Panici's E36 M3 - Realistic Dream Car

[Panici]

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The Purchase Story:


I didn't think I'd ever be making this post.
I've always wanted an E36 M3.
These were the cars my friends had in highschool. The first "fast" car I ever experienced.

I resigned to being happy with my rough '98 328i.
It is still clinging onto life with near a half million KM on the chassis.

The market prices of E36 M3's in my area have been growing faster then I could save up for one.
I got lucky. I feel like a kid on Christmas morning!

It must have been a combination of time-of-year and vehicle condition.
I picked up this M3 for what is on par with BAT's lowest priced examples for the last couple years.

On Saturday I hit the road with my Mom & sister to make a day trip of it.
Drove the car home with a temporary trip permit (for which I needed to speak to the supervisor's supervisor behind the mirror glass at the government office).


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Details/Original Specifications:

1999 BMW M3 (Build Date: 26.03.1999)

• USA Market Car (Imported in 2008)
• 135k Miles (When I took ownership.)
• Titansilber Metallic
• S209 LSD Rear Differential
• S785 White Direction Indicator Lights
• Black Leather Interior inc. Power Heated Seats
• S674 Harman Kardon Hi-Fi
• BMW Business Radio w/Tape Deck
• 6 Disk CD Changer
• 18 Button On-Board Computer (OBC)

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Modification & Restoration:

• Suspension, Wheels, Brakes, Steering
• Engine & Transmission
  • Clutch Fan Delete
  • Pusher Fan - 16" SPAL 30101517
  • AFE Cold Air Intake
• Interior
  • Clutch Pedal Starter Interlock Disabled
  • Chime Module Disconnected
• Exterior
  • Tinted Windows
  • Front Plate Bracket Delete
  • Chrome Kidney Grilles
• Lighting
  • Smoked Front Corner Lamps
  • Glass/Euro Projector Headlights
  • HID Low Beam Bulbs
  • Hella H1 Xtreme Yellow Fog Light Bulbs (Wired for independent operation)
  • DRLs Disabled
  • Strobing LED Third Brake Light
• Bodywork
  • Rolled Front Fenders
  • Rolled & Pulled Rear Fenders

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The Beginning:


The car feels tight and well sorted.
Quite impressive for what is likely all stock suspension and running gear on a 24 year old car.


The interior smells musty/moldy something serious.
As in, drove the car home with the windows half down and still had sore lungs bad.
Last owner stored the car outside and didn't drive it much, so not sure if it's a significant water ingress problem or was just sitting sealed up for too long.

I have three moisture absorbers in the car now, and am going to try a chlorine-shock product this week.

There is evidence of a past life even though the car is stock at the moment.
It appears (at minimum) the rear quarter panels have been resprayed.
All the fenders are aggressively rolled and unfortunately the rears are pulled quite poorly.

This along with the "Go Wide" stickers still in the door jambs makes me think this may have previously been a lowered and "stanced" car.
Will be checking for evidence of damaged strut towers in the future.

Steering wheel leather is worn through on the bottom left side.

There are a few areas with rust bubbles starting, and there is some rust underneath.
I haven't seen anything structurally significant. So far this is the nicest car I've ever bought.

Only other issue I've noticed so far is that the driver's window is reluctant to go up past half way unless two people are simultaneously helping it by pulling up and pushing forward at the same time. 💀

Toolkit is almost complete after transferring two items from the 328i toolset.

I removed the clutch fan yesterday, and will be rewiring the Aux fan appropriately as time allows.

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[Dj Buttchug]

Nice come up. I enjoyed my 99 M3 while I had it. It was a fun, comfortable daily. Check your rear subframe mounting areas, common for cracks.

[82eye]

great pick up. you hardly see them in the wild here anymore.

[alpinaseeone]

Woah sweet, another one to the fleet. Was this a local Ontario car?

Interested to see if you'll dig into this or the miata first over winter

[Panici]

Nice come up. I enjoyed my 99 M3 while I had it. It was a fun, comfortable daily. Check your rear subframe mounting areas, common for cracks.

Thanks for the heads up. Previous owner sent some underbody pics and things look good, but there is no replacement for looking in-person.
IIRC the same areas have plates welded over them on my 328i so I know where to look.

great pick up. you hardly see them in the wild here anymore.

Yes, I'm beyond excited! Like I couldn't sleep properly the night I brought it home.

Woah sweet, another one to the fleet. Was this a local Ontario car?
Interested to see if you'll dig into this or the miata first over winter

From the pile of paperwork it's been in Ontario & Quebec since it was transferred up to Canada.
I recall seeing a couple of US States in the paperwork as well.

Thanks for following along with the Miata!
It's under the knife first. Actually just got it up on jackstands on Sunday.
Positive the E36 and E30 wouldn't fit in the garage together (at least not with the three motorcycles in there too).

Picture isn't a great angle, but there is only enough room between the E30 and Miata to walk sideways. WAY too close for comfort, and you can bet I'll be putting extra jackstands under the Miata and dropcloths between the two cars before I start work. Already threw them under loosely to help me sleep.

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/53362012151_4b39d6e3f0_b.jpg

[reelizmpro]

Nice. I always liked that particular color and wheel combo on the E36 M3. Looks good.

[Panici]

Wow, lots of "excitement" this week with the M3.

I decided to try an "Auto Shocker" Chlorine treatment to get the smell out of the interior.
For whatever reason, the product literally EXPLODED a few minutes after I put it inside the car.

Thank GOD for those fastidious German engineers at BMW in the 90s, because the explosion set off the factory car alarm (which must be sound or vibration sensitive) and alerted me to the problem after I was already inside the house. Interior would have probably been ruined if the alarm didn't go off.
I spent an hour in the cold cleaning this granular and liquid chemical off the seats, dashboard, headliner, doors and center console.
Carpet and inside of windshield still needs some attention when it's not so wet outside.

Instructions said it can stain so I was obviously upset as the entire interior is black, but two days on and everything looks okay.
Gave it another wipe down this morning with leather/vinyl cleaner as appropriate.

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Now for some good news, I bought a set of coupe taillights used for $25. One of the bulb connectors needs some TLC but otherwise they are nice!
Will match the amber front corners on the M3.
















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EDIT - Pictures moved from first post:

[CubbyChowder]

Very nice! Looks like a solid example overall. Despite being a pretty boring color on most cars, E36 M3's look so good in silver, in my opinion. That sucks about the interior explosion but luckily you caught it quick. What other plans do you have for the car?

[Panici]

Very nice! Looks like a solid example overall. Despite being a pretty boring color on most cars, E36 M3's look so good in silver, in my opinion. That sucks about the interior explosion but luckily you caught it quick. What other plans do you have for the car?

Silver is my least favourite colour on a car, but like you said it does work quite well with this body shape. If I can help it, I’ll never go through the repainting experience again like I did with my E30 (but eventually wrapping in a different colour is possible.)

Great question about plans. I have a very hard time leaving anything stock, but such an original car deserves to not be ruined with over-modification.

That said, I can’t see myself ever selling unless I absolutely need the money. So there is no sense in keeping it original just to “preserve the value” for the next owner.

For now I’m going to focus on maintenance, and easily-reversible mods.

I’d like to keep stock suspension for once, and if anything modify towards comfort.

It’s possible I will eventually go down the road of exhaust, cams, M50 manifold, standalone ECU, etc if I want more power. But my intuition says (with a little more intake/exhaust noise) stock power will feel like “enough”.

[DEV0 E30]

Woot. I've caught myself eyeing E36s a lot in the past few years.

It's funny, back when these were 3-5k cars I didn't really consider them a want.

Now E36 / E46 M3 or E39 M5 are really the only other BMWs I can see myself with outside of E30s or... another M Coupe.

[Panici]

Woot. I've caught myself eyeing E36s a lot in the past few years.
It's funny, back when these were 3-5k cars I didn't really consider them a want.
Now E36 / E46 M3 or E39 M5 are really the only other BMWs I can see myself with outside of E30s or... another M Coupe.

They really do make a great driver's car.
Modern enough to be comfortable and livable (if not badly modified), without all the modern car screens and gadgets.
They seem to look better each year compared to some of the new (overdesigned) offerings by BMW.

After owning my 328i for a few years, I knew I wanted a nice E36 that I could keep for the long-term. I just didn't think it would be an M3! 😄

[DEV0 E30]

They really do make a great driver's car.
Modern enough to be comfortable and livable (if not badly modified), without all the modern car screens and gadgets.
They seem to look better each year compared to some of the new (overdesigned) offerings by BMW.

After owning my 328i for a few years, I knew I wanted a nice E36 that I could keep for the long-term. I just didn't think it would be an M3! 😄

Congrats man! And agreed, I think the market shooting up for them also confirms that they and E46 M3s are being considered some of the last analog yet refined classics now.

[Panici]

Small update.
Car is plated now, but won't be driven until the spring when the roads are salt-free.

Made a parts run on the weekend and picked up a few goodies for the M3. Price was right so I couldn't say no.

AFE cold air intake, with an absolutely filthy air filter. I had a K&N cleaning kit lying around, so gave the filter a few rounds of cleaning and rinsing.
Going to oil it up and see if it's salvageable. The heatshield is also rough and will need some paint.
Mostly looking for induction noise here since I plan to keep the exhaust very tame.

M50 manifold with Bimmerworld install kit. Gave this a good cleaning when I got it home, but is still discolored on a few of the runners.
The ECU should be tuned when you do the swap. And rather then pay for a canned tune, I could just go for a standalone.
Not sure if I want to go down this rabbit hole 😅

At any rate, I have the parts now and can decide later what I want to do. They won't go bad sitting on a shelf.
Worse case my 328i already has an RKtune onboard from the previous owner, who said it is mapped for the M50 manifold. So the kit can go on there.

Also since we had a warm day, I threw in a set of Hella H1 Xtreme Yellow bulbs into the fog lights. Discovered they have a layer of protective film on the glass lenses which was a nice bonus.

As an aside, this car has high-beam DRLs. Must have been done when the car was imported into Canada in 2008.
Hopefully it was done the "factory" way with the alternate relay. Will have to dig into the wiring when it's warmer and figure out what was done.
May put these on a switch like I did on my 328i, but perhaps I will use a rear fog light switch to keep an OEM look instead of a metal toggle. Or might just delete the DRLs completely as I could run the foglights. Still have lots of time to decide.

[Panici]

Patiently waiting until the springtime to take the M3 out.
We've had a couple days post-rainstorm that made the roads look free of salt, but I just can't bring myself to do it!

Slowly accumulating parts.

Have a set of TYC Smoked front corner lamps, which should better match the clear side markers and taillights. Need a really warm day to install these, as trying the plastic clips on the ambers in the cold weather is sure to snap them off!

Bought a set of trunk tools for Project Canyongrun, and took a few items from there for the M3 that are in better shape. Also have a complete box now that I have the 10mm socket in the top left spot.

Bought a 25/10/2A charger and have been topping up the battery periodically on days above zero.


And the most exciting news:
Bought a rewrapped 370mm M-Tech II steering wheel to replace the OEM item.
Leather is worn through on the original steering wheel, so this seemed like the logical solution.
Tricolor stitching is a nice touch, although the badge has some crazing and could be replaced.
Prices on these are getting crazy (I can see them going the way of the E30 370mm M-Tech I).

I saw this one pop up for well under the going rate, and decided to take the leap.
Came all the way from Bahrain.

[Northern]

Man what a great pickup. All things considered, the car looks to be in great shape.