2008 BMW 328xi, lots of mods, fast, fun, needs finishing, $3k.

Bought this a few years ago as a fun daily driver, and it's slowly grown and evolved. I was building it up as a track car but I have too many cars and not enough time and I don't enjoy working on BMWs. I'm a Porsche guy now, I don't think my sanity can handle trying to fix both Porsches and BMWs. $3K, includes car and a bunch of fun spare parts. I might consider a partial trade for some nice Porsche 928 parts.

2008 BMW 328XI, so all wheel drive. I forget the exact mileage, but I think around 150K. I'll double check and update tomorrow (It's windy and snowy outside right now.) Mods include:
3 stage intake manifold and stock 330i tune
Euro airbox with high flow filter
M Sport steering wheel
stainless steel catback, can't remember brand. Mild, sounds great.
BBS RC090 wheels (17X8) with 255/40R17 square setup. Tons of grip.
Godspeed adjustable coilovers with front adjustable camber plates. I forget the spring rates but I believe they're 500/700 pounds. Shocks are I think 17-way adjustable.
NRG racing seats, they have a provision for a 5 point harness. Right now I have a DOT legal 4 point harness in it.
Lexan rear side windows
Carbon Fiber trunk lid
Rear european carbon/kevlar crash bar beneath bumper skin, still safe but saves 10 lbs. 
Most of the rear of the car is gutted. Been working on that lately, BMWs just have a lot on the interior so it takes a long time.
Sunroof delete, Condor Speed Shop fiberglass plug. Temporarily mounted, needs better finishing and a bit of weatherstripping. 
Drilled and slotted rotors
XDelete, so the AWD system is setup for 70% rear and 30% front power.
Front lip, can't remember the brand. Inexpensive but looks good and gets the job done, temporarily mounted.

Extra parts I have on hand:
Stainless steel long tube headers. I paid $800 for them.
17" BMW spare tire. These can be hard to find and expensive. I think I paid $250 at the time.
Poly rear upper shock mounts
Racing steering wheel mount 
Hawk HPS front brake pads
Stainless braided brake lines
Probably a few more little things, I'll have to check.
MILVs, which would add approximately 10hp especially to the upper end.

The good:
Just had $7.5K in repairs, went in for a rough idle and CEL and shop said timing chain had jumped a tooth. So they replaced the entire timing chain. Also new clutch line, alignment, valve cover and gasket and breather hose, clutch slave cylinder and hydraulic lines, vanos solenoid, and I'm probably missing a few things. Car has approximately 270 horsepower, and is strong from idle to 7K. With these mods, the car is an absolute blast to drive. It's fast as hell, handles great, stops on a dime, and looks subtle but good. Fun autocross car, was hoping to take it road racing. Still has much of the front interior including A/C so it's pretty comfy. Engine has 150K+ miles but the N52 lasts forever so that's no concern. It runs great, no smoke or anything.

The bad:
*Has the trifecta error lights meaning it needs a small part in the center diff. I forget off the top of my head what it is, as I haven't really messed with the car since last fall. It's an $80 part, the factory one is plastic and you can get an upgraded aluminum one from ebay for about the same price. Actuator gear or something.  Sorry, not trying to be vague, I just haven't messed with this car much lately and my mind has been elsewhere.
*sometimes gets a CEL, I pulled the code and it's an inexpensive part. Like the actuator gear, I don't remember what it was. It doesn't affect anything except a slightly rough idle every once in a while. 
*Driver's side headlight bulb needs replaced. Have to remove the air box to get to it, I just haven't had the time.
*Still need to install coilovers/brakes on driver's side front. They're installed on the other three corners. Not really a bad, just needs to be done.
*Rear upper shock mounts make rattling noises when I drive. I think I forgot a gasket or something up there. I have poly ones to install, just haven't had the time. And I snapped off an allen wrench in the end of one of the rear adjustable shocks. 5 minutes with a reverse drill bit could get it out.
*And the reason I'm selling it: After sitting all winter, I charged the battery and backed it out the garage, ran just fine. Then spent today removing the headliner, side curtain airbags, and sunroof cassette. Probably saved 50lbs total from removing all of that! Installed a fiberglass plug, when to turn it on, and now it won't start. Turns over just fine, it just won't start. I added more gas, same thing. I'm stumped, as I didn't touch anything with the engine and it ran fine two hours before. It started raining and then snowing before I could spend any time diagnosing so I'm just taking this as a sign to move on. I don't have the time or space for this car, to be honest.

It's honestly a good car, needs a bit of work from someone good with BMWs. Finishing these things, adding the MILVs and headers and getting a good tune would get you a reliable 300hp all wheel drive track-focused car. With the rear bias on the AWD you can get the rear end to come out, but it's really stable. Last I drove it, it still got 30mpg on the highway. Last of the naturally aspirated straight 6s from BMW. My plan was to finish these mods and add a carbon fiber hood to help reduce weight from the front end and finish stripping the interior, then autocross it and take it to track days at Mid Ohio and Nelson Ledges. 

Car is located near Cleveland, Ohio. I have a handful of mediocre pictures, sorry. I'll try to grab some interior shots tomorrow. Price is $3K, if you have some parts for a 1981 manual Porsche 928 I might be interested in a trade, especially if you have some nice 17" wheels. First two pics are from about a year ago, last two pics are from an hour ago. Don't mind the magnetic numbers just slapped on the side. And I have plastic on top of the car because it started raining/snowing and I still need to get some weatherstripping on that sunroof plug.

Hey there, welcome back!


You were missed.

In reply to The_Jed :

Thank you. Been doing really well as an author, but this car had an issue that was the last straw so I hopped back on to post it for sale. I really appreciate your kind words.

for curious parties, this is a steal. I've seen the car up close and you're not sniffing the parts for 3 grand let alone the car with all the parts. On top of that it's a great person selling it. Win-win

That's a lot of car and parts for the money! This could be an excellent Challenge car or AX missile. GLWS

Are you on the Eastside or westside? Do you have acurrent echeck? I am on the westside and am interested.

Javelin said:

That's a lot of car and parts for the money! This could be an excellent Challenge car or AX missile. GLWS

I was thinking the same thing. Those models do well in rallycross too.

In reply to trigun7469 :

West side in Lakewood. It just needs the airbag lights coded out to pass echeck. That's a relatively simple process, I can show you the software. If I find the time this week, I might even be tempted to do it myself.

In reply to infinitenexus :

I am in westlake so fairly close. I have to sell my shifter kart first, but would like to check it out. 

Sounds good, my man. Just let me know.

That's a pretty solid deal glws

I'm gonna give it a few weeks and then I'm going to part it out and scrap it. I need it gone.

Can you cross post it to the ASCC page for some more targeted exposure? The autocross festival is next wknd- maybe someone needs a car?

If you part it out, I'd be interested in the headlights for my project e90

Can't believe there's basically no interest in this car. I need it gone, don't think I have the space, time, or energy to part it out. Would anyone be interested if it were a challenge priced car? $2K?

Do you have the removed parts - could I put the interior back together?

I really like the car but chasing CEL codes here is a no-go for me with our emissions testing.   If I lived anywhere else, I would be all over it; it looks like an absolute bargain even with the relatively minor needs.   And it looks gorgeous. GLWS.

In reply to infinitenexus :

If it was rwd and stock interior, I would have most likely bought it. Great for someone needing a project.

In reply to dculberson :

no, most of the interior is gone

I wish I knew why it didn't run.  I have an '08 328xi that has the same center diff issue.  It's been running as rwd only for years.  I want to track it more but it's bone stock and at 300k miles.  However I have neither the time or skills to fix the no start.

Russian Warship, Go Berkeley Yourself said:

I really like the car but chasing CEL codes here is a no-go for me with our emissions testing.   If I lived anywhere else, I would be all over it; [...] GLWS.

This. I've got to deal with emissions, and I've got to be able to pass an inspection that checks for airbags and airbag lights... so I'd have to undo a bunch of the work you've already done after finding the bits.

and I've already got a project I'd have to get rid of, and another maintenance work that's stalled.

right-ish car for me, wrong time.  

It's really a good thing that so many of y'all are far away from Arizona. If this were local I'd absolutely pick this up to make into (another) track car. That is an absolutely bonkers price. 

In reply to SKJSS (formerly Klayfish) :

I think it's either fuel or spark. It turns over just fine. Part of me is wondering if sitting for 3 months gummed up some of the gas? But it started after I pulled it out of my garage. From my understanding this one still has AWD, it's just throwing error codes. I autocrossed it and got the front tires to chirp when I launched it.

In reply to sleepyhead the buffalo :

with this you can code out the airbag lights. I was meaning to do it, I did it with the seat airbags when I put racing seats in it. I'll try to remember to go pull the check engine code tomorrow so I can figure out what's going on. I don't think it's anything major, it's a smaller part.

If I sell it at a challenge price of $2000, I'll put some stock BMW wheels on it and keep the MILVs for myself so I can resell them. I probably have $15-18K into this car, I'd like to at least pretend I'm making some of it back lol.