It’s been a little over half a year since I’ve bought my BMW M2, and it’s a minor miracle that I haven’t yet done something I’ve done in all my previous cars: scrape the bottom of the front-end. I mean, just look at that intricate shape of the M2’s lower fascia: it is begging to be scraped on a driveway entrance into a Safelite AutoGlass location. That’s how my previously-owned Subaru WRX STI got a really nasty abrasion on its front lip.
Coming from a Porsche 911 GT3 that’s got a plastic front-lip designed to be scraped and replaced, I am an expert in doing all sorts of exotic angles entering and exiting driveways, so avoid impacting the front bumper. Even so, there’s only so much you can do. It takes one momentary lapse or misjudgment of steepness, and there goes the your pristine front-end. This is such a problem for car enthusiasts that there’s been a slight cottage industry of lower bumper protectors for sale.
And yet my M2 remains unharmed under my admittedly clumsy hands. I think the reason is due to the front-end, rear-wheel drive layout: the front overhang is relatively short. Therefore, the front wheels are quick to contact the pavement on driveways, saving the lower front from taking impact. Comparatively, In a front-wheel drive car where there’s more bumper and fender ahead of the front wheels, the chance is higher for the bottom of the bumper to hit the driveway incline before the front wheels can elevate the car upwards.
Of course, now that I’ve written all of this, I naturally just jinxed myself. Within the next few drives, I’ll surely ruin the virgin front-end of the M2. Such as it goes.
Pristine for now.