09-08-2004, 10:41 PM
dakar yellow is one of the best colors you could get. BMW's six cylinder (their bread and butter) from those years have one thing that goes bad on them. The water pumps are made of plastic, and unfortunately for you, they fail around 60k miles.
Ask the owner/dealer if it has been upgraded to a metal impellar. If they say no then the first thing you should do if you buy it is to go ahead a fix that.
The E36 in general is one of the best cars around. The E36 M3 is still used as a benchmark for modern day "sport cars"
There is a humoungous aftermarket for E36's too. One of the most common replacements is the headlights. US spec e36s came with the plastic lensed headlights while almost every other country got ZKWs which are elipsoid projectors instead of reflectors. The ZKWs are really a lot better headlights, but the covers are made of glass so they wouldn't be allowed by the DOT.
As with any car, it is important that you get it checked out by a mechanic who knows the make. And its especially true with bmws so you don't pay out a lot of money down the road. Full service records are a big plus.
With only 57k miles on the clock and the car being 10 years old, it was probably someones weekend car so it hasn't seen much use. Also keep in mind there is probably an inspection 2 at 60k miles, and change your oil often to get a lot of life out of the engine.
edited to include insurance + rwd:
RWD is soooo much better i think. read these to influence you
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://slate.msn.com/id/2081194/">http://slate.msn.com/id/2081194/</a><!-- m -->
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.rearwheeldrive.org/rwd/">http://www.rearwheeldrive.org/rwd/</a><!-- m --> (The picture top left here is a bmw e36)
Insurance on an m3 will rape you if you are under 25. especially if you have tickets. Insurance companies count all bmws in the sports car company(even my 318ia). However, my 1994 318 insurance is about $200 more per year than my brothers 1998 honda accord. In my opinion, this is far in my favor. Its just so much more of a car.
Where i'm going with that, is you could get a 318 for a lot less than an m3. Then, spend the money you saved on a DASC(downing atlanta supercharger) and a few other mods and like magic you're putting down about 220 rwhp(95 m3 is 240 at the crank i think). I guess that means you are succombing to this boost thing though, the dasc as a lot of R&D in it though. they cost about $3150. Talk about a sleeper.
Ask the owner/dealer if it has been upgraded to a metal impellar. If they say no then the first thing you should do if you buy it is to go ahead a fix that.
The E36 in general is one of the best cars around. The E36 M3 is still used as a benchmark for modern day "sport cars"
There is a humoungous aftermarket for E36's too. One of the most common replacements is the headlights. US spec e36s came with the plastic lensed headlights while almost every other country got ZKWs which are elipsoid projectors instead of reflectors. The ZKWs are really a lot better headlights, but the covers are made of glass so they wouldn't be allowed by the DOT.
As with any car, it is important that you get it checked out by a mechanic who knows the make. And its especially true with bmws so you don't pay out a lot of money down the road. Full service records are a big plus.
With only 57k miles on the clock and the car being 10 years old, it was probably someones weekend car so it hasn't seen much use. Also keep in mind there is probably an inspection 2 at 60k miles, and change your oil often to get a lot of life out of the engine.
edited to include insurance + rwd:
RWD is soooo much better i think. read these to influence you
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://slate.msn.com/id/2081194/">http://slate.msn.com/id/2081194/</a><!-- m -->
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.rearwheeldrive.org/rwd/">http://www.rearwheeldrive.org/rwd/</a><!-- m --> (The picture top left here is a bmw e36)
Insurance on an m3 will rape you if you are under 25. especially if you have tickets. Insurance companies count all bmws in the sports car company(even my 318ia). However, my 1994 318 insurance is about $200 more per year than my brothers 1998 honda accord. In my opinion, this is far in my favor. Its just so much more of a car.
Where i'm going with that, is you could get a 318 for a lot less than an m3. Then, spend the money you saved on a DASC(downing atlanta supercharger) and a few other mods and like magic you're putting down about 220 rwhp(95 m3 is 240 at the crank i think). I guess that means you are succombing to this boost thing though, the dasc as a lot of R&D in it though. they cost about $3150. Talk about a sleeper.
- ben