The Official Bring A Trailer (BaT) Thread

[fattycharged]

Aesthetic issues weren't unnoticed, just overlooked. I wouldn't pay $50k for this one and I'm guessing his reserve was closer to $60 than not.
The paint job left a lot of want, TiAg looks rough outside of a factory job. I've redone the plastics on mine and it's very noticeable to me, tough color to do right imo


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[nextelbuddy]

I won't be surprised if this one hits $50k


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There's also several things going on with that build that other people who are not well versed don't see

There's some interesting gaps in the custom metal fenders in the front, mainly near the side skirt cover rocker area, the rear bumper even though he decided to keep the plastic trim in the middle, which is not always the prettiest way to go, the rear corners have the same typical Gap that you get when you don't cut out the inside corners and swap in the ones from the touring bumper because the M3 bumper inside corners do not match up with touring rear quarter panel very well.

It's missing the side marker lights on the fenders in the fender trim piece. It's not exactly very easy to do that so whoever buys it probably won't know how to do that or what to do so it'll never get done.

The side mirrors are not OEM or genuine original. They're not M3. They are the eBay M5 replica mirrors so they look a little wonky on the E46 chassis. It takes a lot of work to get the original m31s to fit because the base plates need to be modified and electrically. Sometimes they need modification if the sedan or wagon has linbus style electronics instead of the standard 6/12 pin connectors and the m3s

It doesn't have the factory gloss black shadow line trim that the M sport wagons came with from Germany. It just has the standard black matte trim that the sport wagons came with. Since it is early E46 323 the rear quarter window has an integrated molding trim in it, so you actually cannot change that very easily to a gloss trim. You have to replace the whole window and those are very hard to source

If you look at some of the pictures from underneath, you'll notice that the aluminum belly pan is missing Quite a few bolts because the early E46 cars the chassis is missing specific threaded inserts in the body that the later cars had. So you cannot actually bolt in the belly pan with all of the bolts which is a stiffening plate issue

It's also a lot more difficult to wire in bixenon headlights on that car since it would require wiring in the level sensors and the adjustment motor to the light control module which wasn't done on that car, you can see in the engine bay the headlight connector is a single xenon. They may have installed bixenon headlight assemblies but they're not wired correctly.

The oil cap is a non-m oil cap

Valve cover gasket looks like a non-genuine BMW you can see it's kind of wavy and sticking out and the engine made pictures which means it's not up to genuine BMW tolerances

It doesn't have the M3 v brace on the bottom or the proper connection points that have to be built and welded in

The needles in the cluster are severely faded, almost white so either that cluster came out of a convertible car or it's been in the Sun and it's a very old cluster like coding index 21 or 22.

[fattycharged]

Personally, I would only consider buying such a conversion from a true conversion expert with a reputation on this very forum. nextelbuddy above makes it very clear why not all S54/wagon conversions fit in the same category. I'd rather pay $50K for a truly clean conversion than $25K for a messy one that will end up costing $50K in the long run yet never be truly clean.

I won't be surprised if this one hits $50k


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[fattycharged]

Appreciate all the responses, none of which do I want to deal with. Guess my wagon dreams should start at the beginning…
I won’t be surprised if this still hits $50k. The builders response that he’d “have to check” tapped my interest out for the most part, he knows exactly what he’s got, this isn’t his first build…

[maw1124]

+1 on all the above... I'd need to be intricately involved in the work. Cars are too complex, and every piece is an opportunity for cut corners and shortcuts. It's actually why we trust the factories, which have way more knowledge and way more at stake than "that guy over there" who did a swap.

maw