Ownership Verified: 1995 BMW M3 (US 3.0L), track day car

Redliner said:
You really should NOT! :D

I would drive the snot out of it first the first week before getting it really clean. :p
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it's entirely possible to do both ;)
I like keeping my cars looking good.. and keeping paint clean and protected helps prevent rust and helps the paint last longer.



haz said:
E36 M3, great find, awesome car!! You're going to have a blast. And I never knew U.S spec E36 M3s came with a lower hp output than European, why was that? I drove a E36 325i convertible for many years, although it handled like a boat it went like stink and that beautiful engine sound.... :)

How much was it btw?
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as shown earlier.. BMW was afraid Americans wouldn't buy the M3 if it were more expensive. They were also (probably for good reason :() worried that Americans would fail at maintaining the multi-piece rotors and ITB's. The American market is also why the s52b32us had the same horsepower as the s50b30us, and only gained in torque. The rear diff was also given a shorter ratio. It's because Americans typically don't rev their cars.. they short shift and expect torque. The US upgrade to 3.2 completely changed the power curve and introduced more low end power, which also meant that the engine didn't rev as freely and pull as hard at the higher rpm's. One of the most common mods on the US 3.2L's is the M50 intake manifold swap.. which essentially gets rid of that issue. My car pulls harder and harder until red line... it's awesome.


I paid $5200. He had the car listed at $5900 through July.. but only posted it in one place.. and never on any classified forums or sites. He dropped the price to $5500 before last week, which is when I started talking to him. He would have taken $5000 from me without the TR Motorsport wheels w/DWS tires, but said $5200 was good for the extra wheels. Considering those wheels and tires are worth well over $1k new, I was happy to pay the extra $200 :p

The m3 market is highly enthusiast driven in the US.. and even more so in some specific regions (like the northwest, where I am). This car is by-far the best condition M3 I've noticed for sale under maybe $6500, if not $8000, since January. I was expecting to spend $8000 - $10000, if not more just to buy a car that had a history I could trust and a good previous owner that took care of the car, until I found this one. Most M3's still go for around $8 - 10k at the low end, and more modified cars, or cars with lower miles, easily go for $12 - 15k, if not more. I feel like I got a really good deal... and got lucky.
 
I might argue the trackability and parts availability vs the Miata or e30 but for a dual purpose car... Hard to best the e36 m3.
E30 makes a horrible track car, I don't care what the BMW fan boys say. The chassis just didn't have the ability to get the suspension adjustments, even with fairly extreme mods.

I didn't notice in the lost of things to do that you planned to do the rear diff reinforcement since these chassis are notorious for diff's tearing the sheet metal.

I'm thinking my next car for track use will be an e46 328 or 330i with some m3 tweaks
 
thedguy said:
I might argue the trackability and parts availability vs the Miata or e30 but for a dual purpose car... Hard to best the e36 m3.
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as I said, I'm not buying/building a race car. There's a big difference between a dedicated track car, and a streetable track car.

A miata can definitely do the dual purpose role very well.. but one of my other requirements was that the car I buy had to be faster than my SportWagen. Neither a miata or e30 are that fast. I'd love to have both of those cars some day.. but right now the E36 made a lot more sense.

An E30 is a great race car.. strip it out and do everything to make it dedicated. I'd love to have one. Maybe some day..



thedguy said:
I didn't notice in the lost of things to do that you planned to do the rear diff reinforcement since these chassis are notorious for diff's tearing the sheet metal.
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rootrider said:
  • install rear trailing arm reinforcement plates
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I have a local shop with a very experienced BMW tech, among other good attributes, that I'll be taking the car to over the next few months. I would love to do a lot of the work myself.. but it's tough when you have limited space and the apartment specifically forbids working on cars :(
 
thedguy said:
I'm thinking my next car for track use will be an e46 328 or 330i with some m3 tweaks
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So I'm not completely crazy when I say I want to turn my car into a DE car with an S52 swap when my motor eats it? :p
 
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Congrats on a sweet pick up. I see you're planning on tracking it, so I can understand you keeping the Kosei rims.

But if you have the cashflow, get some nice BBS rims for the street.:cool:
 
rootrider said:
as I said, I'm not buying/building a race car. There's a big difference between a dedicated track car, and a streetable track car.

A miata can definitely do the dual purpose role very well.. but one of my other requirements was that the car I buy had to be faster than my SportWagen. Neither a miata or e30 are that fast. I'd love to have both of those cars some day.. but right now the E36 made a lot more sense.

An E30 is a great race car.. strip it out and do everything to make it dedicated. I'd love to have one. Maybe some day..
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If going dedicated, a Miata is cheaper and faster on a track. Though maybe having friends on a winning 25 hour enduro team that build Miata's helps in that department.
I've run a my trackable miata against fully prepped e30's and embarrassed them and I'm by no means a good driver.

Either way, good choice on the e36, 95 is a good year. Non staggered wheels and obd-1. IIRC They generally are the most expensive since all the turbo/swap guys want that year.

I have a local shop with a very experienced BMW tech, among other good attributes, that I'll be taking the car to over the next few months. I would love to do a lot of the work myself.. but it's tough when you have limited space and the apartment specifically forbids working on cars :(
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This is why I moved into a place with other car guys. Though now I have the benefit of a couple of friends who rented a house in a shitty neighborhood next too the Miller brewing plant that has loads of driveway/garage space and neighbors that don't care if we're cranking out engine swaps at 3am.

Der Stig said:
So I'm not completely crazy when I say I want to turn my car into a DE car with an S52 swap when my motor eats it? :p
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I don't even care about the s52 swap. I'd be happy with just stripping out the dead weight (keeping a/c though, tracks here are in the hot ass fucking desert), throw the M3 brakes/suspension bits and coilovers at the car and anything to get more adjustment in the alignment department and have a blast. Oh and chip/headers/exhaust/intake/light flywheel.
A stock 328i IIRC will run as fast as an e30 m3 in a straight line. Now strip out some weight, consider it has a HUGELY stiffer chassis and superior suspension geometry. Then give it the beefed up M parts with the 200hp-ish engine and you'll have an indestructible track car.
 
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Der Stig said:
Don't forget- you have to pop for an LSD ($2k) on E46s.

And you'll have VANOS. My car is starting to exhibit VANO issues at 80-odd k miles. It's not too bad of a job though. Having the right tools is the hardest part.
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If you have the right kit, it's an easy job to tackle.
 
ordered this today for the driver's side..

Schroth Rallye Cross ASM black
crosssch.jpg



it will cost a lot of money to duplicate the driver's setup to the passenger side :(
 
Mmm, track focused street legal cars <3

I've always found the basic E36 body good looking, shame that so many of them have been ruined, like all previous 3-series. Not this one :)
 
The M3 was great as it came. Why so many think they can improve looks by throwing on random parts is beyond me.
 
Heading out for an autocross today. It'll be a good time to feel the car out a bit. After this the car will likely (mostly) sit until September, when I'll have money to start fixing things.

I'll take some video today.. hopefully it can catch a little of the engine sound. I've missed owning a car that sounds good :D
 
Oh, I think I have expressed my approval of this on IRC and FB and wherever else, so lets do it here too!

Good choice, you won't regret it for general reasons, I hope you don't find reasons to regret this particular car.

Enjoy it! :)
 
Thats a very nice car man. tho I have to ask... whats up with the dirty looking engine cover over your VANOS unit? Looked like you had some accident with gasket paste or maybe even mud lol.

Edit:
After reading the part about how much you paid for your M3.. makes me wanna punch myself a little. Even as mine 2005 E46 @75K miles is more than 10 years newer than yours... DAMN just thinking I could have bought a M3 at half the price and more than half my budget left to spend on parts.....Ugh :)
 
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autocross yesterday.. it was a great way to feel the car out and get used to it. The tires are old and hard.. any input at speed just meant the rear end got away from me.. and not in a very controlled way. The engine also had trouble keeping oil pressure up after a while.. I'll look further into that soon. Otherwise, the car was awesome.. it's going to be a lot of fun.

I'll get videos up soon'ish
 
here's video from the five autocross runs on Sunday.

the times were:
1st run - 65.617 clean
2nd run - 62.764 clean
3rd run - 61.782 clean
4th run - 60.442 clean
5th run - 60.841 missed 1 gate

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bSma0Du5X5I&hd=1
(youtube still thinks it's processing the video for some reason.. so embedding may not work. Just click the link.)


I learned a lot about the car. It's going to be a good one for sure.. I can't wait to see it at the track in a month or two. The tires on the car right now are old.. manufactured in 2006. Any input at speed meant the rear end wanted to kick out. You can see me losing traction a few times in the video. The brakes are also in need of some help, but I already knew this. The car also had trouble keeping its oil pressure up after a few of the runs.. but this doesn't really surprise me either. All of these things will be taken care of soon. The car is fun.. and sounds awesome :D
 
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