E30 Zone

Hi guys, my birthday today, so I've decided I'm going to treat myself and a sad looking e30 down my road.

Pre-facelift E reg
Silver 320i convertible
OBC
Tech-1 steering wheel
Bottlecaps
mix and match cloth interior
131K miles

I saw the car and there seems to be some rust on the lips of the rear arches and under the doors, the sills I think they're called.

I really want to buy the car. So, I need advice please from you experts out there.

1) How can the rust be treated? I think it's eaten through the arches, and beyond repair with sandpaper, so will that mean cutting out old arches and welding in new ones?

2) How do I go about the sills? theres rust underneath them and what do I do to them? How would I get rid of it?

Not bought it yet, or enquired about the price, as the dealer wasn't there.

What would you expect to pay for it though?

Don't buy it

I must admit that was my first thought Fi, you need some photos up for us to look at.

have you any pics????

i would say £700 or less if its quite rusty

in most cases yes you will need to weld new metal in there, same with sills weld new patches in or a new sill depending on what you want to do

if it will last a few mots like that and you want something better in the future just keep it as is??????

Just weigh up all the costs of the rust repair...possible mechanical repairs...Mot (if you need one) the insurance...tax if its due...

and think bout if you can really afford it...because you will be heartbroken if you get half way through doing it and start running out of money

Ive recently and still in the progress of sorting out my sills!

1) Poke and prod until you get holes and no paint!
2) Grind all the brown stuff away
3) Rust treated!
4) With clean metal, patches were fabricated and with the aid of a gas welder welded on!
5) Welds cleaned up with a grinder!
6) Smoothed with a bit of filler! Only slightly!
7) Sanded!
Primer
9) Hammerite under seal, then I am at this stage, laquer!

Think thats what I did in order, hard to remeber everything!


Similiar method for the arches in my case, as there not too bad on my car!



OH and if you do buy it don't forget behind the sills!

I'll get some pics up tommorow. If I get it for less than 500, i'll take it.

i'am sure you would

plenty of frag if you need to after all its just a cabby

Take it from me, if you buy a rusty BMW, unless you want to throw a lot of money (or 9 months of hard labour) at it I would hold out for one with a better shell.
Rotten sills and arches are probably what kills most E30s.

If you fancy a challenge, by all means go for it!

Agree with you Proper and Alex, £500 or less buys you a chance

To be honest, my opinion is that if you can pick it up for less than £500, you should frag it, probably cover your money on the parts, and learn TONS about E30s in the meantime.

Rust is a very expensive hobby when it comes to E30s - trust me, I've been there

beemerbird wrote:To be honest, my opinion is that if you can pick it up for less than £500, you should frag it, probably cover your money on the parts, and learn TONS about E30s in the meantime.

Rust is a very expensive hobby when it comes to E30s - trust me, I've been there

Hmmm ..... me too!

I'm there at the moment.

Here's just one of several bits to sort....



and with a little help from a friendly welder...


Car is nothing special, I just didn't want to send another E30 to the weigh bridge. I've done all prep work by stripping the car etc, and so kept costs down considerably.

I would add though that by the time you can see rust on the outer rear arches, 90% of the time, the inner wings are shot.

If you do find plenty of rust, bargain hard cos it will cost to get it right.