Press "Enter" to skip to content

Tag: BBS

This site contains Ebay partner affiliate links, which may earn us a commission at no additional cost to you.

Wednesday Wheels Roundup

Yesterday, Adam at Fast In Fast Out posted an article covering some of the best vintage racing wheels. I love wheels, and it was fun to see Adam’s article – plus, it also got me thinking about another wheel roundup. Adam asked in his article what was missing – so I found a few that I thought where absent from the lineup but are always fun to see. There’s a set of mega-rare and mega-expensive Campagnolo racing wheels for early BMWs; boy, do they look impressive though! Then there were some great Audi S6 Speedline-made “Avus” wheels. Later models were made by Ronal, but the originals came from the Italian manufacturer. Speaking of, there are a set of the infamous and often-sought Pirelli P-slots for Volkswagens below. Then there is a wild set of Gotti wheels – in some cases, these were raced on factory Porsches as an alternative to BBSs. Check out the width on those rear tires!!! Rota has made some replica wheels recently of some great designs; these both copy the BBS race wheels but also mimic some MSW and OZ designs as well – and boy, are they affordable! Then there are a great set of Ronal R9s that mimic the ATS-made “Penta” AMG wheels; the ATSs are usually more valuable but harder to find. And finally, another set of Speedlines – this time a Techart set for Porsches that just look incredible (and, oddly tasteful for Techart designs). Which is your favorite?

CLICK FOR DETAILS: Campagnolo BMW 13×7, 4×100 Wheels on eBay

3 Comments

1987 BMW 535is

When I was a young driver, I was lucky enough to have a few mid 1980s BMWs in the family. My father had collected an assortment of some of the best; a 1982 633CSi, a 1985 635CSi, a 1988 M5 and a 1988 735i 5-speed. Of course, driving each of these cars, I felt in some measure invincible. Considering I had learned to drive on a 1984 Toyota pickup, these leather-lined inline-6 monsters might as well have been Ferrari Enzos. And as if an invitation to dip into that speed, the later 6 and 7 had factory hard-wired radar detectors. Not only was I at the wheel of a car capable of Saturn V levels of thrust, but it was also invisible. My cloaking device engaged, I’d speed down the roads; in hindsight, the who scene was probably similar to the pinnacle of the storyline in The Hunt For Red October as a torpedo closed in on the submarine. I’d stomp on the binders as soon as those beeps registered what was surely an entire squad of police setting up a roadblock for me. Oddly, they all seemed to occur around stores with automatic doors. Even more oddly, there never seemed to be any police there. And especially vexing was the total lack of response when you would drive past an actual police car. At first, I assumed they just had their systems off. I mean, why would BMW install a system in their car that didn’t work? But as the number of actual police speed that the radar detector picked up remained shocking close to zero, I began to be suspicious that this system had actually been installed merely to annoy me. I still get a chuckle every time I see them in older BMWs, such as this 1987 535is:

CLICK FOR DETAILS: 1987 BMW 535is on eBay

2 Comments

Fake It ‘Til You Make It: 1986 BMW M3 Tribute

Let me go on record as stating that I personally have no problems with replica cars. Especially when you consider the price of exclusive originals or cars that are non-existent, tributes and replicas offer people the opportunity to see cars they would otherwise never get to experience. Several of the Auto Union Grand Prix cars, for example, have been built as exacting replicas of the originals that no longer exist; see them in the flesh, and they’ll make your spine tingle just as much as if Nuvolari or Rosemeyer had piloted them originally. But then there’s a secondary tier of making replica cars that are either just expensive or hard to come by; Sport Quattros, S2s, AMG and Ruf models as well as the exclusive RS have always been popular, and an increasing trend over the past few years has been replica M3s. Of course, when the real deal is only a few thousand dollars, making a replica isn’t economically viable. But prop the price up to near six figures, and suddenly the pain and expensive of creating a replica becomes not only popular, but perhaps even lucrative:

CLICK FOR DETAILS: 1986 BMW M3 Tribute on eBay

8 Comments

2006 Audi S4 Avant

A few weeks back during our “Wagon Week” theme, I wrote up Audi’s last stand in the Avant market; a steadily decreasingly number of offerings in the 2000s. I looked at three nice versions of the Avant that were available in 2008. My unfortunate conclusion, though, was that none of them would be the car that I would want. The S4 Avant was certainly tempting, but the automatic wasn’t the transmission I’d want in there. However, change a few details and suddenly that B7 becomes much more appealing. Add some great option BBS CH wheels and a manual transmission along with a caring owner, and the B7 S4 was a package that really had no rivals. It looked as fast as it went and remains on the best all-weather people haulers made:

CLICK FOR DETAILS: 2006 Audi S4 Avant on eBay

2 Comments

1993 Volkswagen Corrado SLC – REVISIT

Time to look at another Corrado SLC that’s crossed these pages before; back in July, I wrote up this very clean looking 1993 example with some stellar BBS RSs. Unfortunately, the car is an automatic and the big stereo was a turn off; I guessed this car would likely trade hands in the high single digits. Well, it’s back up for sale with a different seller, a pretty extensive gallery of photos showing the very good detailing job they did and a new higher price. It also inexplicably now has 26 miles less than it did last time. Now for offer at $10,900, I don’t see any reason that it’s worth more than it was the first time around. I’d still peg the value between $8,000 and $9,000; for nearly $11,000, I’d much prefer to offer a bit more and try to nab the pristine 1992 5-speed we featured with 100,000 miles less. What do you think is top dollar for this car?

CLICK FOR DETAILS: 1993 Volkswagen Corrado SLC on eBay

The below post originally appeared on our site July 14, 2014:

1 Comment