I just sold the 3. I would have kept it far longer if I didn't have so many long-term automotive relationship issues. Even though it left to make room for my 914, I'm nevetheless sad to see it go. Speaking of the 914, those of you who can remember past...
I drove the 3 today because I haven't gotten around to selling it yet, and tonight I need something with, uhh, headlights. It feels like driving an SUV. I sit way high up in the air and the steering is vague. And the clutch and brake pedals feel like small,...
Some of you are clearly wondering why I'm trolling Craigslist for post-riced Preludes. The rest of you probably assume I'm a huge car dork that does that sort of thing without any reason, and you'd be right. But it turns out that I do have a reason this time: I've...
Being practically 15 years old, the BMW has some defects in its paint job. Ignoring the handful of dents on the passenger side and the occasional paint chip, it nevertheless had lots of smaller scratches and horrendous swirl marks in the paint. A wax would make these a little less...
The biennial emissions inspection for the 3 is due this year, so I got it checked last week before I reregistered the car. The 3 sports an old-skool OBD-I diagnostic port, which is largely useless besides being able to tell you that your OBD scanner tool is, in fact, attached...
Here you can see I've got the front two wheels finished....
So at some point before the wedding I picked up a Fred Meyer plastic grocery bag underneath the BMW, which subsequently melted itself to the exhaust system and smelled all the way to Canada. Being lazy and on my honeymoon, I didn't actually remove the plastic until the last day...
And why, you may be asking, am I so surprised that I didn't crash my BMW today? I washed the car the equivalent of four times yesterday. It turns out that there's a lot of work involved in really getting a car clean. Keeping the paint in good condition requires...
Certainly, it chatters a little bit, but the clutch I installed in the BMW is still fully assembled, and the engine hasn't fallen out of the car yet. So, mission accomplished. But now the damned thing has gone through the third tail-end lamp in just as many months—this was a...
The rear shock tower mounts on the E36 3 series are two of a handful of places where BMW's engineers failed to anticipate the abuse this car would receive. The stock shock mounts disintegrate over time and rattle every time the car goes over a bump. In extreme cases, the...
I've been meaning to perform this modification for a while. Here's the deal: the BMW E36 3 Series cars sold in the US (ti compact model excluded) have a somewhat counterintuitive stop lamp layout. These cars each feature three panels on each tail assembly; arranged horizontally, there's an inner, middle,...
This happened at least a month ago, but I just ran across the picture today. I hate walking through fresh gum, and although driving through it doesn't involve the sticky cleanup, I still feel defiled. Can't you damned kids use a trash can??!?...
I finally had enough time today to wash and wax the BMW. Now I remember why I pay other people to do this for me....
I mentioned last week that if I had a chance, I'd take some audio of the 3 and post it. Well, here it is (WAV, 188kB). Do ignore the ... footsteps at the beginning and the end of the clip. I haven't had a chance to, you know, trim those...
Here we go—videos of Layla and I at the track! One of Layla's many runs (22.7MB MPG) The run where I spun out (24.2MB MPG) One of the runs where I drifted the last corner (Part 1, 9.99MB) One of the runs where I drifted the last corner (Part 2,...
I admit, I forgot to mention: Layla beat my time at the autocross. Badly. She managed a 51.778 and my best time was a lousy stinking 53.306. So what the heck happened? Well, it turns out that Layla now has more track time in the BMW than I do. In...
That's right. I finally talked her into it. How I talked her into it was the A.C.E. Ladies Practice, held today at the Boeing plant up in Everett—the same spot as the novice school I attended about a month ago. The Ladies Practice is an annual event sponsored by the...
This weekend was a "fix the damned car" weekend. I ran my brakes down severely at the autocross two weeks back, so I had AutoLogic throw new rotors and Porterfield R4-S pads on all four corners. They also changed the oil and put a new battery, and the latter caused...
There were a number of small things I noted when I originally bought the 3: the windshield was cracked, the passenger's seat controls were missing the buttons, one fog lamp was cracked, and the front end had a dent in it. I fixed everything except the dent in the first...
Sometime on Friday night, the 3 started dumping steam from under the hood. And inspection yesterday reveals that the entire hose coupling at the top of the radiator has sheared completely off from the end tank. Yes, this means I need a new radiator. No, I won't JB Weld it...
Yesterday, I got the 325 back from Autologic after its VANOS repair. Because things have been sortof crazy around here recently (holidays, landlords, etc.) I really haven't gotten a chance to, you know, drive it. Today I really had my first chance to open it back up again. Hot diggity....
I'd like to start by saying that Mouser is responsible for the name of this post. The reason I'm talking about VANOS again is that it turns out that the VANOS unit on the 3 is pretty damned broken. And before I get into how badly this broken VANOS unit...
I'm looking for new tires for the 3 since the front-passenger tire picked up a finish nail. Has anyone run the Kumho KH11 summer touring tire? Yes, I realize it isn't summer. I already know the 3 is going to be entirely useless in the snow, and I think that...
Late last week the 3 picked up a rather good-sized nail in one of the front tires, and subsequently had to be changed. Layla had already taken the car when this happened and she called me from down the road to tell me that when she pulled into the parking...
Last weekend, I ordered a strut tower brace from eBay for the 3. Put simply, a strut tower brace is a piece of metal that connects the very tops of the two strut towers under the hood. The idea is that when turning, these two towers get stretched together and...
May I gush about Autologic for a minute? Fantastic crew. Their website needs some help. But, great people. I called them up the other day to get the SRS lamp reset on the 3. I had a feeling that the dealership nearby would charge me megabucks for 5 minutes of...
For different reasons, both of my fixes to the 3 yesterday had to be redone. The new dash lamp I installed was slightly brighter than the old ones, so I had to replace those, too. Actually, I was planning on doing this from the start, but the local car store...
Ideally, here's what I've got in mind for the 3 (in no particular order):Reset the damned SRS code Hammer out the dent in the front fascia Install the front strut tower brace that I ordered today (woo!) Coolant flush, new water pump, new thermostat New throwout bearing and maybe a...
Well, I've finally fixed the fogs (err, driving lights) on the 3. You may remember that the broken lamp lens was one of the things I commented on right after I bought the car. It took me just about forever to actually get around to doing it, but thankfully I...
I've gotten way behind fixing the fog lamps on the 3. Way behind. Behind on this and other issues. The windshield is still cracked, for example. And there's still a ding in the front end. And the front suspension squeals from time to time. So I'm doing something about it....
I don't really have the time at the moment to actually go into all of the detail of my Sunday, but here's a snippet. Oh yeah. Hot. That's an M3, for those of you without, you know, eye balls....
How many of you have, at one point or another, lost car keys? It's pretty damned easy, especially if you don't have a keychain larger than one of Saturn's smaller moons. Now, how many of you have lost an entire car before? ...twice? Sunday afternoon, upon my return from fabulous...
I just got the 3 back from the dealership. In the end, I had them fix the passenger seat controls and replace the accessory belt, but they couldn't reproduce the squeak in the front-end. Damn. The funny part comes when I got the car back, however. When driving away from...
I registered my car. I paid a butt-ton in taxes. Despite the fact that I really like the idea of having low (or in this case, no) state income tax, it does have it downsides. Specifically, I had to cut a check for nearly $800 just to get license plates...
...is a great name for a company. That wasn't my point. What was my point was that I dropped by the BMW dealership here in Bellevue yesterday to make an appointment for the 3. Here are some things I've noticed:The parking lot is horribly horribly cramped. Some jackass had a...
Aha! While I was posting Yet Another Asinine Comment to Mouser's journal, I found the car that made me realize that an E36 325is (or 328is...but the point is, not an M3) would be damned sweet. Bam. This is, as I remember, a 1994 or 1995 325is with New Mexico...
I had take-out for lunch. Near the take-out place was this. That's right—it's a Ferrari F430, this year's replacement for the 360 Modena. Yow. Not sure I dig on the Enzo-like taillamps, though. In other news, I also got a clean video of the 3 going through its gauge diagnostic...
On Tuesday evening I hijacked Layla and we went driving around Seattle in the 3. Hilariously, I acted like I couldn't find my Camry when we walked outside. This was funny because she didn't know that I had bought the new one. In any event, halfway through getting lost in...
Sorry about all the car posts recently. I'll cut this shit out ... eventually. But here is the promised picture with the fogs. Sweet. I mentioned before that it seemed kindof silly to have fog lamps that would work without the headlamps. In retrospect, it makes perfect sense to have...
Well, the fog bulbs are done, as are the wipers. And I've removed the cracked license plate frame on the back. And more cleaning, of course. I've emptied the glove box of about a metric ton of unused napkins, and I'm still removing bits of tree shaz from the hood...
Once again, Jason brought up a point which I'd like to address. Specifically, I'd like to talk about the sweet sweet ass on my new car. When I was looking at the car (and when I bought it), the trunk was filled with ... shit, really. There was a truck...
As Jason was so kind to point out, there's a video of me shutting a car door. Now, there's a point to all of this. The E36 (and E46—although I'm unsure of the E90) 3-series is equipped with frameless windows. When you roll the window down and open the door,...
Say hello to the newest member of my family. In case you haven't been keeping up, I've just bought a 1993 BMW 325is. It's exquisite. As promised, I took it out earlier for a little photo shoot. It really wasn't the best spot for it (and black cars are difficult...
Well, not quite. But I did buy the 325iS. All done. I've got the car, I've got the keys. And I don't have any pictures yet. I'm going to go back to the office to work, but I'll post some as soon as I get home. Which may be a...
Mind you, that doesn't say, "bummed." Hot hot hot hot hot. If everything goes according to plan, I should own the car by tomorrow afternoon. We're all set on a price, and all that's in the way are formalities. So now I need recommendations for license plates. Apparantely CTRLALT is...
Wooo! Well, the BMW guy called me back and tonight I'm going to head all the way out to Burien to take a look at it. Supposedly he's had two other offers, but both had a bunch of oddities ("payment plan?") that he didn't want to deal with. The car...
I may have found a car. Yet Another Perk of working at Microsoft is access to the company ads. They have a car listing section with around 300 autos, and nearly all of them are exquisitely optioned. Lots of Acuras and BMWs and, brilliantly, almost no SUVs. One car, in...
