent. If you’ve got the right setup
(see earlier post), you can steer her a bit using the brake and throttle. In MDM mode, if
you’re heavy on the throttle, it’s quite easy to lose the tail or just let it hang out a little. For
day to day driving, the “Comfort” mode is decent (even with the 20” wheels on our test car).
It’s not cushy, but it’s not at all painful either.

Braking
Well, this is starting to become a bit of a habit. Our test car didn’t have the sharpest brakes.
Not because the M5 brakes aren’t great, but because the brake-lines have probably been
boiled on multiple occasions – being a demo car. That said, even with the slightly soft pedal,
she didn’t give us any heart-attacks. Speed was shed effortlessly, the ABS didn’t ever kick in
and there wasn’t even a mild hint of twitchiness. Not surprising, since the discs are bigger
than anything dominos has on their menu.

Launch Control

Unfortunately, these days driver skill has to a great extent been replaced with knowing which
combination of buttons to press. When it comes to getting a high-powered RWD car off the
line, it usually takes some trial and error. However, auto trannies simplify the process, and by
using all the sensors and authority the car has at its disposal, launch control manages to find
the perfect balance between power and traction. You'd think it should be as easy as pressing a
button, but it's a fairly complex setup procedure! The end result is a crisp launch with
minimal drama. In fact, the car seems to move the first meter or so rather slowly before
chirping the tyres a little and then shooting off. The M5 will up-shift for you even in manual
mode, as long as you still have the pedal pressed to the floor. Once everything is eventually
set up (which is the hard part), even grandma could take the M5 from 0 - 100 km/h in 4.4
seconds.

To activate launch control:

1. Warm up the car (drive 15 kms)

2. Set Steering, Suspension and Throttle to the highest, Sport+ setting
3. Gearshift to manual mode
4. Change gearshift to the 3rd (i.e. harshest) setting
5. Turn off DSC completely (LONG-press the button for 3-5 seconds)
6. Left foot brake very lightly, just enough to turn on the brake lights
7. Push and hold the gear shifter forward
8. Chequered flag saying “Launch control active” appears on the instrument cluster
9. You can take your foot off the brake now if you want
10. Floor the accelerator (and keep it there). The car will only revv till about 3,000 -
4,000 rpm
11. Optional: Use the cruise control to adjust the launch rpms up or down depending on
the surface
12. Release the gear-shift from the forward position, and you’re off!
13. To prevent overworking the car, you might not be allowed to engage launch control
again for a few minutes

Other Points:

• For more details on the F10 5-series, take a look at our official review here.

• The M-view HUD doesn’t show whether you’re in "D" or Manual mode. It always displays the gear
number, regardless. In the extremely harsh Indian sun, the reflection of the HUD cut out in the dash
is somewhat visible on the windshield.

• Planning to buy an M5? Like most big-wheeled sports cars, for Indian roads we’d recommend you
stick with the stock sized 19” wheels, instead of the optional 20”ers.

• BMW's much loved BSI package is offered for the M5 too. Costing 5.6 Lakhs, it'll cover virtually all
your service and warranty repair costs for 5 yrs / 100,000 kms.

• If the (electrically-activated) parking brake is engaged and you start accelerating, it deactivates
automatically. Almost as if the Parking brake has been modified to replicate Merc’s much better
implemented “Brake Hold” feature. This is probably nice for convenience (e.g. stopping at red lights,
pulling the parking brake switch, and then starting off without having to release it), but since it’s not
conventional "always-on" parking brake behavior, it could prove to be dangerous!

• Keyless entry and start are cool. Even the rear door handles are touch sensitive and will unlock the
car when someone with the key touches them. Nifty when you want to dump bags on the rear seat
before getting into the front.

• Drive the M5 with the windows down and you’ll hear a constant tick-tick-tick-tick noise every time
you accelerate on a bumpy surface, or get on the throttle too soon coming out of a corner. What is
that? It’s the traction control system working! You’ll be surprised at how early and constantly it kicks
in, even when not driving aggressively. The ESP does a brilliant job without making itself obvious
(unless you hit a bad patch of road and power gets noticeably throttled for a second or two). You'd
have to be a real schmuck to get yourself in trouble when the M5 is fully armed.

• Despite the M5’s ideal octane being RON 98 (minimum 95), our entire road test was done on
regular fuel, since 97 octane was out of stock! We even poured in a few more liters at Wai and
Mahabaleshwar. Absolutely no problems with the fuel; however I’m sure that the engine was not
performing at its absolute optimum output due to the lower octane sauce.

• Despite the high altitude, the car actually felt peppier in Mahabaleshwar. Probably because of the
significantly cooler air (and rarer air doesn’t affect forced induction cars much). In Bombay however,
the car seemed like it was comparatively lower on power. Not sure if it was because of the fuel at
the last place we filled up, or the significantly higher ambient temperatures. We never saw an
average fuel efficiency figure that was outside the 4-6 kpl range, as per the iDrive.

• You can hear 2 electric cooling pumps wind down slowly for a few minutes after the car has been
turned off.