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While my personal inclinations lie in having M-cars as close to the 80s as possible, there’s no question that the E39 and E46 combo are extremely desirable. The E46 M3 continues to grow on me as a relatively-analog total athlete. It’s not quite a top-5 “must buy” yet, but it’s certainly entering the conversation. Today, we have a remarkably similar duo, both examples dressed in the distinctive Laguna Seca Blue on black dubs with moderate modifications. The owners are clearly proud of their car, resulting in prices significantly higher than other E46s on the market.
I feel sometimes that the BMW E30 3 series is kind of like the Mazda Miata of the classic German car world. It’s the answer to almost every automotive question. Whether you want a modern classic to cruise in, a track day warrior or a practical commuter vehicle, there’s an E30 for everyone. This particular one came to our attention via our friends at Classic Car Club Manhattan. One of their clients, Mike, has it up for sale. This is one sleeper of a 325i sedan, with an S50 3.2 liter engine under the hood. Want a dual purpose street/track day car? This would be an excellent solution.
A new hunt of mine is finding affordable E30s with solid potential. The cleanest of the quintessential sports sedan have become quite valuable, but there are still some reasonable examples lurking out there. The “s” models, in both “eta” and standard “i” form, provide outstanding handling with varying levels of power. One path for finding inexpensive classics is being open to high-mileage survivors, of which we have two today. Both have well above 200k miles and the “s” package, but one has the venerable 2.5 liter inline-6 while the other comes with the larger-and-slower 2.7l of the 325e. E30s are ripe for many engine swaps, from stock to extreme, so buying a low-price, high-mileage example provides a great foundation for a project.
It’s always fun to see what the creative engineers can come up with out there. The guys at CG Motorsports clearly wanted to show their building skills, so they went a roundabout way of making an E36 DTM-style M3 tribute, albeit in show/street-car guise. I will admit to a guilty love of wide-bodies, though this love is confusingly matched with a distaste for wings and overdone wheels. These guys took the basic-but-capable 318is and stuck M3 bits all over, including some body parts, suspension, transmission, and engine. Add a DTM-style widebody kit, and you’ve got a tuner’s show car! They’re selling it in a way that sounds like more trouble than it’s worth – offering the chassis and body alone, or with all of the running gear and additions – that just makes me scratch my head harder. Taste and selling tactics aside, it is a clean FrankenBimmer that, at least to me, has some potential.
If there’s one type of car that has a rabid following amongst enthusiasts it is wagons with a manual gearbox. The number of new cars available in this form is few. Good used examples are fast disappearing, with the folks who own and love them hanging on to them like the coin of the realm. The 2007 BMW 328xi Touring we featured early this month sold in short order to another enthusiast who contacted us directly seeking more information. Hopefully, we’ll soon have a recap of that story. In the meantime, if you missed the 2007 E91 Touring, here’s one of the last E91 Tourings for sale in Massachusetts sent to us by our reader Adam, painted in a lesser seen shade of Vermilion Red.
