E30 325i Rag-Top

Or any of the ones talking about SCR (ad-blu) or any of the other US features not fitted on NZ models, or even US models not offered in NZ. It’s a factor with all these “bigger” BMW sites they are heavily biased to US or EU drivers as that is where the vast majority of their users are based. That looks to be a US biased site. Sounds like a good deal to me. So many buyers are put off by the high Kms number, but if the car has been looked after (and it sounds like it has) then it’s an opportunity for the discerning buyer.

I doubt you could rack up 50,000kms a year crawling in Auckland traffic so chances are it’s been on fairly long hot runs, which would be a plus - keeps the top end cleaner. If the servicing has been regular, and not scrimped on, should be all good. Not totally km related but I would check how much life is left in the major wear items like tyres, pads, rotors, etc as they could add a few $$$s soon if they are well down.

Wheels and new boots back on the convertible, in for a warrant and passed with a couple of minor comments. Roll on summer! Cleaned the wife’s 1-Series as it was driving me mad how filthy it was. And more cutting and grinding on the race car. It’s hard work this holiday stuff.

I’m surprised it didn’t sell at that bargain price!

@FIAT 131R is in Wellytown and has lots of E46 M3 parts, he may be able to help you out.

From the photo it looks like it goes to the capacitor on the bracket fixing bolt? The cylindrical looking thing next to the nut. In which case it is probably there for noise suppression to reduce the interference on the radio signal, you can a background "whine" on radio stations if various bits of electric gubbins in the engine bay does not have these fitted.

When you’ve cut too much out what do you do, keep cutting, right..?

Using the large parts thrower to drill / mill the spot welds off the replacement panel - worked pretty well, and no injuries = winning!

Wow, so it’s been a year since I last posted on this thread - so yeah, progress has been slow. Have done a few bits and pieces, but not a lot that is major - filled and sanded front guards, bits of front bumper, boot lid, spoiler,etc - scraped underseal from inner front guards and front floor, then repainted with etch primer. - bought a few more bits and pieces including some genuine M3 bumpers and boot + spoiler, need to decide if going to use them on a race car! Major road block has been the rear quarter where I have been a bit stumped. Have now decided on a a plan B. Cut out the whole panel to use all of the FRP replacement, but it’s a prick of a thing to fit around the pillars and window, so putting the top of a steel panel back in..

Had five minutes spare so did some digging in ETK, E61 525i (I've guessed at LCI, looks to be different for pre-LCI) retrofit spare wheel kit - 36 11 0 308 889 steel wheel on it's own 4B x 17 ET 18 - 36 11 6 758 77 Spare wheel kit is listed for ALL LCI E60 and E6, the wheel is also used on E83 LCI X3s as a spare wheel.

Plenty of parts systems on-line that can give you the part number from the E61 and then what other models it was used on - realoem is one of the most popular. There are only a limited number of the Emergency Spare Wheels (aka space savers) available as rolling diameter is the only real factor, so there should be a large degree of commonality across models.

There are two versions of the M20 dizzy, early L-Jetronic which has dizzy out the side of the block and the later Motronic where the dizzy is off the front of the camshaft. Which version was your 2.7 stroker built from? I would imagine it’s the later Motronic version. Unfortunately the caps for these are always expensive. Best bet would probably be to bring it in from USA is quite small and light.

That’s probably a little too extreme for my taste, but check out the Random BMW Pics thread, there are some very nice ones in there.

Nice cars, but the "Holy Grail" would be the CSL version rather than the CS. This particular cat, not being a fully original version, would be very cool if it was lowered on some big, coloured weave style rims imho. Not sure about the pricing, I haven't followed E9s particularly.

Finally managed to get some decent garage time over the week-end after a very hectic number of months. Friday night finished spraying the repaired lips of the Alpina reps from the Convertible ready for new boots on Saturday morning. Silver paint has gone a bit funny in placesa, fingers crossed a good cut and polish with sort that out. Saturday morning off to P&S Autocentre to get the above mentioned new boots fitted, Hankook asymmetrical somethings as Toyo don't offer 205/40/17s. Whils there in amongst the talking rubbish with the GCs in the workshop I cut a replacement section off an E30 donor car thanks to Pete's pick-a-part @P&S. Note to self - need to buy a sabre-saw they are heaps of fun! After chopping the rear quarters out of the E30 race car to fit the FRP panels I had a re-think of how / where to fit them onto the car, so this panel is basically to go back onto the car to replace a bit (too much...) that I cut off. Saturday PM, cleared up and cleaned out the garage to get enough room to start working on the race car again in earnest and put stuff away properly rather than just dumping stuff randomly until it's not possible to move about any more. Started sizing up the FRP panels and the quater panels to be 100% sure where to cut and join stuff. Finished moving stuff around and started drilling out spot welds on replacement panel when the Mrs. informed me she will be wanting the spare garage fridge to be operational for Christmas - that's right, the fridge that had just been buried behind a stack of wheels and tyres, suspension and body parts. Sunday, took the convertible for a spin around the block to start getting ready for new boots and WoF for summer. Whilst it was out of the garage cleaned all the crap off the floor and moved all the stuff out of the way of the fridge. WIth the garage all clean and tidy it enabled me to get my bench pillar drill out to end-mill the spot welds off so as to leave a better finish for welding. Fingers crossed I can make some progress over Christmas hols, will resurrect the race car thread and add some more photos in there!

What ‘s ride and handling got to do with anything, it’s all about being super low and mega stanced and hella flush isn’t it?

I'm not sure that's a 100% correct, the E87 has the early type comfort access I think - where you have to pull the door handle for it to open? The system will only search for the key fob when then handle is pulled to activate. Even if it were looking for the fob "constantly" the drain would be very low. The new proximity Comfort Access which does constantly ping for the fob (and open / close the bloody doors as you are walking around or past the car with the key) doesn't run the battery down that quickly. It suggests to me that there is a fault in the Comfort Access, or an associated circuit, that is causing the battery drain as it will be permanently live. As above, do some deeper digging to see if you can find where it is pulling the current.

I'm not sure where these bibles are, or who writes them, but I think in this instance they are incorrect. The last of the DTM E30 M3s (the greatest E30 of all time) ran 18"s, there are a number of E30 M3 road cars (mainly in the US and Europe) that are running 18's and look awesome. And possibly the coolest looking E30 in NZ, Hybrids Tech1 is running 18" BBS LMs which are absolutely spot on in terms of size and fitment.

So this popped up on TradeMe today, looked quite tidy from the first picture on the feed, and the asking price caught my eye, $13,000NZ. Should be good for that price thought me.. https://www.trademe.co.nz/motors/used-cars/bmw/auction-2438726726.htm Pros - It's an E30, it's factory manual, it's a nice colour, it's got 15" weaves WITH centre caps. It's had some major maintenance jobs done in the recent past. Cons - it's a 320i not a 325i, drivers seat ripped and mis-matched to other seats, odometer in miles (190,000+ kms), Uk Import (can I get a "rust" in the house?) Will be interesting to see how long it stays on TM at that price in that condition.

When the price on some new wheels is so low, this then makes the prices of the "used" wheels come down as well. Why would you pay $500 for a ratty set of 14" weaves when you can buy a shiny new set of 15" Chinese replica wheels for $700 payable at only $5 a week for the next fifteen years? Who cares about the fact they are not like for like, and the old weaves will still be useable long after the Chinese rubbish has fallen apart on the NZ roads. Personally I think 14" weaves look very average on an E30 after all these years, that combined with the massive sidewalls of the tyres has the ratio all wrong. I guess I have been influenced by all the new stuff rollin' on 22"s with 30 profile rubber. That view seems to be shared by many as there is very little demand for the smaller wheels, and the 15" version is very sought after. Hence the market value of each type, and as a knock-on effect the cost of the centres to go with them.

The key word in the original statement is “new”, if the car still belongs to the manufacturer or dealer then it can only be repaired with new parts - in this case panels. It is not a case of being able to slap some bog in, blow some paint over and still sell it as new. Big difference to a used car, which can be repaired with little impact on value. If i were the owner I would have kept all the paperwork and photos for when I would sell the car, and not have bought it without this evidence. As they don’t seem to have this info, assume the worst case and price accordingly.

Personally I would not be afraid of it, not just because I’m ready to tackle issues myself and can get stuff cheap. From what I have been told and seen there is a real shortage of qualified and capable repairers in Australia (yup insurance companies screwed the trade just like here) so cars are being written off for what some would consider to be easy fixes. If the car checks out now and looks to have been repaired properly (needs a real good PPI scan etc) I would say go for it if price is under market value - to allow for issue with resale value only.

Ahh the '80s, great times. Love the title as well.. Monaco, Monza, Macao.... Welllington!! Which is the odd one out, and not just because it starts with a different letter.

“Gets lots of attention, people stop to take photos” - possibly not for the reasons you think though. Those flares are awful, not blending the front and rear bumpers in just makes them look like the have been thrown on and not finished. And as for the asking price “tell him he’s dreaming”!

They fit behind some 15” rims, weaves are very tight to the back of the spokes and really need a spacer.