BMW M1 by Harald Ertl

Just over a month ago we reported on a very special BMW M1, which was converted for the use of LPG by a few companies and driven by journalist and racing driver Harald Ertl as a record vehicle together with BP. At the time of the report, we assumed that the record car, which today is in a very poor condition and was sold during a Coys auction at the Techno Classica for about 160,000 euros, was a pure one-off vehicle. Understandably, our astonishment was great when we recently visited the Classic Remise in Düsseldorf and found this special M1 in the showroom of a resident provider of classic car leasing. But something was wrong with the picture. The car in the shop window was in excellent condition, with black metallic paint instead of dark blue and cream leather, where the record car shows black. That couldn’t be the same car.

After a brief conversation with Marcus Keller of Comco Classic Car Leasing, where this M1 is on display, it became clear: Harald Ertl and the company C.A.R., which he founded together with advertising expert Gerhard Freudenberg, had converted a second M1, but only visually. While the record vehicle got some engine modifications to run on LPG and then received significantly more power via turbocharging, this second car still has the original inline six-cylinder engine with 286 hp. Even the manual five-speed gearbox and the chassis were apparently unaffected. But this M1, which was originally delivered in orange, also received the new bodywork, developed by the company Seger & Hoffmann from arami fibers. According to our information, even a certain Mr Walter Wolf may have been involved with the design. Based on a model in the wind tunnel they found a good, streamlined shape, which was then reshaped from large plastic parts to cover the M1 skeleton with them instead of the original bodywork.

Already since the late 1950s, the so-called NACA ducts were used in the automotive industry. They simultaneously are very streamlined and suck enough cooling air to the brakes, the engine and other components requiring cooling. Their shape is typical trapezoidal, with the short end pointing in the direction of travel and the inner surface descending toward the wide end. At the BMW M1 by Harald Ertl, these NACA ducts aren’t only visible at the numerous air vents, but the design also uses it from the roof in direction of the rear wing. Below it sit the darkened taillights of the Opel Monza as an unusual detail.

Inside, the second converted BMW M1 features white leather on the ASS sports seats, the center tunnel and the lower part of the center console. Whether the fashion designer Michael Pfeiffer from Munich was responsible for the interior design of this car as he was for the record vehicle before, or whether a supplier of Lamborghini was asked to do it, can no longer be clarified. However, it can be said with certainty that the one who engraved the metal badge behind the gear knob didn’t knew the racing driver Harald Ertl. Otherwise, he probably would have spelled the name correctly. From various speakers the Blaupunkt audio system delivers very decent music quality, which makes up for the prescriber. Maybe one day there will be a meeting of the two BMW M1s with special bodywork made by C.A.R. and we would very much like to be there as well.

Images: Matthias Kierse