BMW 320Ci + 520i - CJ's Fleet

[CJ1987]

Hello,

Thought it was about time i did a write up about my cars as only just realized i haven't done this yet .










After getting a nice bonus from my work at the time i decided to use some of it to get something with a bit of performance for a change and finally settled on this BMW E46 320Ci with 107k Miles at the time which came with a FSH for the reasonable amount of £1600. It has full leather interior, all the usual toys (A/C, Climate control, cruise control etc) and the M-Sport suspension package.

Couple of months in i booked into a local garage to do a full service, replaced all the brakes and changed a couple of worn suspension bushes at the same time for the grand total of £500 but what i didn't realize at the time was that this garage was full of monkeys. A week later i took it out on its first PH run to Oban via Dukes Pass (Scotland) to see it how it handles the twisty stuff, the first 50 miles in it was going well and was keeping up with Audi TT's/ Imprezas Etc pretty well and somehow ended up at the front of the pack and thats when it took a turn for the worse in front of all the other PH'ers in style.

Turns out the garage had used the wrong coolant in it's service which if you don't know is a bad thing in BMW's with their Aluminium engines which caused the thermostat to fail and throw out a massive amount of steam as it lost all of it's coolant across the road. Thankfully i managed to park it up at a lay-by quickly to prevent any more damage and then get it recovered back home. When i got it back home i got to see the true extent of the damage which was one blown thermostat, radiator essentially exploded as well as coolant expansion tank somehow. After some searching i managed to get all the parts for £350 and fixed it myself, as for the garage that caused this they claimed they hadn't put the wrong coolant in it and refused to pay for any of the costs, buggers .

Since then it hasn't missed a beat but is starting to show it's age in some areas so decided to get a stop gap car so the search was on for a small cheap to run car to use for work till i got the car fixed and so of course this is the most obvious choice









This is a 520i with a FSH up until 96k miles (currently sitting at 137k), Mot'd till Feb 2017, Full leather interior with no tears etc and the usual toys for the extravagant cost of £625. After a long drive down to Ayr and after a inspection/test drive i snapped it up as it's only issues was a broken cup holder and a couple of minor rust spots. On the return journey it drove perfectly the full way back and was very comfortable at cruising speed.

As of now i have a dilema of whether or not to keep it after the 320ci is fixed which will be getting kept but as for now this is the current list of work planned for both cars:

320Ci

• Upgrade the brakes all round
• Couple of interior trim fixes
• Refurb and Powder coat the Alloys
• Fix the bodywork and respray when necessary
• Replace the Alternator Belt
• Fix the sticky Passenger door
• New Exhaust
• New Tyres all round

520i

• New cup holder
• Fix the small bits of rust
• New Tyres all round
• Replace all the brakes

Thanks for looking

Edited by CJ1987 on Thursday 16th June 23:37

[Mr Tidy]

Tough choice OP - if you sold them both would that give you enough to get a 325/330i?

I have a 325ti Compact as a daily and it is just great!

Gratuitous photo follows:-

[CJ1987]

I could if i sold both but my plan was to keep the 320ci as my daily driver as i do a lot of miles so need something with decent mpg and then have a weekend car for blasting round the B roads.

[Mr Tidy]

CJ1987 said:

I could if i sold both but my plan was to keep the 320ci as my daily driver as i do a lot of miles so need something with decent mpg and then have a weekend car for blasting round the B roads.

Fair enough, but to be honest from what I've read I don't think a 325i or 330i will use noticeably more fuel than your 320Ci. My 325ti is mostly used outside of rush hour on 30+ miles journeys on A roads and motorways and the OBC is showing a 34.4 mpg average, which is pretty astounding!

But I like the idea of a weekend car for B roads - that's what I've got my Z4 Coupe for!

[CJ1987]

That's not bad mpg, at the moment im doing 50+ miles a day which sometimes is in rush hour but still managing 37 mpg in the 320ci but will cross that bridge when the time comes

[Mr Tidy]

CJ1987 said:

That's not bad mpg, at the moment im doing 50+ miles a day which sometimes is in rush hour but still managing 37 mpg in the 320ci but will cross that bridge when the time comes

That is seriously impressive - good luck in the plan/search!