gjm

400km/h is very fast. Much faster than the majority of people will ever experience in a land vehicle, and that it now features as a 'contest' between car manufacturers is astonishing. On August 6th, a very carefully prepared Bugatti Chiron performed an astonishing - incredible? - feat by accelerating from 0-400km/h, and back to a standstill, in around 42 seconds. Two parts of this sentence are important - the 'carefully prepared' part, and the 'around 42 seconds' - normally I'd be a lot more precise. However, that's now irrelevant. On October 1st, a hastily cobbled together attempt on the same feat was carried out by Koenigsegg using a customers car. Last minute location arrangements using a bumpy, unprepared and slippery concrete military runway which was strictly too short for the purpose, no other car being available so "we took a customer car which had been prepared for delivery," and a factory driver who wasn't confirmed as available until the day of the drive. Which took over 5 seconds less than the Chiron. Actually, 0-403-0 in 37.28 seconds. The 0-400-0 took just 36.44 seconds. The final run included wheelspin when changing into 3rd gear, logging show 183km/h at the time. The 0-400 acceleration is on a par with the world's fastest production motorbike which, derestricted, also takes 26 seconds to reach 400km/h. It does cost a little less, of course. Full details of the Koenigsegg run are here. But for those who thought tl;dr and couldn't be bothered with the link, here's a video.

Apologies to Rob - I replied and PM'd him, having convinced myself that the heading to this said '16x7', which would have been perfect. Nice-looking rims, too.

iX the V12? The only thing I can offer is neither a 4WD or a wagon, but it certainly is economical.

PM'd

Comment on this listing from another source: "must be a typo forom 200 lol cant be 2k cos i seen these post on buy it b4 i wrea it for 1k ono peaces of sh*t these old bmws now" So. There you have it.

The seller may not know the difference between various models of E30, and having compared their (admittedly very nice-looking) example with some that have been listed recently, has decided they'll try a high price and be prepared to be a knocked down a little.

I was going to put this in the 'Dreamer' thread, but it's a fairly unique proposition. Not on TM, but on German eBay, there is a 1985 323i being offered at EUR 69,900. Or about $115000. It's covered just 260km from new. Not 260k, just 260km.

Well, not strictly my BMW, but perhaps that of Miss M. The 318Ti. Correctly fitted the replacement headunit, with Aux input wiring through to the shelf under the glovebox. Removed, repaired, and refitted the passenger side door card. It'd been removed before and as is not unusual, the push-clips had become detached from the card and become part of the door. Sorted now. Sort of refitted part of the headlining so it doesn't hang over the rear window. Unfortunately it looks as though the whole thing needs doing. I'll need more enthusiasm for that. Replaced the rear hatch struts so the bootlid now stays open instead of trying to decapitate whoever opens it. Little things, but they make for a successful day.

Hmm. M54B30 engine and associated gearbox and wiring, lift and shift into a touring?

I thought it was because you can buy lightweight window winders, but not lightweight switches and wiring?

Just looking at the E30 kits, the heart of them is the Bilstein/Eibach B12 kit.

Because... "Focused" road car.

White cars are easier to work on. You can see what you're doing a lot better. Delphingrau, or Dolphin Grey (depending on country of origin, but very slightly different colour shades) is a great colour, as Jon says. No sunroof is popular because no leaks, simplicity, and no extra weight being placed at the top of the car. I kept my coupe shell for these reasons, and I'm replacing the electric windows with manual ones.

Absolutely! Consider it the thrill of the chase.

TBH, any specific E46 requirement seems hard to find. An early E46 318i (M43 engine) coupe with an autobox? Barely such a thing in existence. Actually, we know they did exist, and it's perhaps testament to our good taste that there are none for sale.

Been for sale for a while?

14psi could be good for up to 450hp, depending on other factors (such as cams). I'm sure it's a lot of fun now, but more fun isn't a bad thing.

Hi Josh! Car looks nice. Any details on the build?

Cert will be $800 (? - someone correct this if it is wrong). Work involved to swap the kit will be significant, of course, and you don't know what else you'll find when doing the swap, or what the coupe shell will need to get it up to scratch. And then there is the stigma of a DIY bitsa being for sale - there's no reason why it shouldn't be as good as an ex-factory car, but people are suspicious of such things. I really can't see it being worth the time, grief, effort and expense.

Needs a chip and a dustbin-sized exhaust.

They're not a bad road tyre. They do clog pretty quickly if you go through any mud. These - https://www.trademe.co.nz/Browse/Listing.aspx?id=1426251466 - are a bit more money but imo a better tyre. They are for a 15" rim, but finding some steel 8-spoke rims shouldn't be difficult. I did this with my SWB IIa and ran 29.50 Mickey Thompson tyres. (Just an option. )

Intermittent further investigation is suggesting a secondhand petrol-engined, instead of (new or used) mains electric, unit may be a better bet. I think I can get something suitable - 2500-3000psi, 12-14L/min - for around $500. I've also found that more than a few people have bought older petrol-engined pressure washers to remove the engines and use them in go-karts...

7.50 were OE on the LWB; SWB got 6.50. 80-90km/h is a comfortable cruising speed for a 2.25 Landie. And we ran Kumhos, even 20+ years ago. They were pretty good.

I did a search and while I can't visit the site, there were several results suggesting SATs available on TradeMe?

At the top of that page: "Not to be confused with BMW 1 Series M Coupe." Certainly not a mistake I was going to be making...