BMW B12 Alpina

Alpina's story began in 1962 when Burkard Bovensiepen developed a Weber dual carburetor for the BMW 1500. This carburetor was well received by the automotive press, as well as BMW's own sales boss Paul G. Hahnemann. In 1964, BMW certified the quality of this Alpina product by awarding BMW vehicles fitted with the Alpina system the full factory guarantee. Alpina Burkard Bovensiepen KG was established on 1 of January, 1965 in Kaufbeuren, Bavaria. The company had eight employees. Although Alpina started by producing typewriters, the original Alpina ceased to exist at the end of the 1960s in their attempt to move into the textile industry. In 1965, Burkard established a BMW tuning business, following his success with investments in the stock market. He started the tuning business in an outbuilding of the original Alpina typewriter factory. The company worked on carburetors and revised cylinder heads. By 1970, with seventy employees, the original facility changed locations from Kaufbeuren to Buchloe. In its first years, Alpina established its core competency tuning carburetors and crankshafts to extract more power from BMW engines, elements that eventually defined the company's logo, which came into being in 1967. Between 1968 and 1977, Alpina cars did very well in competition. The highlight was in 1970, when the team's cars won the European Touring Car Championship, the German Hillclimb Championship, rally and track racing championships and the prestigious Spa 24 Hours. Alpina officially withdrew from racing in 1988 because of capacity limitations and restrictions. Tied to this was the decision to begin production of a new set of BMW Alpina automobiles. Since 1983 Alpina has been recognized by the German Federal Ministry of Transport as an automobile manufacturer, thus Alpina-built cars are branded and registered as Alpina instead of BMW, although an Alpina can be bought and serviced at some BMW dealerships, and covered if there is a warranty issue. BMW’s vast experience making inline six engines gave the company a leg when it came to designing and producing a V-12. The M70 V-12 engine is a pair of M20 six-cylinder engines joined at a 60-degree V angle that share a common crank. The M60 shared bore and stroke dimensions, use a pair of ECUs along with two distributors, a set of six-cylinder plug wires and even two air filters from the smaller engine. however, they share very few other parts and no part of the rotating assembly. BMW cast the V-12’s block in Alusil, a hypereutectic aluminium- silicon alloy, as opposed to the M20’s cast-iron affair. They introduced throttle-by-wire and a mass airflow sensor with the M70, features that found their way in nearly every BMW within a few years. In factory spec, the M70 made an even 300ps and torque was a robust 332-lb. ft. Alpina left alone the M70’s engine block, crankshaft, connecting rods and the intake and exhaust manifolds. They fit higher compression Mahle pistons, larger intake valves and a set of worked over cams along with commensurate work to the cylinder heads to improve breathing. A new exhaust system and catalytic converter rounded out the hard changes to the engines and a reprogrammed set of Motronic ECUs. The reengineering and enhancement of the M70 for the B12 resulted in 49 additional horsepower taking the V12 power unit from the standard 300BHP to 345BHP by using lighter pistons, bigger valves, high lift camshafts and a recalibrated Bosch Motronic ECU for each cylinder bank. The 0-62MPH time dropped to 6.9seconds (from 8.0seconds) and the top speed increased to a de-limited 174MPH. The B12 coupe came fitted with four-speed automatic. With the redline raised from 6000 to 6400 RPM, Alpina reprogrammed their cars four-speed automatic transmissions electrons so that full-throttle downshifts made the most of the rev range to keep the lower gear until redline forced an upshift. The Alpina cars came with the suspensions designed for improved handling without any ride detriment. On the B12 this consisted of fitting different springs and Bilstein shocks along with signature Alpina 20-spoke wheels. This unique, rare and outstanding Alpina B12 5.0 V12 Coupe is one of only 5 right hand drive vehicles ever produced. The vehicle was imported from the UK a few years ago. She is in an immaculate condition and although her sleek beautiful lines typify an 8 series, the B12 shows a degree of masculinity and purpose reminding us that this is a very special performance GT car.