He quickly sent a deposit on the car and for whatever reason he decided not to go through with the purchase. Before I even knew all of this, I contacted the seller with interest in the car (I was the first to post a reply about the car) and he mentioned that he had a deposit on it and if it didn’t work out he’d call me. Well, three weeks later he called, I asked a ton of questions and spoke to Kohler about the car, he had seen / driven it before in late 2012 while he was looking at it for someone else. After talking to him about the car I decided to make the purchase.
This was about a month before my wife and I were planning on checking our youngest daughter in at UA, the seller was in Scottsdale, I sent a deposit and we set a schedule to meet a cple of days after dropping off my daughter. After some air flight scheduling changes, we rented a car in Tucson and drove to see the car.
The car was pretty much exactly as the seller presented except for some very minor things that were really not a big deal for me. The plan was to drive to Los Angeles and leave the car at a friend’s house and have it trailered to me at a later date.
The car;
1988 535i
184,465 miles
Schwarz / Pearl Beige
5sp
LSD 3:73 3 clutch
5 past owners, who all wrenched on the car with their checkbooks and charge cards! Every repair/part/service is documented in a 4” folder since day one, I'm very thankful for that.
The first two owners were brothers, then an owner in PA, then an owner in Mesa AZ, and finally the owner in Scottsdale.
Original images for the FS thread-
Spoilers were added by the 3rd owner.
Full Dinan build in 1995 when the car had 32K+- miles and had pretty much everything installed Dinan offered at the time, less the gauge package. A stroked 3.8 stage two motor and literally everything else was done to the car that was available at the time.
When the car arrived in CA I didn’t like the way it drove, at all. It had too much tire and running 17” wheels. It needed some suspension work and and some interior things done, but it’s finally getting to the point where it’s getting dialed in pretty well. List of things done within the last 600 miles
Rebuilt the entire shifter assembly, it was horrible! I did a lot of reading about short shifters, likes and dislikes of what is available and after much deliberating I ended up using a UUC 1M shifter kit, a 185mm DSSR and all new delrin bushings everywhere. The shifts are incredible, smooth and precise and the shifter is oriented perfectly in the console. I had to have a custom shift boot made due to the 1M shifter being slightly different at the top, Carlos in Alameda knocked that out for me (highly recommend him for interior work, I’ve known him for a long time, back when he worked for the original owner who was a good friend)
When the car was in the air for the shifter rebuild, I discovered some bad tire wear and off came the 17s, threw some tires on a set of staggered Hartge style A wheels, Hartge spec sizes 205/55 F and 225/50 R.
It drives so much better with this setup along with the sway bar adjustments. 17s do look good on these cars but 16s is the way to go.
Also did the following;
Removed the high beam screen (CAI) and installed an actual light- not sure where that came form but I didn’t like it at all.
Softened the sway bar settings
Tie rods
Guibo
Dog bones
New CSB
Diff mount (GI Jonas bomb proof purchased form a member here)
Clutch hydraulics complete, hose was ready to go
Clutch over center spring (Thanks Ben)
Original DInan/Bilstein struts/shocks- Been sitting on these forever!
Fixed the center console area, the car has a “high end” audio system and it sucks ass! The shop in AZ did a horrible job. The radio surround was loose, so was the trim that covers the A/C blower area below it, just a garbage job. I still have to get back in there and redo things but it’s good for now. Planning a redo on the entire audio system but for now it'll do, just have to learn how to use the damn radio settings.
Things still to do;
Wheels – I just scored a set of BBS RZ323 wheels and may run these as they are the wheels Dinan installed before the car left their facility (unsure of square or staggered) but I’m torn between the H&B staggered set I got a little while ago, not sure on this as it’s kind of a mix match of tuners, I’d like to keep this car as original as I can, as it left Dinan. Both need refinishing.
Seats ??? Looking for a set of Pearl Beige sport seats or I may use a set I have in Black for now, recover later or if anyone has a set of clean Pearl Beige and need a pr of Black leather seats let me know…
Windshield – two days before picking up the car the PO called me and said that he had someone there to replace the windshield but felt the guy didn’t know what he was doing, I told him to send the guy home. The glass guy bent the chrome bottom trim and destroyed the lower corner piece. I’ll have to get that taken car of with someone who knows what they’re doing.
Sorry about the poor quality images, not much of a photographer, I’ll try to get more images up and more details as the car progresses, I have a few interesting modifications in mind. For now I’m just going to enjoy the car, it’s a blast to drive.
