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Under a dress of rare elegance, the BMW M5 E39 hides an equally refined engine. The naturally aspirated 5.0 V8 of this super luxury sedan delivers 400 bhp, but more than the figure itself – truly remarkable, for the end of the 1990s – what delights connoisseurs is how this value was obtained. Two “gems”, in particular, make this engine a true masterpiece: the eight butterfly valves, one per cylinder, and the double VANOS, a particular system of variation of the timing of the distribution which continuously adjusts the inclination of the two shafts at cams according to the number of revolutions and pressure on the accelerator pedal.