BMW 2002 For Sale $8500

daniswaytough · December 5, 2012

Hi guys,

After moving to London from San Jose California in January i'm coming home for the holidays and am putting my 2002 up for sale again. I had a few interested parties in the car earlier this year and many many tire-kickers, but I never managed to sell the car. I fell out of contact with a couple of people during my travels and in the midst of heavy work loads, so I gave up trying to orchestrate a sale from abroad. I would like to sell the car while i am physically in the states, or at least settle a deal while I can easily communicate with people and arrange viewings.

I will be back in San Jose from December 20 to January 8th, where I will be available to meetup and show interested parties the car. I am in Poland until Dec 10 and will gladly respond to any queries as soon as I get back. Please don't hesitate to ask any questions.

Asking price $8500

Registered Year: 1972

The title is clean.

Mileage: Odometer reads 70,000 but could be 170,000 Miles I am unsure, but am leaning more towards 170,000. EIther way it has definitely been a california car it's whole life. I found hardly any rust when i wet sanded the paint, stripped the interior, and removed all glass and trim. What little rust there was had already been killed by a previous owner. I have pictures of this.

The car was originally a sahara brown, but it was repainted long before I or the previous owner had gotten to it. It's now a later BMW alpine white.

My History with the Car:

I bought the car in the spring of 2007 and since then have replaced almost everything mechanical.

Motor and Exhaust:

The previous owner had the motor rebuilt about 20,000 miles before i bought it. So i estimate the rebuilt motor to have around 30-50,000 miles. When I took the cylinder head off in the summer of 2007 the lack of coking on the cylinders confirmed the receipts and previous owner's claims.

In the spring of 2007 a broken motor mount bracket on the subframe put the motor into the radiator and I managed to warp the cylinder head. I had the subframe bracket reinforced and repaired by a specialist vintage race car fabricator in Berkeley and we left drainage outlets to make sure water doesn't collect and cause rust on the subframe. The head was warped and cracked so i sourced a used replacement in good shape from Ireland Engineering. It had been skimmed before so now runs slightly higher compression but works fine. While the head was off i upgraded the camshaft to an aftermarket ireland engineering cam of 292 degrees. This is a couple of steps up from the stock 264 cam and gives a lot of extra torque. I used the valve train from the rebuilt head and everything has been running smoothly since. I used the original components from the warped head which were all in really good knick for the rebuild. The motor pulls very strongly and loves revving between 2500-4000 RPM. You will get good acceleration in 4th gear on the freeway.

While the head was off I replaced the exhaust system with an ansa, and then finally a brand new ireland engineering stainless exhaust and bavarian autosport coated headers. I have added a beefy weber 38/38 downdraft carb instead of the stock single barrel solex. The motor rebuild, beefier cam and carb combined with the flowing exhaust is a great combo.

Cooling:

We upgraded the radiator with a unit from an early 80's 320i for better cooling and replaced hoses.

Suspension:

When I first bought the car i also completely rebuilt the suspension. Literally just about everything has been replaced. New tie rods, new ball joints, new upper strut bearings, new urethane bushings. New steering column guibo, adjusted the steering box. I then added a Mason engineering front strut brace, ireland engineering front fixed camber plates that give about 1/2 negative degree of camber, stiffer bilstein HD shocks, and ireland adjustable sway bars front and back.

Brakes:

I've upgraded the front brakes with Ireland Engineering's big brake kit that includes larger ventilated/cross rotors from an e21 and calipers from a volvo which are specially modified girling units. I replaced the brake booster with a used unit from 02 salvage in hayward and a brand new OEM bigger master cylinder from a TII. Clutch slave cylinder was replaced as well. When i replaced the front rotors i replaced the wheel bearings as well. I recently replaced the rear brake drum shoes and rear wheel cylinders in January as well.

Battery:

The battery is a brand new interstate unit that I bought In Jan this year. Battery is now in the trunk. when i redid the interior i relocated it to the drunk with a battery cable and distribution block from an e30. It now sits snuggly in the trunk.

Interior:

I've replaced most of the interior. The back seat was freshly restored before i bought the car, and i put in freshly restored e21 is seats in german vinyl from Aardvark engineering. The seats alone cost $1,000. I replaced the carpet with a fresh salt and pepper kit and dynamated the interior to reduce cabin noise.

The car comes with a nicely hidden sound system that kicks really loud.

Transmission & Drive Line:

I swapped the transmission with another used 4 speed. This transmission is fine. ANd if you don't match up the engine revs it will crunch if you try to downshift into first. I replaced the driveshaft guibo when the transmission was out.

Paint:

FInally the car has been freshly repainted. I spent an entire summer 2 years ago stripping car. I stripped out the entire interior, took off all trim, glass, lights, grill, and everything. I wet-sanded the entire car and everything was in good shape. That's when I found only one spot of rust that had previously been killed. There is bondo on the car, but it is slight and not a hack job. I reused the same trim but put on fresh new trim clips around the entire car. The original rubber seals were thrown out and I replaced them with new oem ones.The guys who sprayed it were a little careless and there is a bit of underspray on the sway bars and in the wheel wheels. But nothing major. I'd give the paint quality an 8.5

The alpine white color change was pretty thorough the first time round. down to almost a bare shell. I took out all the glass, removed all the trim, and removed the trunk. I wet sanded the entire-car and did minor body work where needed (the body was already super-straight)

This is a good looking car that was built for spirited shit your pants driving in the backroads. It was never built to be a concours trailer queen. However, it's still nicer than 90% of 02's on the road now.

There are no rust areas that i am aware of. The bottom rocker strips were taken off for repainting and i didn't see any rust. The towers are sound and don't look to have ever been repaired, there was no rust ever found around the pedal box or engine bay the countless hours i was in there. I took the carpet out and didn't any creeping rust creeping in. Like i said this has definitely a stored California car it's whole life and until the last few months has always been garaged. There seems to be some very very slight surface rust coloring on the paint on the underside of the trunk lid, but i wouldn't even call it surface rust. I will show pics.

Things To Know:

It leaks a moderate amount of oil that will need to be looked at eventually. As long as you keep an eye on the oil level everything is ok. I believe it is leaking from the exhaust studs. I would have fixed it myself but i don't have the facilities anymore. My dad sold our house with a garage and my uncle didn't want me tearing apart my car in his driveway so i've had to leave it and cope with it as is.

Right now the electronic choke isn't connected. The element is working but the lever keeps coming off the butterfly. So you have to keep your foot on the throttle at 2,000 rpm to warm it up on start. Someone will need to source a c-clip.

There is a slight rattle from the exhaust hitting the subframe depending on where you've bottomed it out in a parking lot. It rattles a little bit on deceleration. But the exhaust itself is fine. It's a very fine fitment without a lot of room to get it to fit correctly. I've had it not rattle before, but if you pull out of a parking lot with a steep ramp and give it a bump, it will move and rattle a bit.

The heater box works, but there is no valve connected so it only blows hot air that you can control with the fan. I however have 3 spare valves to go with it so you should be able to put one together. They went for about 60-80 bucks a pop used 4 years ago and can only imagine thy've gone up in price, so you won't have to source one.

The car looks to have been hit, but it looks to have happened sometime in the 70s/early 80's when earlier nose pieces were NLA. The engine compartment/ trunk have some sort of spray on lining. Kind of like you see on the beds of trucks, just lighter. Under that the original brown can be see in the engine bay, and trunk area. When i was wet sanding the nose i found that the nose clip was the same color, so it looks like it was all resprayed at some point in the long distant past. THe nose clip is fine and to be honest i'm not sure if it is a replacement? I'm not familiar enough with the grills to know if someone might have just forced a later girll into the earlier nose? Although I doubt that. Of all the things that have broken and that i have had to replace, the nose has never raised any alarms with me or my veteren english mechanical engineer dad who has worked on rusty 60's british cars his whole life. The frame rails are also straight and look to have never been repaired.

Right now the car isn't registered because I am working abroad in London. The car is in great shape and sitting peacefully at my uncle's in San Jose. He starts it up regularly and takes it around the block to keep her happy and in shape.

The receipts for parts paint and labour alone easily surpass the 8,500 asking price.

If you need any more info don't hesitate to ask.

Dan.

Photos:

http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a64/dannyboytoy/DSC_7450.jpg - rear

http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a64/dannyboytoy/DSC_7446.jpg - roof

http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a64/dannyboytoy/DSC_7442.jpg - hood and grill

http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a64/dannyboytoy/DSC_7440.jpg - hood

http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a64/dannyboytoy/DSC_7439.jpg - hood

http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a64/dannyboytoy/DSC_7437.jpg - battery relocation

http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a64/dannyboytoy/DSC_7435.jpg - trunk

http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a64/dannyboytoy/DSC_7433.jpg - driver seat