Pre / post facelift cars

[Peter325iSE]

Guys,

I'm new to E30s so please excuse the silly question.

I presume post facelift cars had plastic bumpers, as opposed to chrome.

What else changed?

Peter

[George_Of_The_Jungle]

engines on the 325s

[Andy325i]

Bumpers yes, M tech kits, head lights, tail lights, interia, Engines (M20 and M10/M40) wheel styles (bottle top/ crosspokes) Diff ratio's. Sure there is lots more too

Andy

[jimthejunior]

Im glad someone asked this as i dont get all of it yet. So which is which, pre/facelift chrome/plastic. Also what about fuel tanks, or is thyat related to engine size.

[Andy325i]

Chrome wrongness was early cars and (cabs for a longer while?) plastic was later I think all tanks were the same size (approx 60 litres) other than the ones with the optional extra tank? Could be wrong here lol

Andy

[Peter325iSE]

So my 325i is a post facelift car with pre facelift alloys?

[Andy325i]

correct unless bottle tops were available from start to finish
Andy

[daimlerman]

The method of building the car changed as well. The later(plasic bumper) one's are much better protected than the early cars.Later cars disposed of the distributer as well,giving better starting and running. Difficult to find a rust free chromie,but most later cars are structurely sound. Late tourings seem to suffer on the sill joints and the tailgate is not a very good design.My '89 4 door is sound in all important places,just a bit of rust around the rear arches and a bit on the scuttle.Fuel tanks? Two sizes,in general,4 cylinder cars have the small tank,6 cylinder cars have the larger one.Except tourings,they all got the big 'un.

[Fushion_Julz]

Bottletops were the "standard" (ie normal upgrade option) alloy wheel right to the death of the 2dr/4dr cars...

BBS were "options" and the standard wheel was a steel job with trim covers.

The actual specs per model changed year on year, though...

Standard SE wheels were bottletops and standard M sport wheels were BBS

so a 325 sport always had BBS, but a 320 SE came with bottletops unless optioned to BBS.

However, run-out models often had different equipment fitted as standard.

[Peter325iSE]

Cool, my car is an SE, so the bottle tops are correct.

Head unit and CD changer aside, it's completely standard!

Peter

[Peter325iSE]

The more I find out about my car the more I like it!

Aside from being totally standard (except ICE), my 325i SE has a complete tool kit (rare?), the fire extuinguisher is still in place (rare?), the alloys are pretty much unmarked, it drives really well and when called upon, has more power than I could possibly need on my 12 mile commute to work.

Lovin' it!

Peter

[ed325i]

Difficult to find a rust free chromie,but most later cars are structurely sound.

I find it hard to find a rust free later car

[oakey]

Difficult to find a rust free chromie,but most later cars are structurely sound.

I find it hard to find a rust free later car

True.
The factory welding around the strut towers on post facelift cars is much more "hardcore" if you know what I mean ? Its much neater on the prefacelift cars. The scuttle is pretty much a facelift car issue. Most early cars I've seen have good scuttles.