General questions and very important

I would ask your fellow BMW drivers in Saudi Arabia. BMW tests their cars in Death Valley which gets even hotter. I would buy a light colored car!

From the Pahrump Valley Times ------ As one Mercedes engineer put it, talking about the road between Beatty and the bottom of Death Valley, “We can’t duplicate that grade over that distance in that heat anywhere in the world.” That makes that particular road a great place to test brakes and cooling systems, but these auto makers are testing much more, and it is part of a larger U.S. road testing program. BMW engineer Max Braun says that they have to justify the overseas trip to company executives every year. The argument is that test track facilities are continually improving, and testing on a track back home would save a lot of money, including the nearly $1 million cost of shipping the cars and equipment. As one BMW representative put it, “If you want to make a premium car, you have to spend some money.” However, although tests conducted on a test track can answer the questions they are designed to answer, they do not reveal issues that can arise in real-world driving situations. Braun says that company executives understand the need for the road tests once they have visited and driven in the locations and under the conditions faced here. The landscape and driving conditions in Europe are so different from those in the U.S. that manufacturers build some mechanical differences into the cars intended for the different markets. BMW, for instance, does not test cars for the European market here. That is done in Granada, Spain. You would think that the test drivers would be pushing the cars to their limits, racing down the highway as fast as possible, but that is not the case. What they want to test is how the cars perform when driven as as actual owners would use them. As an example, Braun says that “people in Death Valley will stop and leave their cars idling with their air conditioners running, which increases the idle speed while they walk around taking pictures.” This is one of the things that the test drivers simulate. He says that temperatures in the engine and fuel system will rise for a time when the engine is turned off after getting hot, then there is the chance of bubbles forming in the fuel resulting in what’s called vapor lock. That is another thing they test for in the heat of Death Valley.

they drive around all day in Phoenix- check the temps there- the BMW is tested to operate correctly in temperatures up to 150 degrees F.