Hello to everyone!(with a question to ask)

[PapaChris]

greetings to everyone,my name is chris and i have visited the forum a lot of times in the past(mostly to see some build threads cause they are amazing :popcorn:)but the last days i've been a daily visitor...

the reason is that i finally have a budget to find an E30 for my self and i'm reading a little more,so i'm very excited and i searching like crazy...

the car appears to be a 89' M40 316i,it's a 2 door with very little amounts of rust underneath but repainted,and in saturday i'm going to check it to an experienced bodyshop guy i know for more rust and hidden old crashes but i have a little question:
how i can recognize its a real M40 and not an older year transformed to one?everything is right outside and the motor is the right one but im a little suspicious on things like it has not power steering(i was almost sure all the newer ones have it)...everything like a serial number letter/digit to check would be helpful,Thanks...

P.S.i hope everything is readable and i'm on the right topic... :D

[crappycoco]

I'd take the VIN and just check which engine the car was sold with.

[Ray Smoodiver]

Welcome to R3v!

Run the vin through http://www.bmwarchive.org/vin/bmw-vin-decoder.html and it will tell you yes or no to wether it got power steering. P/S is option code 215.

How do you mean other motor made to look like an M40? Explain further.

[PapaChris]

the engine is M40 and the rest of the car have all the things on the exterior an M40 car should have...i just had the thought that all M40 E30s have power steering and that made me think of what is original to the car and what is not...

btw thanks alot for the link,it gives even more info of what i needed,unfortunately i didn't hold the VIN but il do it when i see the car again... :-D

P.S.by the term M40 i meant all the car and that was the confusing part of my original post,my mistake sorry!