2004 BMW 318ci M Sport. (LHD conversion content)
Discussion
Feb 2014 the business really took off and we decided that we should move back to the UK so with this in mind I hit Ebay and started car shopping with a lowly budget of around 4k GBP leaving the rest of our savings in tact to buy our first property (Together)
After looking at all manner of things and settling on another Lexus I ended up buying the nearest car I could find to my Father who is still in the UK (To make things easy) and ended up with this.
2004 BMW 318ci M sport with FSH and 70ish K on the clock and in pretty much A1 condition (Cosmetically)
The day we got it back to my Fiancés parents house
No Leather
but M sport cloth in reasonable condition. Bobbles sorted with a Communist electric shaver I found in the house we were staying in at the time.
Lots of niggly problems followed, 2 snapped springs, 4 new shock absorbers, A Lambda sensor, 4 coil packs, full exhaust system and new brakes all round. Also bought another set of wheels with some Fulda winter tyres whilst they were cheap.
After all manner of issues trying to get things sorted to move back to the UK after nearly 10 years of Expat life made this near enough impossible so we decided to move out of the pretty much abandoned house we were staying in to rent an apartment in the big city. No credit history made renting impossible, paying 1000 quid a month to live in an ex council sh*thole didn't really appeal to me after the places i've been living in abroad so this seemed like the right thing to do.
Underground Garages are great however the neighbours seem to frown upon me changing the oil and coolant down there
MOT expired in October and as we were no longer moving to the UK I just carried on driving it for a while planning to scrap it for parts. Whilst browsing breakers yards trying to get the best price I noticed on one of their cars (Without the dash and interior trim) that the actual bodyshell of the car was symmetrical meaning that the LHD and RHD variants had an identical bodyshell meaning that its not a great deal of work to swap the steering wheel over. The OH made a few calls and we met with several people who could do the work.
Eventually we decided to get the man with a pair of dungaree's and a rather fine beard to do the work so dropped the old girl off at his shed in some village near the Polish German Border.
4 weeks and around 800 quid later.....
Done, No rattles, squeaks etc, Everything works 100% and no difference at all now to an original LHD car. Theres a few bits of interior trim that I need to rectify such as the black cube trim on the dash and centre console (Ordered from BMW) Full engineers report and a Polish MOT (Not that the MOT here really means anything)
Took it for a full checkover at a BMW dealer too for peace of mind.
We then took a trip to the OH's parents place last weekend to make a start on the beaurocratical nightmare that is registering a car in Poland. (I didn't want Poznan number plates for a few reasons)
Anyway after 2 days of visiting 6 different offices we finally got it registered.
Total cost works out at around 4500 GBP which is pretty good considering similar examples are fetching 6 - 9k Euros with comparable spec and mileage
Feb 2014 the plan is to find a very late e46 M3 and do it all again now I know the process (The OH disagrees with a wedding pending and a house build in process)
After looking at all manner of things and settling on another Lexus I ended up buying the nearest car I could find to my Father who is still in the UK (To make things easy) and ended up with this.
2004 BMW 318ci M sport with FSH and 70ish K on the clock and in pretty much A1 condition (Cosmetically)
The day we got it back to my Fiancés parents house
No Leather
but M sport cloth in reasonable condition. Bobbles sorted with a Communist electric shaver I found in the house we were staying in at the time.
Lots of niggly problems followed, 2 snapped springs, 4 new shock absorbers, A Lambda sensor, 4 coil packs, full exhaust system and new brakes all round. Also bought another set of wheels with some Fulda winter tyres whilst they were cheap.
After all manner of issues trying to get things sorted to move back to the UK after nearly 10 years of Expat life made this near enough impossible so we decided to move out of the pretty much abandoned house we were staying in to rent an apartment in the big city. No credit history made renting impossible, paying 1000 quid a month to live in an ex council sh*thole didn't really appeal to me after the places i've been living in abroad so this seemed like the right thing to do.
Underground Garages are great however the neighbours seem to frown upon me changing the oil and coolant down there
MOT expired in October and as we were no longer moving to the UK I just carried on driving it for a while planning to scrap it for parts. Whilst browsing breakers yards trying to get the best price I noticed on one of their cars (Without the dash and interior trim) that the actual bodyshell of the car was symmetrical meaning that the LHD and RHD variants had an identical bodyshell meaning that its not a great deal of work to swap the steering wheel over. The OH made a few calls and we met with several people who could do the work.
Eventually we decided to get the man with a pair of dungaree's and a rather fine beard to do the work so dropped the old girl off at his shed in some village near the Polish German Border.
4 weeks and around 800 quid later.....
Done, No rattles, squeaks etc, Everything works 100% and no difference at all now to an original LHD car. Theres a few bits of interior trim that I need to rectify such as the black cube trim on the dash and centre console (Ordered from BMW) Full engineers report and a Polish MOT (Not that the MOT here really means anything)
Took it for a full checkover at a BMW dealer too for peace of mind.
We then took a trip to the OH's parents place last weekend to make a start on the beaurocratical nightmare that is registering a car in Poland. (I didn't want Poznan number plates for a few reasons)
Anyway after 2 days of visiting 6 different offices we finally got it registered.
Total cost works out at around 4500 GBP which is pretty good considering similar examples are fetching 6 - 9k Euros with comparable spec and mileage
Feb 2014 the plan is to find a very late e46 M3 and do it all again now I know the process
(The OH disagrees with a wedding pending and a house build in process)This happens a lot with Elises, I sold mine to a Dutch guy who was going to convert it to LHD, as it costs about £1k to do and pretty much doubles the value of the car.
People in the UK have no idea how good they have it when it comes to used cars, £5k+ for a 4 pot E46 is perfectly normal in a lot of Europe, largely because when the Western Europeans have had enough they get bought up and exported to Poland/Hungary/Romania etc.
That looks like a decent job, I guess there's a roaring trade in RHD>LHD conversions out there with the number of Poles buying up UK cars and taking them home, combined with the cheap labour rates for doing the work.
People in the UK have no idea how good they have it when it comes to used cars, £5k+ for a 4 pot E46 is perfectly normal in a lot of Europe, largely because when the Western Europeans have had enough they get bought up and exported to Poland/Hungary/Romania etc.
That looks like a decent job, I guess there's a roaring trade in RHD>LHD conversions out there with the number of Poles buying up UK cars and taking them home, combined with the cheap labour rates for doing the work.
LHD versions cost 7k + over here and most cars here in PL have a dubious history as most have been written off in another country at some point and often badly repaired.
the 800GBP i spent on getting it converted to LHD is about the same as it would have cost to drive to the UK, get it MOT'd and then bring it back, Factoring in fuel a week or so in hotels etc and lost earnings whilst doing it so it seemed like the right thing to do. + I was intrigued by the whole idea and wanted to see it done.
It had to be a 318i as anything over 2000 cc get hit hard with the import tax 30% or something stupid + 23% VAT
Heres a few comparable ones up for sale
http://suchen.mobile.de/auto-inserat/bmw-318-318ci...
http://suchen.mobile.de/auto-inserat/bmw-318ci-m-s...
the 800GBP i spent on getting it converted to LHD is about the same as it would have cost to drive to the UK, get it MOT'd and then bring it back, Factoring in fuel a week or so in hotels etc and lost earnings whilst doing it so it seemed like the right thing to do. + I was intrigued by the whole idea and wanted to see it done.
It had to be a 318i as anything over 2000 cc get hit hard with the import tax 30% or something stupid + 23% VAT
Heres a few comparable ones up for sale
http://suchen.mobile.de/auto-inserat/bmw-318-318ci...
http://suchen.mobile.de/auto-inserat/bmw-318ci-m-s...
jamiebae said:
This happens a lot with Elises, I sold mine to a Dutch guy who was going to convert it to LHD, as it costs about £1k to do and pretty much doubles the value of the car.
People in the UK have no idea how good they have it when it comes to used cars, £5k+ for a 4 pot E46 is perfectly normal in a lot of Europe, largely because when the Western Europeans have had enough they get bought up and exported to Poland/Hungary/Romania etc.
That looks like a decent job, I guess there's a roaring trade in RHD>LHD conversions out there with the number of Poles buying up UK cars and taking them home, combined with the cheap labour rates for doing the work.
The chap that did mine had 2 other e46's including an M3 in for conversion and is already booked up until may next year. He only converts BMW's and said that it is now becoming really popular as used cars in the UK are so cheap. The history is more traceable than on the continent and the condition and spec of UK cars is often far higher than anywhere on the continent.People in the UK have no idea how good they have it when it comes to used cars, £5k+ for a 4 pot E46 is perfectly normal in a lot of Europe, largely because when the Western Europeans have had enough they get bought up and exported to Poland/Hungary/Romania etc.
That looks like a decent job, I guess there's a roaring trade in RHD>LHD conversions out there with the number of Poles buying up UK cars and taking them home, combined with the cheap labour rates for doing the work.
Yes UK residents have it very good with used car pricing! Compared to Poland and Australia they are an absolute bargain.
The Polish used car market is indeed, erm, 'interesting'. They import 750,000 used cars a year (new car sales are 280k a year) and half the used imports are over 10 years old. When buying a used car there you basically accept that there's a better-than-average chance that it has been crashed, clocked or more normally both of the above as it's pretty much impossible for a member of the public to trace the history.
jamiebae said:
The Polish used car market is indeed, erm, 'interesting'. They import 750,000 used cars a year (new car sales are 280k a year) and half the used imports are over 10 years old. When buying a used car there you basically accept that there's a better-than-average chance that it has been crashed, clocked or more normally both of the above as it's pretty much impossible for a member of the public to trace the history.
Its a bizarre situation here, We went out back in September to find a 2/3 year old Audi A1 S-line, Went to a few dealers and looked at several only to find out that they had been crashed and repaired. We then went to both Audi Main agents here in Poznan to have a look at their used stock only to be told that they had all been accident repaired too. Hence converting the one we have made sense for the short term until the house is complete and we can buy brand new.CDB1983 said:
The chap that did mine had 2 other e46's including an M3 in for conversion and is already booked up until may next year. He only converts BMW's and said that it is now becoming really popular as used cars in the UK are so cheapeasily nicked and transported abroad...........
Maybe? EFA
I drove back from England to Luxembourg yesterday.
En route from the Tunnel terminal at Calais heading towards Dunkerque then Lille, I was amazed at the number of Polish, Bulgarian and Romanian Vito type vans I passed, each with trailers and a BMW/Audi/Merc on them(UK plated cars) all heading home for future local use, presumably.
En route from the Tunnel terminal at Calais heading towards Dunkerque then Lille, I was amazed at the number of Polish, Bulgarian and Romanian Vito type vans I passed, each with trailers and a BMW/Audi/Merc on them(UK plated cars) all heading home for future local use, presumably.
gary3170 said:
i,m in sweden and driving a e46 323ci cab i bought in england for 2k,lhd ones here are 7k plus hmmmmmm got any contacts for the guy op? i,m buying a e46 rhd cab in march/april :-)
Sorry about the late reply, Not had much time to get on here recently with planning a wedding and building a House, send me a PM and i'll forward the guys contact details if you are still interested, (My OH can translate if required)Anyway the BMW has now been replaced by another BMW, This time a 320d from Belgium, The brother in law bought this one off us which prompted a new car search.
(When the house is finished i'll be doing the whole swapping sides thing again as its well worth it and the specs and condition of cars for sale in the UK is far better than anything to be found on the continent)
jamiebae said:
This happens a lot with Elises, I sold mine to a Dutch guy who was going to convert it to LHD, as it costs about £1k to do and pretty much doubles the value of the car.
People in the UK have no idea how good they have it when it comes to used cars, £5k+ for a 4 pot E46 is perfectly normal in a lot of Europe, largely because when the Western Europeans have had enough they get bought up and exported to Poland/Hungary/Romania etc.
True.People in the UK have no idea how good they have it when it comes to used cars, £5k+ for a 4 pot E46 is perfectly normal in a lot of Europe, largely because when the Western Europeans have had enough they get bought up and exported to Poland/Hungary/Romania etc.
In Holland, when buying a car you not only pay the normal VAT, we also have another tax called BPM, which is about 40% of the net retailvalue of the car, which gets added to the price. So if we were to buy the same car in the UK and in Holland, the Dutch one would be far more expensive.
And that higher purchase price reflects on the secondhand market as well, keeping the prices up there too.
I couldn't believe my eyes when i first moved to England and was able to buy nice cars for so little money. And still now everytime i go back to Holland, especially in the GTO people ask me how i can afford such a car, and i have to explain how much cheaper (by a lot!) the cars are in England.
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