JFT

We found a place kind of like this - at least kind of like the entry, there on the left, the thing that spirals upward - in Geneva a couple of years ago. It's a public parking garage that is circular and a continual upward spiral. The garage is big enough so that there is a duel entry/exit lane from top to bottom and wedge-shaped parking spots on each side of each lane. Pretty cool idea. Now I think of it, there is - or at least was, a few years back - another cool parking spot under St. Stephen's Catherdal in Vienna. To use this one, you drive in, leave your car. The attendants load your car onto a dolly and push the dolly into the parking - we'd call it storage - area, stacking one on top of another. The methodology was interesting enough, but that they managed to build it under one of Europe's most venerated cathedrals was especially interesting, I thought.

Great lookin' car, great looking pix! I especially like the first/top one. And I, too, am curious about camera and lens(es).

Great lookin' car, great looking pix! I especially like the first/top one. And I, too, am curious about camera and lens(es).

My two cents? Keep it the original color. Better for resale value, better for stealth, better for not showing dirt. Also, it's quite a nice color, in my humble opinion. But as they others note, it is your car. At the end of the day, you probably should please yourself.

I think the rule of thumb always is that you start with three full turns from all the way in, looking for point when the idle speeds up just a bit - but if your car has black exhaust and plugs, sounds like it might need smaller jets.

First of all, good luck in your search. And in my estimation, which is worth exactly what it costs, it's smart to make it a search, the more extensive, the better. I'm looking too and so far have seen and driven more than a half-dozen cars. What I'm finding is, frankly, a lot of overpriced crap. I'm willing to pay toward the upper end of the scale for a proper, very nice '02. I've not found any of those. What I've found have been 40-year-old cars that have not seen any love or upgrades at all. Oh, I did see one very original car with braided-steel brake lines, but it needed brake pads, a suspension rebuild, a new interior and its engine was very soft. Oh, and there were traces of rust, even though the car is, and apparently always has been, here in Kali-Fornia. What I'd expect to find for $8-10k, which is my budget, is a very nice car that already has had everything done to it. Period. This isn't my arbitrary number, it's from the pricing guide Sports Car Market puts out. I've found several quite untainted, dry, original cars in that price range. They'd make great starting places, I suppose, but have been priced at double what I think they're worth. When you add up the cost of paint, interior, engine and chassis (which includes suspension and brakes), you're looking at a whole lot of money that would need to be spent before you had a truly usable car. What I'm seeing (and your experience may be very different from mine) is that apparently these cars have not received the levels of love and respect as, say, vintage Porsches, MGs or other classics. Perhaps that's because recognition of the valuable and classic nature of these cars is late in coming. I don't know. That's not to say that there aren't great cars out there, because there are. I attended a Vintage BMW gathering here in the LA area a couple months back and there were many delectable cars there. None of 'em for sale, as far as I could tell. So for what it's worth, I'd strongly suggest that you do NOT jump on the first car you find. Shop carefully and hard, and don't buy a car until you know for sure that it is indeed the one you want. Do whatever it takes to obtain a prepurchase inspection from someone who knows these cars. Or better, see it yourself, and take a set of mechanic's rubber gloves and a flashlight with you so you can really inspect things while lying on the ground, looking closely. Oh, and on the headroom issue? I'm 6'4" and have plenty of room inside, even with a sunroof. Recently I drove a car with Recaro seats from a 320i, however, and found the headroom to be insufficient. But i think that 6'6" might be pushing things. All the more reason to see, and drive, as many of these cars for yourself as you can. But that's just me.

I guess I'm wondering where, in the clutch-pedal travel, it starts to bite when you release the clutch? At the beginning of the travel? In the middle? Toward the end?

What we have here is another example of the value of the Web community. This happened to me years ago with my then-almost-new 1602. Oil everywhere. Mechanic - I seem to recall that it was at Vasak's place in Manhattan Beach; I was working nearby as a reporter for the South Bay Daily Breeze - told me it was a problem with the oil pump, which was, he said, making way too much pressure. Now we know it's probably as simple as a stuck pressure-relief valve. But back then, there was no '02 community, no way to ask a group of owners what the problem might be. No way to be certain that anyone even knew what the problem was. As I recall, a test showed huge oil pressure - 165 psi - and I paid a healthy repair bill to "solve" this problem. Not saying I was cheated. I'm not at all sure that the service people understood the problem, as there just weren't many of these cars around. Maybe they did. Who knows? What I know for sure is that the body of knowledge represented by this forum - even when some of it is represented by or presented with sarcastic or snarky answers - is priceless.

Want!

Parts? Like restoration books, they appear to be nowhere near as available as those for Porsches, MGs and others. Porsche parts, for instance, are expensive, but are very widely available. Parts for these cars not nearly as much, as far as I can tell. As I continue to look for a car, this continues to be a very great concern. But I do continue to look and ponder, as these little cars are quite compelling. The MacCarthy book? Long on details in some areas, very short on them in others. For instance, I don't find diagrams of the wiring looms, and I don't find specific details of the differences between the distributors used in the various years of these cars; part numbers, specific advance curves, etc - both of these are areas that I should think would be elemental inclusions in any "restoration guide." Also, no detailed tuneup information, and no detailed listing of torque settings for nuts and bolts. That's not to say it's not a valuable resource. Rather, it's to note that it leaves some important questions open. Sadly, it does appear to be one of the very few such books available for this car. I find this just a bit frustrating, as the only thing better than good information is more good information. Fortunately, there is lots of info on this board, and at several other sites on the Web, that should help you as you search for a car. Bottom line? It's the same for an '02 as it is for any old crock: Buy one that somebody's already done all the body work and paint on. Better yet, buy one that's a completed project - body, paint, chassis, running gear - move-in ready, as they say in the real-estate trade. You'll be money ahead. Remains to be seen, of course, whether I'll follow my own advice. Unfortunately, what I've found in my search so far here in SoCal is that there are a great number of quite ragged cars around. So we shall see.

We've got a '2003 5 Series - E39, I think it is - sportwagon. The thing has been bulletproof. It's a fabulous driver's car that handles and stops in spite of its size. It has been very reliable - now has a few more than 100,000 miles on it and never has given a lick of trouble, with one notable exception. Where you do spend money is on doing the brakes, especially if you have the dealer do the work. Also, and here's that exception, every 60,000 miles or so the bushings on the front suspension need to be replaced and that can get spendy. The sportwagon hauls a whole lot. Fuel mileage around town is about 18 mpg, out on the Interstate at a steady 75 mph and running on cruise control, it will return 26, 27 mpg. I also should add that the interior has stood up incredibly well. One very maddening point is that at the very front of the car, the front spoiler hangs quite low. It's plastic and integral to the front bumper cover. It's really easy to just pull the whole thing off, destroying it in the process, by letting the car's nose - or chin, if you like - extend over one of those parking bumps you see at the front of every lot's parking space. These are held down with big metal spikes that sometimes stick up over the top of the blocks. If one of those spikes can catch that spoiler so that when you back out, off comes the bumper cover. Expen$ive. Ask me how I know. You quickly learn that it's smart to not pull all the way up to those tire stops. Our car has the sport package - it rides quite firmly and those big fat tires make a good deal of noise when they wear. We've got Michelin Pilot Exaltos on the car - they're far better than the Continentals that came on it in terms of both ride and grip, but they're still noisy. Would we buy this car again? Yes. In a heartbeat. But we won't have to for a while yet, because we plan to keep this one for another 100,000 miles.

North Hollywood Speedometer is considered by many folks in the old-car world to be the go-to place. http://www.nhspeedometer.com/ No affiliation, etc.

Looking at '02s. Drove one yesterday that I think won't make my short list, but this question develops. Has anyone out there checked with a GPS to see how fast a stock '02, with stock tires and gearing, is traveling at 4000 rpm? This one I drove indicated 80 mph, and that was obviously very optimistic indeed, as it seemed like we were standing still, and traffic was passing like we were chained to a Caterpillar tractor. Thanks in advance.

Rick, I'm not looking for a fight or an argument, so let us not let this degenerate; but actually I have looked at this issue quite deeply indeed. First, it's my understanding that you can indeed transplant a late engine into an early car and have it be perfectly legal. The combination merely has to meet the emissions requirements for that particular engine, which usually means that you have also to transplant the ecu for that particular engine, along with the catalytic converter, etc. Then the completed swap has to pass the emissions test. Seems reasonable enough. And I do believe that it's the rule that allows the hot rod community to continue to thrive. Second, you're right, some mods discussed here on the FAQ may actually aid emissions - but how could the framers of these rules know, and specify for sure, which mods were permissable and which ones were not? For instance, which electronic ignition is approved, and for which car(s), and which one(s) is/are not? God knows that here in California, our legislators, the ones who actually voted this into state law after the Air Resources Board framed the rules and who it's tough to imagine having any sympathy at all for the car hobby, have enough problems dealing with simple stuff (see State Budget). Seems more effective to just issue the blanket rule, which is what they did. Could our smog laws be better? Sure, they could. But are they stupid, on their face? Nope, don't think so, even as maddening and as frustrating as they might be.

I don't mean to be disrespectful or iconoclastic, but I've lived here in SoCal for a great many years. I find the smog laws anything but stupid. Yep, we still have smog, on hot summer days when atmospheric conditions are just right. But we have far, far less of it, far less frequently, than we used to have. And that is largely thanks to those "stupid smog laws." Rather, I think that that living in California and buying a '76 '02 probably qualifies as a questionable decision. Better to examine that decision, one might think, than to bitch about the air-pollution laws. In fact, I'd think that any car from '76 on up to the year (whatever it was) when cars were widely equipped with a three-way catalytic converter (which obviously made meeting emissions regulations much easier) would be something to avoid. I'd also think that exactly this problem would make a '76 a great deal less valuable than an earlier one. But that's just me. All that said, I hope that you can find a solution to your problem.

For those with experience with both cars, how is the owner/driver/maintenance experience different between the '02 and the E21? Just curious. Thanks in advance.

With respect to both you and your grandfather, you may be asking for trouble by putting straight water into your car's cooling system during the summer - or at any other time. The block is cast iron, the head is aluminum. Aluminum can, and will, corrode, with straight water. I know this from personal experience, I'm afraid. Mike Maccartney's restoration book has photos of heads that have been so treated. These photos show significant corrosion of the water passages in the head. When they corrode sufficiently, the head-gasket blows out. Expen$ive. That's why a 50-50 mix of water and antifreeze is recommended by all manufacturers these days.

Don't know how difficult these are to source, but I thought I'd mention that Autobooks-Aerobooks in Burbank, Calif. carries both the Mike Maccartney 2002 books - the "BMW '02 Restoration Guide," and "The BMW 2002 - a comprehensive guide to the classic sporting saloon." Just bought them both there this morning. The store, which is worth a visit because of its comprehensive nature, fan be accessed on-line, at: www.autobooks-aerobooks.com Telephone is (818) 845-0707. Pretty cool place - and nope, I have no interest in the place, financial or otherwise. Best - Jon

So you're saying, Rick, that you swap the diff ratio at the same time you swap to a 5-speed to keep the overall final-drive ratio as stock, in effect just giving the car an additional intermediate ratio, right? Thanks - Jon

Just a general question about the need to swap out the 4-speed for a 5-speed. An important change, or not? I ask because I’ve noticed, having owned a number of ‘70s-era German cars, that their engines all seem to be tuned to run at medium to high revs at freeway speeds. My ‘71 M-Bz 250 was like that, my ‘69 Porsche was like that, and of course 1602s and 2002s are like that. Right? The rule of thumb, back before the fancy tunable cams and engine-control electronics that we have now, was that an engine’s best efficiency was found in the area where the horsepower curve intersected the torque curve. If that’s the case, if you add a 5-speed trans to an ’02, for instance, especially if that trans uses 5th gear as an overdrive, do you not risk screwing up that formula? Just curious. Any input will be – well, interesting. -JFT

If it's idling too fast, that's probably not timing. Could be something else, including a vacuum leak - or, maybe the idling is just set too high. First thing to do is to invest in a good timing light. Second thing is to make sure the point gap is set correctly. Third thing to do is make sure you have no vacuum leaks to screw things up. Then try timing the ignition to the factory settings, see wha' happens. At least that's how I'd proceed. -JFT