all that keeps coming into my head when it boils down to it is power to weight ratio.
as best my understanding goes and have recently been re-assured that the scale for power to weight ratio is as follows-
if you double the weight you need to * weight by a multiple of 4, that equates to a ratio of 2/1 power/weight,
so:
enigine specs
m10 318i = 105bhp
m20 320i = 129bhp
m20 325i = 170bhp
as a rough guide as i have no weights (will amend if supplied) i will assume that a 6yl is to have an extra 40% in total weight (ENGINE + BOX).
as standard this means that the m20 will need 42bhp extra just to meet the m10, and anything extra it has is halved,
so if the m20 needs a total of 147 bhp to match m10 the actual gain once power to weight has been considered is,
m20 320i = -36bhp
m20 325i = 11.5bhp
SHOCKING EH???
although it does need to be considered that all spesc are not using the same box and diff, so i expect that there is a margin of around 30% error on my calculations (yet again will ammend if flywheel bhp can be supplied)
m10 and m20 ebgines where only chosen as rough comparison aswell
so really the square headed germans where spot on by making the m3 a 4cyl, and also for making f1 cars with 4cyls, and considering that this car ran 1400bhp and was basically an m10
you can't meet the sound of 6cyl with 4 cyl's though








