Am I in a minority?

sogood

I own a 1990 BMW 735, model number, E32. I love this car and cant, for the life of me, understand why there aren't more of them on the roads. I have seen several 6 series, which I think are the cats pyjamas, and millions of older 5 series, which I think are a little bland, but hardly ever see another 7 series of the same vintage. I know the road tax at 1,600 per annum is a major deterrent, but beautiful examples of these cars can be picked up for very small money in the UK. Get a good one and you have luxury, high spec, trouble free motoring for very small money, all things considered.
Anyway, my point ( or request) is, if any boardsies see one, could you please post as many details as possible? I would love to compile a list of numbers, types etc with a view to maybe forming a small owners club. I visit the irish BMW owners forum regularly, but this tends to be home to younger drivers and younger cars etc. I have owned my car since 2002 and in my extensive travels all around the country as a coach driver, I have seen 5 of these cars in that length of time!! Surely that makes it a collectors item? LOL.
Thanks in advance for any info, especially regarding abandoned, scrapped etc 7 Series cars.

unkel

Same thing will happen to the E38 over the next 10 years

And almost all other cars of similar age with an engine over 3 litres...

At least at that stage your E32 will be a classic

Do you not live around Dublin? I see a few E32s every year alright.

carchaeologist

Road tax,and the fact that people think old cars are troublesome,and that the more expensive the car was originally,the more expensive it will be to repair now.
What sort of money are these making now?

sogood

carchaeologist wrote: »

Road tax,and the fact that people think old cars are troublesome,and that the more expensive the car was originally,the more expensive it will be to repair now.
What sort of money are these making now?

The short answer is, no money! A very clean 1990-1992 model with history etc could be picked up in the UK for anything between 500 pounds sterling and a grand. You couldn't sell one over here if you tried. For a little more money you could go after the later model. Check out Donedeal for later models (e46) I think and Carzone for lots of E32's. Horses for courses I suppose.

unkel

carchaeologist wrote: »

the more expensive the car was originally,the more expensive it will be to repair now.

That's one of the top 3 clichés of classic motoring. No offense to you, carchaeologist, but this keeps coming up all over the shop in car magazines and classic car sites all over the shop.

For sure, parts of an originally expensive car will be more expensive than similar parts of cheaper cars. But it might very well be the case that the originally expensive car was built to a much higher standard, so that said part doesn't need replacing.

Some simple examples from my experience. My '96 E38 had nothing big going wrong with it, except that it needed a big suspension job at nearly 140k miles, which cost a grand. I mean a grand, in 13 years of driving it. Most cars in Ireland never even reach this mileage. Oh and it needed a drivers door winding mechanism after having many smoking owners for many years - a quick calculation tells me it must have gone up and down about half a million times Again it did not cost much more than what it would have cost for your average family hatch.

Sure, a new door for my 928 would cost €4,500 from Porsche (I kid you not) but who the hell would order a new door from them?

sogood

Thank you Unkel. Very true. Build quality means just that, with much less going wrong (in my own personal experience) than is often the case with much "cheaper", modern cars. Especially given the number of posts in "Motors" and the costs of parts quoted! I have been very pleasantly surprised by the relative costs of some odds and ends that I've gotten over the years and nothing that was particularly needed, just part of an ongoing refurb.

These cars may be sometimes costlier to repair, but they are definitely easier to maintain. Oil and water and you're sorted almost. Road tax is a bummer, but I'm surprised by the number of people who tell me that I'm mad to spend 30 euro a week on tax, as they light up another cigarette, at about 60 euro a week. I'm not knocking smokers here, just that it's relative.

sogood

carchaeologist wrote: »

Road tax,and the fact that people think old cars are troublesome,and that the more expensive the car was originally,the more expensive it will be to repair now.
What sort of money are these making now?

Just remembered, there's a 1997 735 on Donedeal at about 1,750 euro. Has been on there for a while now and it even has a cool reg. 97 D 735. looks like a nice car, would be tempted myself if I could afford to tax two of them!

VolvoMan

E32's have, like every other big car does, become of an age where owners just can't be bothered fueling, taxing or maintaining them anymore. This leads to the big decline of them on our roads, as they get sent to the knackers yard once they need something costly like a suspension rebuild. It's an attitude that is all too common in Ireland.

I have seen the odd late model E32 up until a few years ago. It has to be said though, during their production run from '87-94, Ireland wasn't a very wealthy country and this sort of car wasn't common on our roads in the first place.

carchaeologist

unkel wrote: »

That's one of the top 3 clichés of classic motoring. No offense to you, carchaeologist, but this keeps coming up all over the shop in car magazines and classic car sites all over the shop.

None taken,its not my personal opinion,just what people who dont understand old cars think.
No one ever factors in depriciation with a new car,if you bought a house and it lost 50% of its value over the next year or two,no way would you buy it!
I agree with it being in the top three,another is "that old yoke must drink gallons of petrol" when in fact alot of older cars when well maintained are no less economical to run than modern ones.

unkel

carchaeologist wrote: »

No one ever factors in depriciation with a new car

Very true! I can see a substantial shift towards people owning classic (as in 30 year old classic tax qualifying) cars happening real soon. Am I only wishfully thinking or are there more ZVs occurring near you? :cool:

Pdfile

sogood wrote: »

I own a 1990 BMW 735, model number, E32. I love this car and cant, for the life of me, understand why there aren't more of them on the roads. I have seen several 6 series, which I think are the cats pyjamas, and millions of older 5 series, which I think are a little bland, but hardly ever see another 7 series of the same vintage. I know the road tax at 1,600 per annum is a major deterrent, but beautiful examples of these cars can be picked up for very small money in the UK. Get a good one and you have luxury, high spec, trouble free motoring for very small money, all things considered.
Anyway, my point ( or request) is, if any boardsies see one, could you please post as many details as possible? I would love to compile a list of numbers, types etc with a view to maybe forming a small owners club. I visit the irish BMW owners forum regularly, but this tends to be home to younger drivers and younger cars etc. I have owned my car since 2002 and in my extensive travels all around the country as a coach driver, I have seen 5 of these cars in that length of time!! Surely that makes it a collectors item? LOL.
Thanks in advance for any info, especially regarding abandoned, scrapped etc 7 Series cars.

imho you should be a E3x club... e30/32/34 etc... with an age Limit, not to be Thick with anyone just to keep it a true 80's modern classic club.

unkel wrote: »

That's one of the top 3 clichés of classic motoring. No offense to you, carchaeologist, but this keeps coming up all over the shop in car magazines and classic car sites all over the shop.

For sure, parts of an originally expensive car will be more expensive than similar parts of cheaper cars. But it might very well be the case that the originally expensive car was built to a much higher standard, so that said part doesn't need replacing.

Some simple examples from my experience. My '96 E38 had nothing big going wrong with it, except that it needed a big suspension job at nearly 140k miles, which cost a grand. I mean a grand, in 13 years of driving it. Most cars in Ireland never even reach this mileage. Oh and it needed a drivers door winding mechanism after having many smoking owners for many years - a quick calculation tells me it must have gone up and down about half a million times Again it did not cost much more than what it would have cost for your average family hatch.

Sure, a new door for my 928 would cost €4,500 from Porsche (I kid you not) but who the hell would order a new door from them?

next door neighbor has a 1990 E34 just under 200k and all that ever went wrong is the steering ( arms came free as far as i remember ) though he services it Reg... ive never seen him do anything else as it actually needs nothing else. People say cheap classics are false economy... i say thats a load of Brain cowen... Buy smart it'll last.

--amadeus--

I would have thought electronics will be the killer on cars like that moving into classic status. By 1990 the electronics in a 7 series would be pretty sophisticated and while you would never buy (for example) OEM brake pads for a classic if electronics fail you have little choice and they can be eyewateringly expensive to fix, to say nothing of the diagnostic equipment needed to do even the most routine work.

Actually on that isn't there a Merc (the new SL?) that has to be plugged into a computer just to change the brake pads? The end of the home grease monkey methinks

Rust or Weld

Road tax is the killer of these lovely motors, if the government had any cop on & brought the taxation in line same as the uk for example everyone would be able to tax these larger motors & more people would drive these beauties! my 2 cents worth.

Dades

Rust or Weld wrote: »

if the government had any cop on & brought the taxation in line same as the uk for example everyone would be able to tax these larger motors & more people would drive these beauties!

The government don't want people driving these larger motors. Their flawed view is that people buying new cars is greener than people holding onto older cars with higher emissions. In reality the truth is they like collecting motor tax and VRT. :pac:

itarumaa

Even I do like a lot to drive these older cars, if I would have a 1k suspension job to my S40, it would be scrapped right away and I would buy something else for that 1000 euro.

Spending 1000e for car that I bought for 850e sounds a bit silly for me.

That kind of figures kind of keep me away from owning old BMW as well, I just do not trust the car enough, I am afraid I will having huge bills with the car.

And I could not consider spending 1600e for road tax, no way.

However classics are compeletely another story. My friend bought a Rolls Royce, 72 year for 3k. V8 and automatic, nice car all the way and since it was classic the road tax was minimal.

But for me I think it is pointless to buy old, large engined car and use it as daily driver, 2l is max for me anyway.

--amadeus--

itarumaa wrote: »

But for me I think it is pointless to buy old, large engined car and use it as daily driver, 2l is max for me anyway.

But unless people buy and use these cars when they are in the 10 - 20 yr age bracket they don't make it to classic...

itarumaa

--amadeus-- wrote: »

But unless people buy and use these cars when they are in the 10 - 20 yr age bracket they don't make it to classic...

Good point, altough I assume in UK keeping a 3l car would be much cheaper than here and when it gets to classic level, well it is a short trip to collect the car.

alpina

If you spend 1, 000 on a beautiful 1990 7 series, kept it for ten years, you've just spent 14, 000...Think that's basically the jist of it. I got my hands on a relatively pristine 1981 6 series in '04 & between taxing for the year one year & summer months another, have already spent over 5, 000 for the peasure of a round disc. Especially with the way things are now, this is a hard pill to swallow not to mind afford