Enthusiasts Blogging Our Favorite Classifieds
The Polar Silver 911 Turbo 3.6 we featured back in March is up for sale another reserve auction. Bidding sits at $175,500, which is right around where it was bid to on its last reserve auction. The reserve remains unmet so we’ll have to see if either the seller will lower his reserve or if another buyer is willing to pony up to steep asking price being sought here.
It’s always a happy occasion when I come across a ZHP that has been well loved and remains unmolested. In fact I think these cars are more likely to have been left in their original state than an M3 simply because the folks that tended to opt for the ZHP were more “grown up”. All I mean by that is while the E36 3 series was in production there was no four door M3 option so if you were a family man who wanted a go fast BMW, this was your car.
The ZHP only got a 10hp increase over the regular 330i but reprogrammed engine management and a close ratio six speed manual made it feel quite zippy. It’s stiffer and slightly lower too but from what I’ve read the ride quality didn’t suffer and that’s a big plus. I’ve driven a couple of E46 M3s and while they’re fantastic for spirited driving, I don’t cruising around in them on city streets. In this era before adaptive suspension setups you had to decide whether you wanted a performance car that was tolerable in day to day life or a sporty car that was OK when you wanted to get after it a bit. The older I get the more I find myself thinking the latter is the right way to go and I think the 330i ZHP is a near perfect choice for the driver who might go to the track a few times a year but mostly enjoys a spirited canyon run.
When you really feel the need to stand out it’s difficult to find a better way than with a pastel-colored sports car. Of course, there are a wide array of hyper and supercars that will fit that need, which can add an even wilder appearance to that brightly colored exterior. They also come with a very steep price tag. What is the budget-minded shopper to do? Well how about this Riviera Blue 1995 Porsche 911 Carrera Coupe, located in Miami. The mileage isn’t terribly high when we consider that this 911 is 20 years old, but at 117K miles it’s certainly lead a fruitful life thus far and comes in on the higher end of where we typically see a 993. Riviera Blue is perhaps the most iconic of the 993 colors even if it only made an appearance during the first year of their production, after having been made available for the first time in 1994 for the out-going 964. At the very least it’s a color that I first and foremost identify with the 993.
It’s always a bit amusing when we stumble across listings where the seller doesn’t seem to have a full grasp of the vehicle which they are selling. In some cases, it’s a buyer’s dream – snatching a car that the seller doesn’t know the value of. In other cases, it’s just a lack of accurate information. I’ll give this seller a break in that, at the very least, they don’t offer much of a description at all on what is a very interesting 1986 BMW. Represented as a “86 M6”, enthusiasts will immediately spot many issues; it’s not a U.S. spec car, so it’s not a M6. What it is, though, is quite an interesting find in many ways, so let’s see if we can break it down:
Wagons are the GCFSB car of choice, if you haven’t noticed. Only our resident Volkswagen/Audi guru Carter is flying the five-door flag, however, with his 2002 Volkswagen Passat 1.8T Variant 5-speed manual. While I sit here and wait for the perfect 1995 Audi S6 Avant to come along, I’ll admire this 2002 BMW 540i Touring for sale in Portland, Oregon. It looks like a real beast, and with Dinan engine mods and a worked over suspension, it’s almost like the M5 Touring that never was.
