Hi! New to the forum, here's my car. Bought her 2 years ago, our relationship had a lot of ups and downs (currently it's a major down unfortunately), but overall since a 6cyl E36 was always my dream car, and it happened to be a convertible which may be a bit more heavy (therefore slower) and definitely less rigid than the other versions, but the topless experience with these amazing engines gives it all back to you and then some. She's originally a '97 20i but the engine was swapped for an M52B28 just before I bought her, along with a full 28i drivetrain. I gave her a full suspension rebuild right after the purchase. We had problems, can't even list half the parts that were swapped out since she's mine, some of the biggest issues were rust and cooling related. The thought of selling her came to my mind many times when she produced expensive problems at the worst possible financial time for me (and that is happening now as well, just as Coronavirus made me lose most of my income, she decided to produce problem after problem, currently the camshaft beacon after having been serviced for different reasons 2 times last month...). The biggest problem with her, other than being old and therefore producing problems no one would even consider on newer cars (materials get old after 20+ years right...), is the lack of quality parts, and the price of the parts that do offer good quality. Keeping it running and not just temporarily fixing problems with cheap parts is extremely costly, and at the end of the day, as much as it is fun on a sunny day with the top down, you'll never get a car you can use comfortably since you're always worried about which part will break next, and will it happen this time or the next time, or hopefully sometime later. And here in Hungary, roads are in worse condition than you could ever imagine (especially the winding roads you'd take with a car like this), so the suspension always has some part on their way out soon.
Owning a car like this is a never-ending circle of "Oh I love this car" and "F*** me I should sell this pile of s***".
Overall, though? Love is never perfect, and now that E36 prices are starting to go up, as much as it would be the financially right thing to do, I always resist the thought of selling her.
She's not a daily of course anyway.
Exterior paint: Boston Grün Metallic
Interior trim: Turquoise leather/cloth
Rims and tires: 17" BBS RS II + currently Michelin Pilot Sport 4S 235/45 front and rear
(image inserting doesn't work for some reason so I can only leave a link)
https://imgshare.io/image/1TVH9
Last edited by AlexFindley; 04-06-2020 at 01:55 PM.
Bookmarks