New Cars!! Aries and 325i

[Silent_Fart]

Hey everyone. So I posted a few weeks ago that my moms 98 caravan caught fire. Well we finally got the insurance money from it and began searching for a good replacement for her. We ended up buying her a 1993 325i. It has about 150k on it and is an automatic but I was surprised when I saw it. It is REALLY nice I have never driven a BMW before and this thing hauled, have yet to be aloud to go on the highway with it to open it up but just driving it around the block told me what I needed to know about the car. The wierd thing about the car was the fact that even though it is 14 years old everything is pristine still. It has the factory cd changer, full spare, tool kit, all that. We ended up getting the car for 2700 and it hadn't been smogged so before we bought it we had them take it to get smogged. Overall I am really happy about the car. Now my dad's 1993 caravan with 240k on it finally had the transmission go so we bought a white dodge aries. The aries was another odd story. It was owned by an old lady and it had been garaged the whole time she owned it. It is an 88 and only has 100k on it. Everything in this car is pristine as well so we were really happy when they accepted our offer of 800 bucks. I will take some pics later but for now here's the craigslist post we got the BMW from.

http://sandiego.craigslist.org/car/273972662.html

fake edit: oh yeah my dad was reading the manual and he say's the manual says it's an E36. What is the difference between an E36 and an E30.

[Weazel]

The e36 and e30 are chassis identifications.

When bmw changes the body style of their model, they also change the chassis code.
The e30 was the second generation of 3 series as it's known now. e21 was the first. e36 came after e30, and e46 after that.

iirc, the last year for e30's in North America was 1991 or so. e36s came after that, of course.

The chassis codes for all other bmws are similar. So if you find an "e28" its a 5 series. An "e38" is a 7 series.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bmw#External_links
I'm not sure if it's all correct info, since it's Wikipedia, but the chassis code chart at the bottom is roughly correct. Keep in mind though, that the European models sometimes had different year ranges than the North American ones.

[chuckybob]

Originally Posted by Weazel

the last year for e30's in North America was 1993 or so (for the convertibles). e36s came after that, of course.

fxt

[Tuanies]

Originally Posted by I cant fix columns anymore I cant fix columns anymore :(

fxt

1992 for the E30 Cabrio actually.

[Therapist]

E30 and E36 differences?
Styling
Engines
Suspension
Interior etc.

Cool car, 93 was the first production year for that bodystyle

[jarhed13]

Originally Posted by BIG DILDO

E30 and E36 differences?
Styling
Engines
Suspension
Interior etc.

Cool car, 93 was the first production year for that bodystyle

Yup. Also one of the only years the 325i came with grey plastic bumpers on certain packages

[occupant]

Aries good. allpar.com

And an E36 BMW for $2700 is pretty decent. I'd rather have nine $300 K-cars myself, but hey, good choice.

[Silent_Fart]

Originally Posted by occupant

Aries good. allpar.com

And an E36 BMW for $2700 is pretty decent. I'd rather have nine $300 K-cars myself, but hey, good choice.

We got the BMW for my mom. She has wanted one for her whole life and she has had nothing to drive but minivans since she got married to my dad. The aries is kick ass. I had a 1987 chrysler wagon and I loved it, I did my first tranny swap on it and worked on it a lot so the aries is basicly the same thing (sadly has the 2.2 non turbo engine, my wagon had the 2.5 vroom vroom!!). The Aries is going to be for me once my dad get's his new work van, since he works from home most of the time he doesn't need a commuter car. I will drive the aries till I get reimbursed from my parents, then I am buying a miata and will keep that as my weekend car and drive the aries to school and stuff. I am glad I finally have a decent car, I am only 17 but I work on my own stuff and working on a piece of crap(my old wagon) was painful because no matter what it would still suck.

[occupant]

2.2FI...99hp/121lbs-ft torque
2.5FI...100hp/136lbs-ft torque

2.2 Turbo III (Spirit R/T) swap for great justice...224hp/218lbs-ft torque

[SHENSAREG the SECOND!]

Congratulations. Not a big fan of the K but the E36 is a pretty nifty ride.