Eagle

Both have their advantages but if you are wanting the faster track car then E36

As said it should remain at 12 o'clock position once its upto operating temp, where is it sitting and\or decreasing to? Only time ive seen the temp gauge move on the BMW's ive owned is a couple of needle widths hotter but thats driving on the track in summer time.

RE001 were a decent tyre and im sure RE002 are good but id also consider them to be at the lower end when it comes to the Potenza tyre range, we seem to miss out on alot of the other options here in NZ.

Just start with an alignment as the info it gives you can tell you a lot and its probably most likely thing. If it doesn't solve it then you can eliminate it being that and look at other things mentioned

Fixed

If you are getting tyres swapped then no reason why you shouldn't get an alignment at the same time, i have no idea who is good in Chch but i usually specify my alignment settings anyway. The 318ti has no rear adjustment from factory iirc so you can only really adjust front toe. I specify 1-1.5mm Toe in(+) on each side usually as ive seen alot of places adjusting toe in to excessive amounts.

$1000 seems reasonable from what i can see but thats a 155kw motor and they aren't id call rare.

Is it lowered? Making sure the wheel alignment is within spec would be the first thing id do

Damn i just threw a complete auto box out recently

^Pretty much but i would drive it anyway as well

Probably just BMW being conservative\covering their ass, Germans are more pedantic than Japs after all. Most sources ive seen for the M20 state 60,000 miles or 4\5 years, i personally think 80,000 is a good medium baring age or if its being used in extreme conditions. The M40 is a lump of sh*t to start with so probably better to drive it till it fails, celebrate, and then put in a M44 like you said.

No doubt its due but 26,000 is pretty ridiculous - 80,000-100,000km is the average and most belts ive seen can easily go past those figures. Do you know it hasn't been done? No idea on the labor costs sorry

Is it manual? Ive always liked the look of them but the few auto ones ive been in and driven(3.8 and 5.0's) had nothing on the E34 sorry but im sure they would respond well to some bolts on and a good tune?.

Rust convertor

Sweet. It might give me some inspiration to turbo mine one day.

This. The easiest solution is simply not to login any more

Must be very run in then or you live in traffic I remember getting stuck in Auckland traffic once for about 1 1\2 hrs and was averaging 29L per 100 and i was driving a manual 535i, only other time ive seen that consumption was cruising at top speed.

Most E34's ive owned averaged around 13L per 100km driving around Hamilton, open road its usually around 10-11 but that's usually going constant 110 and odd passing, you probably could get down to 9L if you tried and car was in good shape but i couldn't care myself as i don't drive the car for the fuel economy.

Yep pretty much the same, E32 is just bigger and heavier version of the E34 with more features usually, they are usually cheaper as they're not too popular as kiwi535 mentioned. Its the stop\start around town driving that makes M30 drink alot but open road its not much worse than M50 or M60, M30 makes up in being a nicer engine to work on, less complex and cheaper.

An E34 525i, 535i or 540i or an E32 735i or 740i would be the go as people have mentioned. If you can do the work yourself and you probably get an ok E39 528i for 4k but there are more parts that can go wrong\more to replace having a more complex suspension, electrics and engine. They also don't have as good build quality.

I have oem set from a 740I but haven't checking if they work with 728o

Yeah no doubt but was more aimed at how cheap they are atm compared to others as you have listed above. If koni's are $466 then seems the obvious choice ibboostn: Munroes probably handle fine compared to worn shocks but its well known they are inferior

I just bought a complete set of Koni Srt.t shocks from shox.com for $650 which included shipping and gst. Ive been wanting to try them for awhile now as they are half the price of adjustables and im real impressed with them for the price, they're nice and firm( bit fimer than my oem boge sports) but still comfortable a ride. After using Koni's and Bilsteins on various cars Koni imo are superior and would probably would probably work out cheaper than most options at the moment

When i got the 740i done the shop used Total lubricants, i think it was G3 but not 100% as it was years ago. It was a bit over $200 for the fluid and was around 8L they used iirc

I don't remember them having a starter relay. White should be DME and blue is probably the fuel pump relay