[E30saam]

Howdy. I've been on the forums for a bit now. I loved going through members project threads and learning so i figured why not make my own thread. I bought this 328i a little over a year ago.

I'll start off going through my BMW history. I’ve had 3 e30s and an e36. My first car was 1985 BMW 325e that I found not running in it's original owner's garage back in 2011. I bought it for $500 got it running, and dailied it for 4 years. It went through some changes over the years. I built some coilovers for it and did small oem+ mods like euro bumpers, headlights, grilles, headlight wipers, oem mud flaps, rear plate filler. Paint was beat but the interior was mint and the car was the perfect first car in my eyes.
Here's a pic of my first e30 when we dug it out of PO's garage. Also added a few pics of the changes it went through over the years.






After owning it for 4 years I wanted more power. As a broke college student I was looking into swapping in an m52 or m30 and getting the AC working but quickly realized I’d be dumping way more money than I would want to at that time in my life. So I looked for a replacement and found a clean 2 owner 95 M3. Unfortunately I had to sell the e30 to fund the M3. Luckily I sold the E30 for the same price that I paid for the M3. So I got double the HP and A/C for $0. It was my daily on and off for 5 years. What a fun car. I still own it today. I'll never get rid of it.
Heres a pic of the car when I first got it and some changes through the past few years. Pretty simple car. Mostly stock. Just some period correct Kelleners wheels, suspension upgrades, and euro spec/OEM+ touches.

[E30saam]

After the e36 I daily drove several 4x4 Toyotas because they are cheap to own, hold their resale value, and are fun to take offroad. After a while of daily driving trucks I missed dailying my BMW m3 so i would sell my Toyota, and daily my m3 again. Eventually I came to the point where I was looking for a daily driver that could replace my e36 M3. At this point in my life I drive about 30k miles a year so I wanted something reliable and decent on gas, that wasn't a shitbox, and was comfortable on the highway.

I was really looking to not buy another BMW. Post E36 BMWs seemed like a pain in the ass. I wanted a daily I didn't have to ever worry about. So I thought to myself what's the closest thing to a Japanese BMW. That's when I remembered the Infiniti G37. I found a rare clean 2011 G37S. It was a Crew cab (Sedan), 6mt, and a 1 owner car. I drove 2 hours from my house to look at it and figured I had found my next daily driver. After driving it I realized that while the LSD and power was nice, but the car was a huge boat. It weighed 3800lb and you could feel it. heres the car I drove.


I ended up passing on the car and started thinking about what other cars I could get. My buddy actually drove me to look at the car and we were in his e90 325i 6mt. It was well used but still ran really well. I noticed his odometer was well over 210k miles. That's when I asked him what he had done to get that far, and that's when I realized it really wasn't much. Just basic stuff here and there, like, water pump, and some gaskets. Was the n52 e90 really just a more modern e36? This had me intrigued. All this time, I was avoiding BMWs just to want to go out and buy another BMW.

So now I was on the hunt for a 128i or n52 e90/e91.
It just so happened that a good friend of mine who’s a salesmen at a local BMW dealership was selling his car. Back in april of 2020 the original owner of the car traded it in on an identical spec G30 330i, so my friend scooped it up, put 7k miles on it , modded it a lil and got bored with it and then gave me a price I couldn't refuse on it.

Its a 2010 328i rwd 6 Speed with the M sport package. It’s also my favorite spec: Alpine over Saddle. The icing on the cake was the single hump dash. I love the classic amber radio. The original owner really speced this car exactly how i would have wanted it sans the halogen headlights, which have grown on me. Car had 128k miles on it. Had a ton of maintenance done at the dealership by the original owner. My friend added some small mods that I really liked and kept to it. For example, the IND bumper marker deletes, Active Autowerks axle back, ZHP shift knob, M performance Alcantara shift boot OEM roof rack, Black M performance grills, H&R lowering springs, and window tint.

I test drove the car and instantly fell in love. It reminded me of a modern version of my e36 m3. And for the money i couldn't refuse buying the car. It was about half the price of the g37 I found, and it was a much better car.
Pics from the day I picked up the car.

[E30saam]

I really enjoyed the car the way it was. I've done some small maintenance/repair on it over the last 30k miles. As you can see from my previous BMWs I really like OEM+ mods, and I like trying cost effective options to see how much I can get for my money. I wanna be in this daily driver for under 10k including mods.

First thing (at 135k miles) I did was remove the awful runflats, and replace them with Michelin Pilot Sport AS4, to get a more aggressive stance and to get more life out of my tires I bought another set of staggered 193MS and took the rear of both my sets. So I'm running a square set of rear wheels and tires (255/35/18) and sold the front set to more than offset the cost.

After that (at 137k) I installed a budget suspension set up. I bought the cheap Bilstein PSS coilovers from Rockauto and a set of TRW M3 front control arms, and got an M3 GTS alignment. It was a great upgrade for only ~$1k.

Another small touch I added was a Rennstall DTM style shift knob. The shifter really reminds me of my e30 with this shift knob. Its my favorite knob that I've tried so far.

Here is a pic of the knob,


After that i've been just driving the car. I'm 159k miles. I’ve taken this car on many road trips from Birmingham AL to Atlanta, Charleston, Charlotte, Asheville, Knoxville, etc. Here's some pics I have of it at a few of my road trips.

Here it is in the North Ga mountain,

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Here it is at The Blue Ridge Parkway,


Here it is at the Dragon/Charahalla,

BTCC Vibez

[E30saam]

Heres both of my BMWs together. My E36 M3 has now retired as my daily driver and is a project/weekend car now. I'm happy to have found a similar modern version of it to enjoy everyday.




I’m looking forward to updating this thread with new updates.

[Biginboca]

That’s a really sweet E90 you scored… I’m looking forward to seeing what you do with it. N52 is a great motor that won’t let you down. Your e36 is very nice too!

[alexwilcox29]

Oh man great write up! I was in a completely different situation coming from an e90 335i with the N54, I wanted a more reliable equally as good car and settled on the e90 328i m sport in manual!

I got impatient after 2 great cars fell through, one of which was space grey on oyster, m sport, manual, slick top, single hump, manual seats, roof rack, and xenons! Absolute dream spec, dealership unfortunately didn't have the title for some reason!

I ended up settling for an lci m sport e92 335i, manual Le Mans blue on black! I figured the n55 would be a little more reliable (knock on wood)

Worth mentioning my e90 was automatic and I wanted to get into something a little more engaging where I was able to use all of its power more often! Every time I see an lci m sport e90 I think of what could have been!
Hopefully someday I'll snag a low miles one!
Some pics attached of my previous e90 and current e92, the wheels will go on soon!

[tej98]

Sweet dream spec E90 and E36 combo!

[E30saam]

Originally Posted by Biginboca

That’s a really sweet E90 you scored… I’m looking forward to seeing what you do with it. N52 is a great motor that won’t let you down. Your e36 is very nice too!

Thanks! Love going through your build thread. N52 has been awesome. It’s been a solid daily for 35k miles.

[E30saam]

I grabbed some mint ferric gray 219ms last week. I’m thinking about looking for another set of fronts to run a square set up. I think I’m going to love this oem+ look.

[ternerdaniel]

Originally Posted by E30saam

Heres both of my BMWs together. My E36 M3 has now retired as my daily driver and is a project/weekend car now. I'm happy to have found a similar modern version of it to enjoy everyday.




I’m looking forward to updating this thread with new updates.

Wow, your cars are awesome.

[bkwld]

219 wheel on AW will look awesome! It will definitely take some work to fit the rears.

[doomfull]

cleannn

[jswane92]

The combo of those cars is awesome!