E36 m3 purchase?

[warmseth]

My 90 325's motor just shit the bed and I've contemplated dropping an s52 in it for some time. I recently thought "hey why don't I buy a salvage title e36 m3 for relatively cheap and drive it around for a bit. Then when I can afford to, strip it for goodies and sell the shell. I figue I can get the motor and trans, front seats, 5 lug steering rack and a few other do dads. Your thoughts?

[Anguz]

doooooooo itttttttttt

[A_Whelan]

Sounds like a good plan. Depends on how hard it would be to get the salvage title road worthy (I'm un familiar with the process). If it costs less than $500 then go for it buy any more and you should just do the swap now. Read read read!

[Joe G]

i read the thread title and thought NO. Read your thread and say YES.

[flyboyx]

how much is the salvage car? hopefully less than 3500.00. you will be able to recoupe a good portion of your investment if the price is in this range.

[warmseth]

I don't think it would be as cheap as $3500. I see salvage title m3s in the la area for between $4500-6500 frequently. So earmark around $5k I'd guess. But then I have to figure I might get $1000-2000 out of parts selling if I just keep the motor. It's probably a break even compared to buying a motor for $3k or so. I'll talk to Chris at Castro's about it and see what he thinks.

[Stanley Rockafella]

i read the thread title and thought no. Read your thread and say yes.

+1

[e30vert]

No.
Less motivation to actually pull the S50 out of the e36 M3 if it is a running and driving vehicle. Buy the engine and have it sit there and look at you and it will provide motivation.

Too much chance of just saying "heh, I guess I will just drive the M3 its not too bad"

[rThor432]

^^Thats true. You'll drive it and realize 'hey, this isn't as bad as everyone said..'. Can't believe salvage cars are going for that much. I love my E36 M. S52 E30 is a lot of fun too though..

[Kershaw]

running decent condition e36 m3s can be had for 5-7 grand here.

[Cletonius]

If it was me I would get the cheapest running one I could and strip it. Rebuild the motor and swap everything over, electronics and all. If you have the whole donor car it's really easy.

The key is driving the donor home and then nowhere else.

[flyboyx]

i have a obd2 swap build thread in the 24v section from a couple years ago. i purchased a totaled 2000 z3 m with 46,000 miles for 2500.00. i kept the engine, suspension, seats, and rear diff and hundreds of other little parts. i sold off the rest of the parts and completely made back the money i spent on the car plus another couple hundred dollars. i still have the body shell but at this point, it pretty much looks like a dog bone that has had all the meat picked off. it will go to the scrap yard soon and there will be another 150.00.

you don't need to buy a drivable car to accomplish what you intend unless you feel the need to drive it a while. in that case, its pretty hard to justify a swap.