BMW Hits a New Milestone

We all knew it was going to happen eventually. At least we did since they announced that it was going to happen at the EICMA fail in Milan, Italy a little over a year ago. But BMW finally pushed out their first ever production scooters from the assembly line.

Starting out as the BMW Concept C scooter that was shown in 2010, BMW unveiled the two production models, the C600 Sport and the C650T. Come Thursday, December 1, 2011, BMW was hitting a whole new milestone at the Berlin Spandau plant when the very first of their Maxi-Scooters, a C600, was completely completed. And much of the BMW enterprise was ecstatic. Andreas Müller, leader of the Maxi-Scooter project, said, "It's a really proud day for everyone involved with the Maxi-Scooter project. This day has been a long time coming for us but everyone has been working tirelessly behind the scenes in the build-up to today's start of production... We're all looking forwards to seeing the first C600 Sport and C650GT machines out on the road from next March."



But excited or not, the question remains, are the production scooters the same as the scooter that raised all of the interest back in 2010? A lot of the hype about the concept scooter came from BMW's innovate take on the scooter style. Turning away from the traditional look and moving more towards the futuristic feel with a sleek yet aggressive style gave the BMW a possible opportunity to bridge the gap between scooterists and anti-scooter, purist motorcyclists. But as pictures of the first production C600 are rolling off the line, they certainly look a little more toned down.



Still, it's about time that BMW jumped on the scooter train. And there's no denying that BMW will have surely put the same amount of quality and performance into their scooters as the rest of their vehicles. The C600 scooter is the sportier of the two. Targeted towards more adventurous and ambitious riders, it might be the link between the sportbike and the scooter world. The C650GT, on the other hand, is designed around riders who prefer more comfort for touring. Both feature a 2-cylinder inline engine of a 647cc displacement along with a whole slew of other top quality features.

With the production line off and running, BMW estimates that 78 Maxi-Scooters will be made daily, five days a week. While the very first scooter isn't up for sale, advance orders are already racking up and the lucky first orders should be receiving their Maxi- Scooters in March of 2012.