BMW Glas 3000 V8 1968: a rare car that is not a BMW at all (22 photos + 3 videos)

Probably, even a good part of BMW brand fans are perplexed looks at this car and tries to understand what kind of model it is, about which, very likely never heard of. Even the name Glas 3000 V8 seems atypical for BMW.





Bring a Trailer online auction bids for unusual a coupe called a 1968 BMW Glas 3000 V8. It was created in Dingolfing, where one of the BMW factories is located, however, developed and released by the little-known company Hans Glas GmbH. The presence of the Bavarian brand in the name and on the body of the two-door due to the fact that BMW during in the second half of the 1960s, bought the company and renamed some of it models.



Externally, the BMW Glas 3000 V8 is unlike any authentic BMW. The thing is that the design for the Glas coupe, which appeared in 1965, was developed by Italian Pietro Frua. For a certain similarity with the models of others Italian coupe companies even got the nickname Glaserati.





For the sake of saving an 8-cylinder engine for this model, the company Glas developed by combining two blocks of the then existing firms 4-cylinder engine with a volume of 1.3 liters. Original Glas V8 equipped with a 2.6-liter V8, but by the middle of the second half of the 1960s its volume was increased to three liters. It is believed that such an engine developed up to 160 liters. With.



Glas is called one of the first in Europe to apply on its engines overhead camshafts. According to one version, the reason for buying Glas concern BMW was just striving to get legal access to this development. But by 1969, the production of cars under the Glas brand was curtailed, and the production facilities of this company became the basis for one of the largest BMW factories today.



Thus, the BMW Glas 3000 V8 coupe was produced only for a year, and the alliance of the two companies managed to assemble only 389 copies of this model.



The sample put up for sale drove about 94 thousand kilometers and is in relatively good condition, also due to restoration carried out five years ago. Still now for a rarity offered at auction for $37,000. It is possible that the car will rise in price, as there is still about a day before the end of trading. In 2021 on this auction has already put up for auction a similar model with mileage 83 thousands of kilometers, and the rates then reached 63 thousand dollars, but the price the owner was not satisfied, and the transaction did not take place.