After 20+ years of e30 and e36 ownership, and some other BMWs in-between, I ended up skipping a bunch of generations and picked up an F97 X3M for family duty. That really opened my eyes to modern cars, and when it came time to add another "me" care I had it narrowed down to an M4 CSL or F87 M2 CS. So what do I do? Buy an E46 M3 haha.
When I was 16 years old, this magazine came out (yes I still have it) and man did this car get me. I was already a "BMW guy" at that point, but man this was the one. Now I felt like I had moved past older BMW's, but when it came down to it owning this was probably something I needed to do.
So less than two weeks ago I picked this one up from a member here on the forum. Flew down to Atlanta, and drove it back to PA with an overnight in Greensboro, NC:
I guess NC can get pretty foggy? B/c this is what I walked out to at 6:30am the next morning. It was like this for the first hour or two of my drive.
And after about 7 hours it met the current residents. Unfortunately, after 12 years of ownership the E36 M3 is going to get the boot.
So the reason I am a bit over older BMW's is b/c I am tired of "restoring" cars slowly over a multi year timeframe. I just want to enjoy the car, and only have little maintenance or upgrades to do here and there. So the plan with this thing is to throw everything at it in as short of a time as possible. This is going to be the dream build, and the goal is to get it to 90% in a matter of a few months at worst. I want to experience this thing as fresh as possible, and just about all at once.
So I have a brand new driveshaft, engine/trans mounts, and steering coupling ready to go (will probably just have a shop do it). Since time is important, I won't try to tackle everything myself. The big 3 was already done by the previous owner, and he offered to install parts with the sale, so he ended up replacing all of the bushings in the rear (+ some other stuff) for me. I am going to pull the trigger on a full suspension/bushing overhaul for the rest the second the CSL Kingpins from Schmiedmann get tracking info (it's now been 20 calendar days).
Half the exterior CSL parts are inbound (boy do I have an interesting story about that, that I will post in the main forum). And once I pull the trigger on a front CSL bumper, the car goes in for paint. Unfortunately, the paint is a bit worse than I expected so 2/3rds of it is going to get resprayed. And there will be plenty of other things to come too.
But for the first week, I replaced the headlight lenses, gaskets, and corners b/c what was on there was atrocious.
And I should mention the spec: 2006 Comp slicktop w/ SMG and what appears to be no additional options. Kind of perfect for what my goal is with this car.
When I was 16 years old, this magazine came out (yes I still have it) and man did this car get me. I was already a "BMW guy" at that point, but man this was the one. Now I felt like I had moved past older BMW's, but when it came down to it owning this was probably something I needed to do.
So less than two weeks ago I picked this one up from a member here on the forum. Flew down to Atlanta, and drove it back to PA with an overnight in Greensboro, NC:
I guess NC can get pretty foggy? B/c this is what I walked out to at 6:30am the next morning. It was like this for the first hour or two of my drive.
And after about 7 hours it met the current residents. Unfortunately, after 12 years of ownership the E36 M3 is going to get the boot.
So the reason I am a bit over older BMW's is b/c I am tired of "restoring" cars slowly over a multi year timeframe. I just want to enjoy the car, and only have little maintenance or upgrades to do here and there. So the plan with this thing is to throw everything at it in as short of a time as possible. This is going to be the dream build, and the goal is to get it to 90% in a matter of a few months at worst. I want to experience this thing as fresh as possible, and just about all at once.
So I have a brand new driveshaft, engine/trans mounts, and steering coupling ready to go (will probably just have a shop do it). Since time is important, I won't try to tackle everything myself. The big 3 was already done by the previous owner, and he offered to install parts with the sale, so he ended up replacing all of the bushings in the rear (+ some other stuff) for me. I am going to pull the trigger on a full suspension/bushing overhaul for the rest the second the CSL Kingpins from Schmiedmann get tracking info (it's now been 20 calendar days).
Half the exterior CSL parts are inbound (boy do I have an interesting story about that, that I will post in the main forum). And once I pull the trigger on a front CSL bumper, the car goes in for paint. Unfortunately, the paint is a bit worse than I expected so 2/3rds of it is going to get resprayed. And there will be plenty of other things to come too.
But for the first week, I replaced the headlight lenses, gaskets, and corners b/c what was on there was atrocious.
And I should mention the spec: 2006 Comp slicktop w/ SMG and what appears to be no additional options. Kind of perfect for what my goal is with this car.
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