BMW E93 325i msport convertible

[dave_s13]

Out of blue yesterday a car popped up on my wife's Facebook feed, 'ooh, that's lovely" she says. I've asked the man if we can go see it tomorrow. I had a scan and thought why not.



So, travelling the whole 6miles to view and I could tell immediately this was a good car.

Some more pics.











So, it a 2008 325i auto with 50k miles on it.

It's got recent bills for all new brakes, rear shocks, 18" alloys replaced (19s cracked), new high pressure fuel pump and various other bits. The leather needs a bit of a clean up but other than that it's pretty much mint.

Planning doing nowt other than drive it, service it as required and hope nothing breaks, especially the roof, it's terrifyingly complex!

Best bit is we seem to have paid less than the Evans halshaw valuation, which is a bit lucky to say the least. Wish me luck with it.

Moderator edit: no advertising

Edited by jeremyc on Monday 21st January 11:16

[Bungleaio]

I had one of these for a while and they are a nice car I'm sure you'll enjoy it. They aren't particularly fast but they are reasonable. To maximise roof down action I would recommend a wind deflector such as https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Genuine-BMW-E93-Wind-De...f:1&frcectupt=true

I got in the habit of keeping the wind deflector in place and the tray thing in the boot in it's lowest position just in case I fancied dropping the roof whilst out and about. If you drop the windows whilst moving it will reduce the amount of time it takes to drop the roof when stationary.

If you fancy making it sound better the BMW performance exhaust sounds great https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xpR7g02LEGk

This was quite a good forum for info back when I had mine - https://www.e90post.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=...

[Maxus]

Looks very nice. Is this a 2.5 or 3.0 engine? The 3.0 litre version responds very well to a remap (+c50 hp). Well worth doing from what I read.

[dave_s13]

It's a 3.0.

Thanks for the tip re the wind deflector, I've put a bid on. That's the wife's birthday present sorted if I can win it.

[Fox-]

Is that the right rear bumper? From the photo it looks like an SE rear bumper.

[dave_s13]

Fox- said:

Is that the right rear bumper? From the photo it looks like an SE rear bumper.

To be honest, it could be an SE but with an msport badge on the back! I'll have to check for sure.

Edit....just checked the green slip, deffo an m sport.

Edited by dave_s13 on Sunday 20th January 22:22

[helix402]

Super. Please remove the M badge from the boot!

[Mr Tidy]

Your car looks lovely OP.

And they look like M-Sport seats (heated too) so it's probably a Sport model - but as helix said it really shouldn't have that "M" badge on the boot!

A 325i will never set the world alight, but is a great place to waft away the miles so as you say, just enjoy it.

(My daily is an E91 325i, but being an early one it's got the N52 engine).

[dave_s13]

Ok, so I may get busy with the heat gun and dental floss tomorrow then.

Just been looking at the BMW warranty. £70/month for the fully comp cover down to £40/month for driveline only.

I'm tempted given these things can throw some big bills, but then again it had a new hpfp late 2017 so that's one main worry covered, to a degree anyway.

[CornedBeef]

Fox- said:

Is that the right rear bumper? From the photo it looks like an SE rear bumper.

Yeah that's definitely an SE rear bumper oddly! The rest of the car has got the sports bumpers/skirts/window trim etc.

[f1nn]

The (presumably) replica wheels are doing nothing for the car, I’d look at sourcing the correct wheels and rear bumper.

[dave_s13]

Bumper seems to be correct if you compare it any other 325 m sport on auto trader, and it looks totally fine to me. The 335i has a different bumper with the twin pipes. This does look better but it's not a 335i.

Re the wheels. It came on 19s with rubber band tyres and apparently they all cracked over time leading to issues after repair with the tyres holding pressure. So the previous owner swapped them for 18s with normal tyres to improve the ride. I don't mind them myself at this stage but something to think about anyway.

Thanks for the replies so far.

[cerb4.5lee]

dave_s13 said:

Bumper seems to be correct if you compare it any other 325 m sport on auto trader, and it looks totally fine to me. The 335i has a different bumper with the twin pipes. This does look better but it's not a 335i.

It looks like the SE bumper to me, the M Sport has a different grey colour piece in it at the bottom of the bumper.

[dave_s13]

Who knows mate, it's probably been written off and rebuilt knowing my lack of looking for closely at these things when car buying.

But...it still looks good, there's no part of me thinking I need to be spending money on a new bumper!

[cerb4.5lee]

Yes mate and it still looks fine to me. There's hardly any difference between the two bumpers anyway. It looks a very nice example, and I'm a big fan of the folding metal roof because when its up it retains the looks of a Coupe.

Enjoy it.

[chan61922]

Same vehicle here mate, I can confirm that I have a m sport model with the grey trim on the rear bumper that everyone is referring too. Seems odd that yours doesn’t, does your log book state sport? Looks like a clean motor though, enjoy! New here so haven’t figured out how to upload pics but will do....

Also to the poster who claims the 325(3.0) can be mapped with 50hp gain, really? I know it’s a detuned 330, but surely a n/a vehicle won’t see gains like that from just a simple map

[chan61922]

[Bungleaio]

chan61922 said:

Also to the poster who claims the 325(3.0) can be mapped with 50hp gain, really? I know it’s a detuned 330, but surely a n/a vehicle won’t see gains like that from just a simple map

I looked into it when I had mine and the inlet manifold is different between the two models. If you fit the manifold you can get it mapped to be the same as a 330.

Things may have changed since I had mine though as it was a good few years ago now.

[chan61922]

Interesting, a lot of messing about for 50 more ponies though, did initially want the 330 has its indentical in running costs/mpg etc, nothing came my way at the time though. Saying that I knew someone with a e36 328i years ago played about with the inlet manifold and got quite a decent gain too

[PorkRind]

Some of the bigger il6 and V8 do respond well to a map. I got 70hp out of my c63 which isn't too bad at all. Nice car btw, enjoy.