From the stuff I’ve looked at, it’s often nonsensical. Doing stuff in unconventional ways for little apparent reason. Like, in BMWs example, you have to use a lift or jack up the car level to just check the transmission fluid; or the mostly-plastic cooling system which fails and results in the engine being ruined often. I’ve seen other weird engineering choices in electronics too (have done contract work for a German company).
From the stuff I’ve looked at, it’s often nonsensical. Doing stuff in unconventional ways for little apparent reason. Like, in BMWs example, you have to use a lift or jack up the car level to just check the transmission fluid; or the mostly-plastic cooling system which fails and results in the engine being ruined often. I’ve seen other weird engineering choices in electronics too (have done contract work for a German company).
In my 335i the front differential goes THROUGH the oil pan
Replacing the oil pan gasket required me to drop the entire subframe of the car
And ya the water pump routinely goes every like 80000km. Designed to fail.