Project Overly Ambitious

[DesertBMW]

Regarding the E30- I shipped it out from California in early 2023. I drove it around a bit and even took it to one of FCP Euro's cars and coffee events at Lime Rock where I got to park it on the racing surface. Then a local kid started asking questions about it and I ended up selling the car to him. He drove the car down to South Carolina for school, drove it for a few months, then sold it to someone down there. I quite miss the car as it was my first car and I owned it for 19 years, but at the same time am not that upset that I sold it. It was an incredible build, and I am super proud that I made it happen- it is by far the biggest project I've undertaken.

Not being able to help myself, in late 2023 I bought a 1994 740i that a previous owner had swapped a 420G into. Honestly...it feels like a bigger more comfortable version of my E30 considering it has near as makes no difference, the same engine and transmission. Guys- the E32 is just. so. fucking. solid. It really is a big leap up from E30s in terms of ride and build quality. That being said, IT'S BIG, and it's not even the LWB. I recently bought my wife an E46 Touring (that's also been manual swapped) and find myself reallllllly enjoying driving it because of its size. I just prefer the 3 series size factor, apparently.
I like the idea of an E36 or, even better, building a 2.7L (or bigger) M20 and getting back into an E30. I really like that latter idea.

Anyways, time will tell. Thanks to everyone who chimed in on this thread and helped me out in getting the E30 build done, I couldn't have done it without y'all.

Reason why you think stock E32 feels a lot better than your E30 is because your swap was never done right. As soon as I saw you had solid motor mounts and half of suspension was all aftermarket poly urethane garbage, I knew you hated to drive the car. It probably felt like driving some old school pickup truck. Most people that do M60 swap into E30 do it the bare minimum way just to get it running and just to say they did the swap. Bone stock 318i E30 that you had with M42 engine felt way better than any E32. The E32 feels like driving a van. I drove a lot of cars in my life, nothing feels better than E30 remember that.