When the next generation BMW X1 arrives sometime around 2015, it will be based
on a front-wheel drive architecture, sharing its platform with the Mini
Countryman. This isn't new news – stories and editorials have been parsing BMW's
FWD strategy for more than a year, and in April of 2011, now-CEO Ian Robertson
proclaimed there could be six to nine new BMW and Mini models as part of a
"compact car family" based on a shared platform.
A report in Autocar about the switch adds a few more details, though. In
addition to the cost benefits from this arrangement, the next X1 will lose its
six-cylinder engines but offer more room. The tranverse-mounted engines preclude
the six-pot unless BMW redesigns it, so plans are for nothing any larger than
four cylinders and possibly the 1.5-liter, three-cylinder powerplant slated for
the 1 Series GT. A Haldex clutch will continue to provide AWD capability, and
the upshot with the smaller engine bay and firewall moved forward is more room
for passengers and cargo.
The platform is referred to as "UKL," for Unter Klasse (Under Class), and its
place in the product portfolio is apparently more complex than simply saying it
will form the basis for small Mini and BMW models: stories suggest it has been
built with the flexibility to underpin the next generation 1 Series as well as
the next generation 3 Series. No, that does not mean the advent of a front-wheel
drive 3 Series, since the UKL platform was reportedly designed with features
like a movable firewall support enabling transverse and longitudinal engines as
well as FWD, AWD and RWD powertrains. It does, however, mean the ads proclaiming
"This is why we don't make front-wheel drive cars" will probably never surface
again.
