1991 BMW 850i. V12 madness...

[johnfm]

Spent Friday afternoon in a pub in Cambridge, waiting for my son.

While there, saw this on eBay, did a deal, collected it on Saturday - drove it 200 miles home.

It survived.

V12 goodness.

Wish me luck...










Seems it was driven regularly until about 5 years ago. Then bought by a young lad who couldn't afford to insure it!

It's only done 1000 miles or so in the last five years, so I have a few jobs to do.

New plugs now in - has made a noticeable improvement in running.

Need to refresh all fluids and filters, get some new rubber on it and sort out a couple of very minor electrical things.

Surprised at how reasonable service items are - plugs, oils and filters are all sensible and brakes aren't all that big, so not too pricey. Bridgestone Potenza all round will cost around £475, so not too bad either.

Then over to leathercare in Warrington for some reconnolising of the front seats.

A little bit of TLC and it will be a fun cruiser.

First impressions - it must have been pretty awesome in 1991 as a new car. It has effortless, lazy torque and a reasonable push in the back with you press the "8 mpg pedal" as I call it.

It will tick over at around 2000 rpm at 80mph - and hit 22 mpg on my 200 mile journey home, which isn't too bad for an 80-90 mph cruise.

[Stoatman]

Brave is not the word , good luck .

[driver67]

Some excellent reading for you here OP :-

850 CSi - first steps

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

Great find !

Edited by driver67 on Wednesday 18th March 21:34

[hardyfella]

lovely

[Jonny_]

Too old, too complex, too much to go wrong...

I keep telling myself this about 850s. Then some sod puts up pictures of his and suddenly it starts looking like a good idea...

Looks superb, especially in that colour. Really suits it. Ridiculous to think that's a 24 year old car!

[Andy665]

Lovely, been very tempted by one of these for years

[J4CKO]

Wow, lovely.

[stewy68]

Lovely thing. A proper BMW and having driven two examples, it's amazing to think that the people with 118's et al actually think they've experienced a 'BMW''.

[shalmaneser]

I love these things. Absolute best of luck!!!!

[helix402]

Enjoy the spark plug change!

[jamiebae]

Lovely old thing

[cerb4.5lee]

Massive fan of these and remember fondly when they were launched and I thought they were amazing and still do and I just love the shape, enjoy it.

[johnfm]

helix402 said:

Enjoy the spark plug change!

It was a doddle. Plug #12 literally took 3 minutes. You need a short (4" or so) extender and a universal joint.

All plugs start to finish only an hour or so.

A noticeable difference.

The car is, like many cars of that era, quite a bit smaller than it looks. It isn't a huge, massive car at all.

Hope to bring it up to scratch over the next month or two.

[benny.c]

Superb. I've always liked these and would love to own one, but I'm not brave enough.

[johnfm]

New set of Falken tyres ordered. £372 delivered.

That'll do nicely.

[stewjohnst]

Bravo,

It's one of the cars I continually dredge the trader and ebay for and wish I had the balls to buy one.

[Amirhussain]

Always loved the 8 series BMW, the shape is pretty pleasing to the eye.

[johnfm]

I think balls are needed for the expensive cars out there.

This was cheap - I know some people who would spend this much in a brake upgrade for their GT3...so a relative bargain.

[yellowstreak]

Not madness at all - its a great car. I really fancy one myself.

[schuey]

One of my neighbours who loves an obscure car had one of these,he had to fix something simple on it,prop bearing or similar but it involved taking the exhaust off from the down pipes back. He called me over saying "check this out" he then started up and gave it few revs ,sounded awesome!!! Don't think any of the other neighbours were amused. Great car.