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BMW reminds us what made the original M3 so great

Just because many are slavering for the global debut of the 2016 BMW M2 at the Detroit Motor Show doesn't mean BMW will let us forget the coupe that gave the letter "M" its global moxie: the M3. The Roundel has posted the first in a five-part series devoted to that seminal M, the 1987-1991 E30. Built as a homologation requirement for the race car BMW needed to beat Mercedes 190E 2.3/16V in the German Touring Car Championship, it was 1.5 times more expensive than the 325i of the time and company sales heads had doubts about being able to sell all 5,000 of them. As we know, that story had a happy ending. The first models came with a 2.3-liter four-cylinder with 195 horsepower, a chopped and tuned combination of the four-cylinder M10 block first used in 1962 and in Formula 1, with a cylinder head from the six-cylinder M88 that did duty in the M1. By the time the M3 Sport Evolution models marked the end of the first-gen production run, displacement had risen to 2.5 literz and output to 238 hp, but more important than those numbers were the phenomenal handling and relentless race victories. You should definitely check out the video above for BMW's peek into the backstory of the fourth M car after the M1, M535i, M635 CSi, and M5, and arguably most important. But if your M-centric tastebuds prefer a more modern take on the German brand's most driver-friendly vehicles, take a look at the videos below. Related Video:

Europe's BMW 1 Series hatch caught looking fresh faced

Hey, remember the BMW 1 Series? Yes, German brand's successors to the US-market coupe and convertible have one-upped the old car to wear the 2 Series designation now, but in other markets, our No. 1 crush still lives on, and as evidenced in these spy shots, the entry-level hatch appears to be undergoing a modest facelift.
We've spotted prototypes of the refreshed 1 Series before, with the majority of the car's changes focused around the front fascia. This time around, we're seeing the three-door variant, with wheels seemingly fitting of a Sport or even M Sport trim.
Of course, this One's not for US, as the small BMW isn't slated to come to our market anytime soon. Click through the gallery above to see what we're missing.

Poor headlights cause 40 cars to miss IIHS Top Safety Pick rating

Over the past few months, we've noticed a number of cars and SUVs that have come incredibly close to earning one of the IIHS's highest accolades, the Top Safety Pick rating. They have great crash test scores and solid automatic emergency braking and forward collision warning systems. What trips them up is headlights. That got us wondering, how many vehicles are there that are coming up short because they don't have headlights that meet the organization's criteria for an "Acceptable" or "Good" rating. This is a revision made after 2017, a year in which headlights weren't factored in for this specific award. This is also why why some vehicles, such as the Ford F-150, might have had the award last year, but have lost it for this year. We reached out to someone at IIHS to find out. He responded with the following car models. Depending on how you count, a whopping 40 models crash well enough to receive the rating, but don't get it because their headlights are either "Poor" or "Marginal." We say depending on how you count because the IIHS actual counts truck body styles differently, and the Infiniti Q70 is a special case. Apparently the version of the Q70 that has good headlights doesn't have adequate forward collision prevention technology. And the one that has good forward collision tech doesn't have good enough headlights. We've provided the entire list of vehicles below in alphabetical order. Interestingly, it seems the Volkswagen Group is having the most difficulty providing good headlights with its otherwise safe cars. It had the most models on the list at 9 split between Audi and Volkswagen. GM is next in line with 7 models. It is worth noting again that though these vehicles have subpar headlights and don't quite earn Top Safety Pick awards, that doesn't mean they're unsafe. They all score well enough in crash testing and forward collision prevention that they would get the coveted award if the lights were better.