Best allrounder, for me, is the 2.6
I'm sure you mean 2.5 manual
Like the 3.0 over the 3.2, the 2.5 is marginally quicker and a damn site more economical than the 2.6... ...and as you're going for the smaller v6, so economy is a factor, I've suggested manual, despite the Omega manual box being bloody awful
No worse than the average lorry.
You reckon? I've not driven any lorries with such a horrible box... ...though the Omega box is simpler to understand than most larger lorries
Try a Mitsubishi Canter. It had 45miles on the clock when they gave it to me, and it ground the first 3 gear changes until the oil had warmed up which took about 5 miles. It was the same when the engine expired five years and 180,000 miles later.
We had a much older one that only one of us could actually drive; if you didn't get a down change exactly right, you had to stop and force it back up through the gearbox.
Omega gearboxes aren't slick, but then a high mileage BMW isn't any better.