A lot of people aren’t fond of how BMWs have been looking lately. Indeed, the kidney grilles are large enough to swallow babies, and how do you even explain the XM to someone? Well, if you’re not a fan of BMW’s current designs there is a shop in Germany that can give you something different. Estella-Fahrzeugtechnik is a coachbuilding firm and if you buy a current generation BMW Z4, it’ll come out of the other end of the shop as the Tender 5.7, a new BMW designed to look like the BMW 507 that Elvis owned. Look, I’m sorry for your headache, but you should pop some Tylenol before continuing.
Every day of every week, I’m always online searching for some sort of car to buy or at the very least, look at. While there are cool cars to be found on Facebook, Craigslist, and Hemmings, you’ll find some forbidden fruit on a site like Classic Driver. Usually, I’ll find some obscure German microcar there but today, well, I’m not sure what I found. If you’re one of our European readers, Estella-Fahrzeugtechnik will be happy to sell you this 2021 BMW Z4 M40i for €288,000, or $312,955 at current exchange rates. If you’re an American, you probably can’t have this.
Either way, I’m fairly sure everyone reading this article right now is going to have an opinion of what they’re looking like. I have a feeling you’re either going to love it or hate it and there’s going to be no point in-between.
Estella-Fahrzeugtechnik was founded in Germany in 2016 and has since produced carbon fiber body kits for sports cars and exotics. However, the firm advertises itself as more. Estella-Fahrzeugtechnik says it’s a coachbuilder, tuner, and more. The company claims it could handle the full development of a vehicle, including Finite Element Analysis to designing tooling.
The Tender 5.7 isn’t just a showcase of this company’s skills, but seemingly a love letter to the BMWs of old. Estella-Fahrzeugtechnik is taking just 15 G29 BMW Z4s and is transforming them into cars that look vaguely like old BMW 507s. From Estella-Fahrzeugtechnik:
Ursula Andress, the first Bond girl, fell for its charm, Alain Delon drove one, but Elvis Presley made it immortal. Stars and legends like these did not miss the chance to drive a roadster. Our Tender 5.7 brings back to life the new attitude to life of the 50s and 60s – unconventional and upbeat like the King of Rock’n’Roll. For many years, Elvis Presley’s roadster gathered dust forgotten in a barn near San Francisco until it was rediscovered by chance. This wonderful story inspired us to breathe new life into this timeless and rare beauty in our interpretation.
We from estella-Fahrzeugtechnik GmbH have presented our Roadster Tender 5.7. As a longtime partner of renowned tuners in the automotive industry, we enjoyed bringing our own vision of the Tender to the road. We developed the carbon body in cooperation with ds-Fasertechnik GmbH. The result is a fascinating combination of contemporary lightweight construction and state-of-the-art technology with the elegance and aesthetics of the 1950s.
Real Tender
As Estella-Fahrzeugtechnik notes above, this is a BMW Z4 with a carbon fiber body kit made to resemble a 507. However, Estella-Fahrzeugtechnik doesn’t stop there. The Tender 5.7 is then painted in BMW Classic colors and the interior is decked out full leather in the color of your choice. Additional touches include Tender 5.7 badging, including on the brake calipers, the addition of forged wheels, and a custom leather wind deflector.
It’s also not all show and no go. There’s a Euro-spec BMW B58B30C 3.0-liter straight-six under the hood. In stock form, this would have made 335 HP, but Estella-Fahrzeugtechnik popped open the hood and added a larger turbocharger, a Euro 6 downpipe, and a Bastuck exhaust system. Some tuning later and Estella-Fahrzeugtechnik says this engine is now pumping out 500 HP and 479 lb-ft of torque to the 20-inch forged wheels. A set of coilovers assists the wheels in fitment.
The rest of the car is pretty much a standard Z4 M40i. There’s a Harman Kardon 12-speaker sound system, two 10.25-inch screens, and an eight-speed ZF automatic transmission. Of course, Estella-Fahrzeugtechnik is a coachbuilder, so if you have personal requests, the company will attempt to fill them.
Some of you are squirming right now for sure, but I think you need to know that Estella-Fahrzeugtechnik has already built two of these. The first has already been sold and you’re looking at the second one right now. Barring any custom color choices, Estella-Fahrzeugtechnik says that purple and white are now taken. What remains are 13 more colors for 13 more cars, which include a dark green, a bright red, and a sort of dull yellow.
If you’re one of our American readers, the Tender 5.7 is forbidden fruit, as it’s unlikely Customs will be entertained by a souped-up, Euro-spec BMW. If you’re one of our European readers and you want a modern BMW 507, your price of entry will be €288,000, unless you ask for customizations. At the very least, this is much cheaper than a real BMW 507, which will set you back well over a million dollars.
I’ll just be sitting right here processing everything I’m watching here. I’m not sure if I like it or I don’t, but I’m glad it exists.
Images: Estella-Fahrzeugtechnik
I’d take one in green with Carmel interior. Put it on my AutopianBux card please. It’s not bad, I get a Z8 vibe from it. For the money I’d rather the new Morgan Midsummer and a couple of old style leather aviator headgear and goggles for me n my dog.
I really like the front end and the interior but the rear end looks a bit confused…
Agreed. Well, I like the front. The interior is a bit much for me.
It looks like an aging Sunbeam Tiger after one too many facelifts.
Wow! So many bad exterior details and angles on just one car. It’s kind of impressive. It’s almost like MTG at the SOTU, but in car form.
Looks good in the publicity pictures, though it seems like there’s too much going on in the tail. I’d like to see some pictures that aren’t taken from its best angles.
Ooof, outing myself as someone who has seen “Cars 2” too many times (thank you nephews) – This is a pretty decent Finn McMissile! He was definitely Aston inspired, but a lot of these details match.
I get what this site is about and all. But there was another retro styled white coupe with modern BMW i6 power, and round headlights released this week, which looks (in fairness my uneducated design opinion) far better.
https://www.carsales.com.au/editorial/details/morgan-and-pininfarina-create-midsummer-roadster-145951/
Ohhhh, that’s nice!! Thomas usually covers new cars while I stay in my corner playing with motorcycles, RVs, and old stuff, so I’ll send that to him. 🙂
If you have the money to have one of these built I’d assume you could buy a US Z4 and ship it over for conversion. Probably would too hard to bring it back over that way. But that’s not how I’d be spending that kind of money anyway.
whispers I don’t mind modern BMW grilles
(tactically retreats before artillery shells land where I was standing)
I had no idea there were BMW designers reading this site. 😛
Oh no! The ‘hurt your brain’ tag… at least there’s not a cringe thumbnail.
That said , kind of weird but cool enough vehicle.
My literal all time dream is to restomod a Z3 to look like a 507
Aka the polar opposite of this vile irredeemable staggering monstrosity
Something’s just a bit off, it looks fine from certain angles, but others are just awkward. Like the headlights are too far away from the grille, or the grille doesn’t have enough forward lean, or the car is too wide for the grafted-on details, the individual elements have been reproduced faithfully enough, but the proportions are wrong. Also, modern windshields are killer for a lot of retro-inspired designs.
While all that is true, it’s a hell of a lot better looking than any modern BMW.
Well, that’s certainly true. Though that is also a bit of a low hurdle to clear.
It reminds me much more of the last generation Ford Thunderbird than a 507…
My thoughts exactly, sort of like an actress who gained a lot of weight and had a lot of plastic surgery
Waiting for the Toyota Supra version.
Cue up: “Is that a Supra?…”
Classic Case of “Wheels don’t match the style”
For a retro-conversion, it looks okay, much better than most of them out there. (Looking at you ’49 Ford Thunderbirds!)
But the wheels just don’t match the car, they stuck with Alpina-style wheels. Now swap them over for some Rotiform STLs ( https://www.rotiform.com/rotiform-stl ) color matched to the cars paint, it would look a helluva lot better.
’49 Ford Thunderbirds?
https://www.motortrend.com/uploads/sites/21/1997/05/775large-1949_ford_thunderbird-front_left_view.jpg
I’m going to blame the Mitsuoka Orochi for liking weird purple cars because this isn’t half bad in purple imo.
NEIN!
My eyes!!! The goggles do nothing!!!
Good one!
Not for me. It looks like it was generated by AI with no actual 507 reference images. Still, it will have its admirers and that’s a good thing because stifling innovation should never be a goal. Imagine if AC had told Carrol Shelby to go pound sand. Plus, carbon fiber!
I love it
MY EYES!!! THE GOGGLES! THEY DO NOTHING!!!
Dammit…beat me by 13 minutes 🙂
Has anyone ever told them the Z8 exists? This is in the same league as those C5-based retro Corvette rebodies.
Bingo. The Z8 is infinitely more cohesive and attractive, while this looks as badly kitbashed as those Tri-Five Corvettes you mention.
This reminds me of those Chinese knockoff Corvettes. Like someone hooked up some compressed air and over-inflated the whole car.
It’s more a modern Kaiser Darrin than BMW.
Styling aside, that purple paint is gorgeous