BMW 650i With 4,800cc V8 Engine Running On CNG [Video]
The BMW 6 series is quite an iconic car. Back in its day, the original 6 series was on sale in both petrol and diesel iterations and as both a coupe and convertible. The 650i was the most monstrous, as it housed a massive V8 petrol engine under its hood. Looks like a person from Gujarat has fitted the BMW 650i with a CNG kit! A BMW V8 running on natural gas- well ladies and gentlemen welcome to India…
This CNG conversion was featured in a video shared on YouTube by Sai Fuel Vadodara. The host starts the video by saying that he’s come all the way to Surat to get a taste of India’s only BMW 650i coupe retrofitted with a CNG kit. The car un question wear s a Blue colour, and is a coupe.
The cabin has a tan colourway to it. After giving us quick looks of the cabin, design, seats and the features onboard, the host shows the CNG button and fuel gauge and starts talking about them. The CNG button sits on the lower right side of the footwell, near the bonnet release pull handle.
We get to see that a Red light is blinking near the CNG switch. The host explains that the vehicle was running low on CNG at the time of filming the video and the same caused the Red light to blink and the system to beep. He then open the 650i’s hood and films the engine bay. We can see the huge engine cover made of fibre, which neatly covers the entire CNG hardware. It is nearly impossible to say that this car runs on CNG, in one glance. It is only when you remove the engine cover that the additional hardware becomes visible.
The host then removes the engine cover on video. We get to see two CNG rails with 4 injectors on each side. This makes it a total of 8 injectors- one for each cylinder. The CNG kit on this BMW is from Zavoli. The vehicle gets a new ECU and CNG pressure gauge as well. The system gets two filling nozzles- one in the front and one at the rear.
The CNG tank (gas cylinder) sits inside the boot. The host opens the tailgate to show this. He says that the installation of the Zavoli CNG system was done by Maruti Auto Gas in Surat. The vehicle gets a 12kg tank that has an effective tank capacity of 8 kg. The refill nozzle can also be seen in the video. Even with the huge tank in place, the 650i’s boot offers decent room- yes, that’s how huge it was back in the day.
The video further also shows how the car revs and its exhaust sound. You can hear the V8 come to life and it sounds great for a CNG powertrain. The car retains its functional quad exhaust tips. The host further takes it for a spin. First, he shuts off the car completely, and starts it again to bypass the low-CNG beeps. Then he starts driving and comments that despite being a CNG car, this BMW 650i delivered well in performance and handling. There is little to be felt in difference in terms of ride, and it had no error codes on the dashboard either.
We are not sure about the actual output figures of this CNG-powered 650i. But back in its day, the 4.8-litre V8 petrol engine on the coupe used to churn out 362 bhp and 489 Nm! It could sprint to 100 kph from a standstill in just 5.5 seconds.