Another BMW: 1987 all over again!
 

Greetings my fellow Yenkonians!

Ah, 1987. I was a freshman in high school with car posters on my wall: Ferrari Testarossa, Bob Glidden's T-Bird, Bob Chandler's Bigfoot airborne over some derelict cars, and of course, dreams of owning my first car and what I'd get when I hit 18. That was to be a 1966 Mustang Coupe bought at 17-1/2 with stop signs for floor pans and no lights and/or gauges worked. I know, so freaking cool! Senior year we could drive to school and remember pulling up in my Mustang with glasspacks next to a well-to-do classmate who was driving a brand new 1990 325is. I'd never looked at them before, but man, that one caught my attention for some reason. We all harken back to owning something we never could back in the day, and fortunately my back in the day isn't as far back as most, so finding a good example of something in the 80s is still obtainable. I started a casual search for a nice E30 and found this 1987 325is just a little North of me. It checked all the boxes, so I picked it up.

Nothing in 1987 is setting the world on fire as far as performance goes. I'm pretty sure brake horsepower means, "Hey, is the brake on? Why is this so slow?" But it's the nostalgia we all go for, whether it's smelling like a gastank or stopping distance comparable to a Freighliner. Either way... sniff....ahhhh, memories!!

These era BMWs pull nicely in the 4k rpm range and shift like a hot knife through butter. So much fun. Neat thing? They are about 45% smaller than anything on the road today. Do you really know how big today's cars are in comparison to 80s transportation? It's quite remarkable. And the speed limit. Let's not forget 55! Keeping up with today's cars at 80-85mph when the speed limit is only 65 feels like I'm about to break the sound barrier. Yet best part? Old skool creds from all the new BMW enthusiasts on the road. Pretty cool!

Everything works on this one including the cruise control. Sunroof, PW, sport seats, AC, pretty much fully loaded. A non-cracked dash and recent major maintenance including timing belt all done. So what's the plan? Glad you asked!



I'll upgrade the wheels, add an MTech body kit, paint, and find a few missing
that are readily available on Ebay from guys parting these out. I'll install new seat covers to give it a more supple feel even though the original ones are in good shape with no tears. There's a few lights on the dash which are pretty common to these cars that I already fixed (ABS and brake lights, and brake linings). Last upgrade will be an R134a AC conversion.

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Hope this inspires some to buy a memory no matter how lame! :biggthumpup:

Cheers
Dave

Congrats Dave!!

Those are nice little cars... I had a bronzite colored '86 325ES that got me through college circa 94-96... I sold it with 238K miles.. Congrats on your purchase!

Very cool. I had a grey-market, 1981 635CSI 5 speed, in Polaris Silver back in the late 1980's. I would commute home to New Haven from law school in Boston every weekend to work on my Mopars. What an amazing car...except everything on the dash was in German and the A/C would freeze up solid on the highway and nothing would come out the vents. But man, that baby could cruise.

Man I bet a LS swap would be pretty easy on that. Or a GN 3.8

Another BMW
 

Congrats Dave. I had a lot of fun driving my E30M3, as BMW said, "the ultimate driving machine".


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My neighbor has been looking for a BMW just like this for his wife. I can't believe how these cars have increased in price.

Nice! I get first dibs when you sell it in June!!!

That gen M3 has gone way up in price, I know of a roller that's been sitting a while, guy knows what he has.

On my secret list of cars I've wanted is a IX version of that gen 3 series. Those are 4WD.

Switching veh's.. since were in the 80's. Brother has an 81 Triumph TR8 Conv and this thing is a rip, 5 spd all aluminum V8 (old Buick motor molds bought by Rover/Leland) now I want one. People look at this thing and cant understand where the V8 rumble is coming from. These too are climbing in $$ now

I think the BMW term: "the ultimate driving machine" was thought up by Chuck Jordon during the short time he had worked for BMW. Bill

OK, now THAT’S funny. Am I that predictable?:hmmm::biggthumpup::smile:

These are fun little cars and yeah Tim, they have started to go nuts. The paint on this one, while it looks good, it really isn’t. So what’s a SuperDave to do? I think we all know the answer to that….:cool2:goggles

Cheers
Dave

When I got the car, it had already had a bunch of work done and that included some lowering springs and such. Stance is good, but those 14" weaves had to go.

My vision for the look I wanted was the 333i. BMW made these for the South African market and they had Alpina and MTech attributes. I also wanted to update the exterior yet wanted to keep the "diving board" US bumpers. So step one, all new brakes all around followed by replica Alpina 16" wheels. I think this is how it's supposed to look!

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Wanting a more aero look, I added an MTech and Alpina style skirts along with an MTech style rear spoiler. So of course, I had to now redo the paint.

I wasn't about to break the car down (this is an 87 BMW.... not a Ferrari/ Hemi/ COPO) so some strategic masking was in order. I added flex agents where needed, but I wanted the bumpers monotone with the paint. Today I just shot the DBC followed by DCU2021. Perfect? Nah. But way better than it was. A couple small sags, one or two bugs, but those will be fixed with the wetsanding.

Later next week I'll mask off and paint the trim black then reinstall the new emblems, grille, and fog lights. I might add Alpina stripes to it, or an MTech stripe. Not sure just yet.

More to come!

Cheers
Dave

Memory lane here....

This charming '87 325i was my late wife's summer driver. Solid, fun car, but WOT best described as "gaining momentum".

Dave, your suspension and wheel mods only make this one better! :cool2:

Love the license plate Bill!!:headbang:

Oh, wow! Very cool Bill. Good description and glad it was a pleasant memory! Common thing is to swap in a later big six, but we’ll see if I decide to go down that road. Right now, it runs great just the way it is!:biggthumpup: Plus, I’m joining the BMW Classic Car Club on a tour this fall and going in this, so it needs to be road worthy by then:scholar:

Cheers
Dave

That was actually a Pontiac slogan well before then.

K

Low mileage one here in $40k range with a few hours left..: https://bringatrailer.com/listing/19...ign=2024-02-28

I love your E30 Dave. I have had an '85 325es 4 door in Cinnabar Red and black with the awesome dash computer that gave you all of the pertinent information that you needed. So far ahead of its time in my opinion. I also had an '89 325 that was maroon and black. I loved the tucked bumpers on the '89 more than the diving boards on the earlier ones. I've seen guys take the earlier bumpers and "deflate" them to fit them closer to the body, but not much give if you get into an accident.

Your paint looks great as well. Love that you fixed the kidneys in the grill so that they're back to being silver/polished as they got a little lost in black.

They're like 350 Chevy's that never stop running.

Thanks guys. Latest update with the blacked out trim, Alpina inspired details, and a few new exterior emblems and such. :biggthumpup:

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These things are a lot of fun. Easy to work on. Although some aftermarket parts are junk just like the rest of the aftermarket world in relation to our other cars. Only thing I’m fighting right now is a noon-fitting sunroof seal. It’s so tight it won’t let the sunroof move. I removed it, and the roof works perfectly. The aftermarket one is way too tight so I’ll have to come up with an alternate solution. It’s mainly a dust shield. Inside of the sunroof is nice and clean with no rust.

Cheers
Dave