E46 Radiator Grilles

[Gad-Westy]

One of my radiator grilles committed suicided on a dual carriage-way. The other one looks like it is ready to do the same (clips broken). The car is 2000X Touring so pre face lift. Will any grille fit, whether from a coupe, saloon or touring or is the touring different at all?

[Gad-Westy]

bump

[E30M3SE]

Coupe grill will not fit, but touring and saloon are the same, I think there are '98-'01 and '01-'05 varieties.

[the_kato]

As above the coupe has a different bonnet with wider kidneys. Touring or saloon will work, don't know if the facelift changed the grill though

[Fun Bus]

Facelift gave the car a thicker grille surround. Is the coupe grille really different to saloon and coupe?

[the_kato]

Yup

Have a look at realoem.com, coupe's have completely different bonnets and grills with seperate part numbers

[Fun Bus]

Every day is a school day. Thanks for that.

[Gad-Westy]

Wonderful. Thanks all. Suprisingly hard to find realistically priced standard used items on ebay. I don't really want the black look.

[adam85]

Gad-Westy said:

Wonderful. Thanks all. Suprisingly hard to find realistically priced standard used items on ebay. I don't really want the black look.

Go for OEM as the clips on the after market items are sheeoite in my experience! Also put some Vaseline on the tabs before clipping them together.

[NickXX]

Further to this, note that 4 cylinder e46s have black plastic slats, 6 cylinder cars have chrome slats.

[Gad-Westy]

NickXX said:

Further to this, note that 4 cylinder e46s have black plastic slats, 6 cylinder cars have chrome slats.

Now there is something I never knew!

[Fun Bus]

The same applies to the current 3 too. It was and is the case on the 5 also.

[edc]

I have the world's first 5 cylinder E46 - one black and one chrome grille