I've long been a dormant RR fourm stalker but thought it was probably now time to make myself known especially as I now have something moderately worth posting about. I'm not going to vomit my short and mainly very vanilla car history here, mainly to save my own blushes.
I had been regularly trawling the usual classified outlets for a number of months (if not years, actually) for a suitably tidy but suitably within budget E34 for daily driver duties. A 540 manual would have been lovely but having seen a few move through a popular auction site recently with lots of tin worm, no MOT etc and go for several thousand squids – not realistic. I spotted a nice dark blue 525i touring that was '<5 miles' from my postcode according to Autotrader. I couldn't not pick up the phone.
(Pictures from the advert)
Further detective work uncovered that it resided in the nice end of town (detective work = taking a long hard look at the photos and observing some gates, gravel drive and a bit of stone wall). It turned out to be very ‘<5 miles’ indeed, less than 800 yards from my father’s house in fact. I popped over that day after work to view it.
The spec – 1992 E34 525i Touring, M50 non-vanos engine, manual gearbox, 158k miles.
It’s really very tidy indeed considering its now knocking on 25 years old. The exterior is very tidy on the whole. It’s had recent welding done to the rear of both sills which is slightly unsightly but by no means dreadful. The only real niggle a large rust patch on the bottom of the drivers door (common prob). Other than that its almost entirely rust free. The interior is almost immaculate, the driver’s seat having been retrimmed in OE BMW fabric and it having mats upon mats upon mats all over the place. The test drive didn’t present anything worrying – just a bit of a whiff of burnt oil once in a while, which I presumed was caused by a leak from the cam cover gasket onto the exhaust manifold that I’d spotted earlier.
I agreed to buy it and left a deposit with a very pleasant couple that had owned it for the last 21 years.
More to come.
I had been regularly trawling the usual classified outlets for a number of months (if not years, actually) for a suitably tidy but suitably within budget E34 for daily driver duties. A 540 manual would have been lovely but having seen a few move through a popular auction site recently with lots of tin worm, no MOT etc and go for several thousand squids – not realistic. I spotted a nice dark blue 525i touring that was '<5 miles' from my postcode according to Autotrader. I couldn't not pick up the phone.
(Pictures from the advert)
Further detective work uncovered that it resided in the nice end of town (detective work = taking a long hard look at the photos and observing some gates, gravel drive and a bit of stone wall). It turned out to be very ‘<5 miles’ indeed, less than 800 yards from my father’s house in fact. I popped over that day after work to view it.
The spec – 1992 E34 525i Touring, M50 non-vanos engine, manual gearbox, 158k miles.
It’s really very tidy indeed considering its now knocking on 25 years old. The exterior is very tidy on the whole. It’s had recent welding done to the rear of both sills which is slightly unsightly but by no means dreadful. The only real niggle a large rust patch on the bottom of the drivers door (common prob). Other than that its almost entirely rust free. The interior is almost immaculate, the driver’s seat having been retrimmed in OE BMW fabric and it having mats upon mats upon mats all over the place. The test drive didn’t present anything worrying – just a bit of a whiff of burnt oil once in a while, which I presumed was caused by a leak from the cam cover gasket onto the exhaust manifold that I’d spotted earlier.
I agreed to buy it and left a deposit with a very pleasant couple that had owned it for the last 21 years.
More to come.
