A prototype of the upcoming iX3, the first vehicle built around BMW’s upcoming Neue Klasse platform, has been out testing again. And like previous test cars, it seems to be fitted with a pair of traditional BMW grille kidneys hidden beneath a section of camouflage in the center of the nose. But will those kidneys really be present on the production car, or is BMW just trolling us? It’s not easy to make out the shape from some angles, but on a few pictures we can again see what looks like the bulging outline of dual-kidney surrounds. They appear to be very different in size to today’s swollen kidneys, and look more like the sort of thing fitted to the iconic E30 3-Series of the 1980s.
You might well be asking asking “why
wouldn’t they be there?” After all, while it’s changed shape and size over the
years, the kidney grille has been fitted to the front of most – but not quite
all – BMW cars in some form or another for 90 years. But if you look at the
various Neue Klasse concept cars we’ve seen so far – the little i Vision
Circular, the i Vision Dee and the latest Vision Neue Klasse – all have
featured the same style of front end that’s very different to what we see on
today’s production BMWs.
Instead of having a pair of kidneys set
into the front of the car, the entire front of those concepts was split into
two, effectively becoming a pair of kidneys. The designers seem to be taking
cues from the full width panels fitted to BMW sedans between the 1960s and
1990s that housed the headlights. And while a concept version of the iX3 isn’t
among the list of show cars unveiled in the past couple of years to prepare us
for BMW’s next generation of vehicles, it seems logical that it would share a
family look with the other cars.
But then, maybe they’ll also get some kind
of small, traditional kidney grille by the time they make it to production
three years from now because BMW isn’t quite ready yet to reinvent its most
famous design feature so radically that some people will no longe recognize it.
Or perhaps it plans to artfully blend the old with the new, much like it did
with the M1, Z1 and original 8-Series. On the other hand, the R&D team
might just be having fun with us, sticking fake kidneys under a chunk of camo
wrap knowing we’ll tie ourselves in knots trying to second-guess the truth.
