• BMW 530 Motorsport Limited Edition • 1970 • The 530 MLE was BMW South Africa factory-prepared race car for competing in the country's Modified Production Series in the mid-1970s. In 1976, the machine scored 15 wins in 15 consecutive starts, and the vehicle also tallied three championships in as many years.
As part of the Modified Production Series rules, BMW South Africa had to make at least 100 road-legal versions of the 530 MLE. A team at the factory drilled the pedals and bodywork by hand to reduce weight. The sedans came with manual windows and no air conditioning to save weight. They featured a tuned version of the brand's 3.0-liter inline-six engine now making 197 horsepower (147 kilowatts) and 204 pound-feet (277 Newton-meters) of torque. The run to 62 miles per hour (100 kilometers per hour) required 9.3 seconds, and the top speed was 129 mph (208 kph).
After years of searching, BMW South Africa in 2018 acquired one of the only BMW 530 MLEs known to have endured beyond its 70s heyday. Car number 100 came with a particular pedigree – it was owned by race driver and the racing 530 MLE’s team manager Peter Kaye-Eddie, and its engine and chassis numbers are a matching set.
Unique in the world, the Rosslyn-produced vehicles saw weight-reduction measures that included bodywork and pedals drilled by hand, manual windows with no air conditioning, and Mahle wheels.
South Africa enjoys a long history of rare and storied BMW special editions. In 1973, BMW Group Plant Rosslyn was the very first BMW plant established outside of Germany and several models were specially built for the local market until 1990. A growing list of these have been methodically restored by BMW South Africa in later years, including the cult classic BMW 333i.
