Hi all, I am 21 from Melbourne, Australia.
I grew up in a BMW family and have always loved BMWs. My first car was an E36 328i manual coupe. I went to a trackday and got hooked and started modifying the car quite extensively for track use. Eventually it got to the point where it was too low, too loud and received too much attention from the police to drive it every day. Here are some photos of the E36:
If anyone would like to some more info on the E36, check out my Wheelwell or PH build thread:
https://wheelwell.com/profile/555162...300b3f/garage/
http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/t...f=47&t=1570389
I then bought a fully optioned, last model year manual VW V5 Bora off my best mate as a daily driver. I owned both cars concurrently for a few months.
I then got to the point where I made a shopping list of parts to finish building my E36. This list added up to $8,000. At that point I thought it would be incredibly stupid of me to tip that money into the car (especially considering I had already spent quite a lot on it). So I decided I would put the car up for sale because I knew I would want to keep modifying it haha. I ended up getting a great price for the car and sold it even though I was attached to it - it was my first car and made so many great memories in it.
The plan then was to buy an s2000 to replace the E36 as my track/weekend car. I then spent 6 months looking for an s2000. Then after test driving an s2000 I decided I didn’t want one anymore. Whilst it would have been great fun on track, it wasn’t fun to drive on the road unless you were in VTEC (which means you are at immediate loss of licence speeds), it was a bad road car (noise, drivability, space etc) and you couldn’t slide it.
So that day I decided on a whim to look at manual 130i’s for sale. I was pleasantly surprised to see they had a dropped a bit in price since I last looked a year or so ago. All of a sudden I got rather excited about the prospect of a 130i, it would be; a great driver’s car with an awesome engine, somewhat ugly but unique and cool and a great daily driver.
That day, a 130i was posted to carsales. I loved the spec (I wanted a light interior and something other than black after my E36) and decided I had to have it.
Some info on the car:
2006 M-Sport
Manual
106,000km
All options except for front parking sensors, nav (neither of which care for) and heated seats (which I miss from my Bora haha)
Full service history
The owner was a great guy (a young BMW enthusiast who owned an E30 M3, E36 M3, Alpina E30, E21 and a 944 S2) and the car had a full service history. Before I knew it I had booked flights up to Sydney to buy the car and drive it home.
On 15 October 2016 I flew up to Sydney with my girlfriend and bought the car. I then drove it all the way home to Melbourne. We checked out a couple of Sydney beaches and then drove Royal Nasho before heading to the Hume. It was a long day (woke up at 0430 and got home at 2215) but it was a heap of fun, the car performed brilliantly. Here are some photos from the road trip:
A few days after I bought the car, Nick and I went for a spirited drive and photoshoot in the countryside. Here is an unedited iPhone photo of me playing with Nick’s camera, and a few of Nick’s proper shots (check out NM Photography on Facebook and @nmphtg on Instagram):
My plans for the car
I plan to daily drive the car and track it semi-regularly. I’ll modify it slowly as I’m really enjoying driving a stock car for a change haha. I’ll decide what mods to do after tracking the car stock and seeing what areas I think need to be improved and in what order.
At a guess, this is my future mod list (in order of priority):
Tyres
Exhaust
LSD
Brakes
Coils
Camber parts
Wide, square wheels and tyres