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The Aficionauto gets his hands on Back To The Future BMW

When thinking about the cars of Back to the Future, Doc Brown's iconic DeLorean is surely the first one that jumps to mind. However, the latest video from The Aficionauto tracks down a more obscure but still rather cool vehicle from the series. Host Christopher Rutkowski heads to Connecticut for a difficult drive in Griff's screen-used 1976 BMW 633 CSI from the second film in the trilogy. Owner Jeff Chabotte bought the car in thoroughly neglected condition and spent weeks with his father and son bringing the futuristic Bimmer back to life. The slew of scoops and nacelles behind the seats might not be aesthetically beautiful, but they're authentic to the appearance in the film. For authenticity, Chabotte even keeps the busted taillight from Griff hitting it in the movie. As Rutkowski finds during his drive, Griff's BMW poses absolutely no threat of chasing down the DeLorean to 88 miles per hour. There's actually a pretty good reason for that, though. The interesting story involves how the producers procured this gray-market 633 CSI to be in Back to the Future II. Related Video:

BMW i3s traction control tech going in all BMW, Mini cars

The BMW i3s is essentially a warmed-up version of the i3 electric car we all know and love. The performance boost isn't huge — just 14 horsepower and 15 pound-feet of torque — but it also gets a new suspension, wheels and tires as well as an improved traction control system. We found the car to benefit from all the updates when we drove it for our First Drive Review, but now BMW has offered up more details on just how the traction control system of the i3s helps make it better to drive. The company says it'll expand the technology to all future BMW and Mini models as well. The i3s's system is calibrated to help it to pull away quickly from a stop, making full use of the instantaneous torque offered by the electric motor. It also improves stability when accelerating out of corners, when using regenerative braking and, of course, when the road conditions are less than ideal. The results are palpable, and with the other improvements the i3s definitely feels stronger off the line, as we found on our drive. It's also about a half-second quicker to 60 miles per hour, at 6.8 seconds. The secret is in the response time of the stability control, which BMW claims is 50 times faster than the conventional system. This is made possible by moving the control process into the powertrain itself, rather than a remote unit. This reduces the signal path and, thus, the response time of the traction control system. BMW's Head of Chassis Development, Peter Langen, said of it, "With their high levels of torque and instantaneous responses to every movement of the accelerator, electric motors already make significantly higher demands on driving stability systems than conventional power units." While engineered to make the most of the electric motor, BMW says the shorter cycles of this traction control system show promise for internal combustion vehicles as well. As such, we'll begin to see the improved technology applied across the BMW and Mini lineups going forward. Related Video:

BMW E9 3.0L CSL Batmobile is an awesome retro racer

When BMW released pictures of its 3.0 CSL Hommage earlier this year and then brought a period-livery racing example to Pebble Beach, this is the car it was looking at. The BMW E9 New Six CS came before BMW Motorsport and BMW M cars existed, and well before the tagline "The ultimate driving machine," but it paved the way for all of them. Built as a road-going coupe from 1968 to 1975, 1,265 units out of a total production run of 30,546 units were homologated for the European Touring Car Championship. Fitted with the final specification aero package in 1973 and powered by a 3.003-liter inline six-cylinder with a base rating of 200 horsepower, it proved such an able racer that it won the overall ETCC trophy six times - four of those after its road car donor had ceased production, and a bunch of other races like a class win at Le Mans. Clean samples go for huge money. That aero kit earned it the nickname "Batmobile," and Car Throttle drove a left-hand-drive version in the UK (BMW did build 500 right-hand-drive models, though). This is less a car review and more a dream drive, the host letting us know right off that the 3.0 CSL is the one car he's wanted to drive more than any other. He also finds that the Coupe Sport Leicht had a stop/start system... of the temperamental kind. Check it out in the video above. Related Video: