Another BMW: 1987 all over again!

[A12pilot]

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.









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

Cheers
Dave

[dykstra]

Congrats Dave!!

[69Z11Pacer396]

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!

[njsteve]

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.

[GMC_Typhoon]

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

[jwbavalon]

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

[TimG]

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.

[Crush]

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

[Pro Stock John]

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.

[JRSully]

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