Description
Recently emerged from long-term storage, this is a remarkable opportunity.
Lot number: 304 - guide price: £60, 000 - £80, 000 (+ buyers premium of 12. 5% plus VAT (15% incl VAT) on the first £300, 000 of the hammer and 10% plus VAT (12% incl VAT) thereafter)
To be offered by Silverstone Auctions as part of 'The Seasons Opener Sale' from 10:30am BST on Saturday 5th March 2022.
Please see the Silverstone Auctions website for full details of how to register and how to bid.
For viewing of this car and the rest of the catalogue, you can attend our venue of RAF Hendon Museum (use NW9 5QW for satnav) on Thursday 3rd (pm) or Friday 4th (all day). Please contact Consignor Lionel Abbott via our website or telephone number listed here for more information.
Visually indistinguishable from its more 'run of the mill' relations, the CS and CSi, the 3. 0 CSL (Coupé Sport Leicht) was creative homologation at its best. Success in motorsport sells cars, and the marketing department's requirements led BMW engineers to develop a limited-production 'homologation special' to meet the constrictive framework of the ‘Group 2’ racing class regulations at the time. By removing the trim and using thinner steel for the main bodyshell; aluminium alloy for the doors, bonnet and, boot lid; and Perspex for the side windows, a valuable 300lbs (136kgs) in weight was saved – 'Leicht' indeed.
Mechanically, these cars were almost identical to the fuel-injected CSi (which meant 200bhp and 140mph plus) but to take it into the over-3litre class, the engines were bored out slightly to 3003cc. Equipped with all-round independent suspension (McPherson strut front/ semi-trailing arm rear), disc brakes and responsive steering, it was wonderfully balanced. Very expensive when new (several hundred pounds more than a 2. 7 RS 911 CSLs are now the most highly coveted BMW of the 1970s with a fabulous competition record.
We understand that only 1, 039 CSLs were built in total with 500 of these finished in right-hand drive for BMW UK. Offered here is number 104 (#228104) of those 500 accompanied by a letter from BMW Group, Munchen confirming that it was manufactured on 14th November 1972 and delivered to BMW Concessionaires GB Ltd. on the 17th November finished in Polaris Silver (Code 080) with a black interior. Two old V5s show that it had just two previous owners prior to its sale in January 1990 to a prominent London barrister living on the Embankment. From 2006, it has been in storage with the speedometer showing 78, 142 miles and the history file contains a clutch of MOTs going back to 1986, multiple invoices from the eighties raised by Cronk Garages Ltd. of Redhill, further invoices during the early nineties from Cheyne BMW London and accounts for further work carried out by a garage close to the large Scottish family estate where the car spent much of its time in later years.
Having been in storage since 2006, it now requires restoration or at best re-commissioning but presents a blank canvas as probably one of the last unmolested CSLs to come to auction. It still has its original non-sport steering wheel, which may well be unique, and is supplied with the aforementioned history file and its original handbooks.
These low-production, era-defining coupés often feature as a choice in car enthusiasts' 'dream garage' scenarios, and with good reason - beautifully engineered machines with that seventies BMW magic and probably the prettiest homologation special ever conceived. This is a fantastic opportunity to awaken this dusty Lightweight from sixteen years of slumber.
