2001 BMW E46 330ci

Project Heinz is a 2001 BMW 330ci purchased here in sunny San Diego, California.

I had been wanting something fun and rear wheel drive for a while. Here in SoCal there are some amazing roads, and it’s a crime not to have something to drive them in on a regular basis.

However, there are certain parameters for this project. My initial budget for purchasing the car and getting it into shape is just $7000 in total. From there, it’s going to take some inventiveness, sharp shopping and a crack mechanic going by the name of Nando to turn the car into something fun and interesting. So, let’s explore the basic parameters of this project.

The over concept here is to build a quick and agile road car that can be run for fun at a local time attack night at a nearby track, and can be fun to blast around on track days elsewhere and used to build driving skills. So within this scope, the car has to work as a car that can be used day to day for running errands and a couple of times a month run up to Orange County and San Diego on missions. It doesn’t need to be a daily driver but it has to have practicality to a degree. I can put up with a fair amount, but my main parameter there will be my wife being able to jump in it and go across town without complaint. She likes a quick car and rocking a manual gear shift so it shouldn’t be unreasonable but it does mean for both our sanity there will be no roll cage and five point safety harnesses here.

There will be a crank in horsepower through forced induction once the chassis is where it needs to be and everything as reliable as a 15 year old can be, but the key word will be “balance”. Once the initial budget is eaten up, everything will be on the budget of a self employed man living in California. Sounds wonderful, until you realise the cost of living here is actually quite high. Not UK high, but it’s trying.

Now, I did consider going older with the car but there are other practicalities here. First and foremost is that the kid will be riding passenger at times, so safety is a consideration in terms of being hit and the car needs to be modern enough for the one time you may need it impact protection.

Other cars considered here was a Mazda MX-5 or Miata depending what continent you’re on (Too small - I’m 6’1 and my wife is not short either), a Nissan 350z (For that money it’s hard finding one that hasn’t been thrashed), an RX-8 (You can find prime examples for not much money, but good luck finding one well maintained enough to not need an engine in the very near future) and a couple of others that slip my memory right now.

After all that, I circled back to the BMW. Like many my age it’s something I’ve always wanted to own and drive the crap out of an E46. The practicality is a solid and I like a six banger engine with a solid transmission. The only work I can’t do myself or with the aid of an actual mechanic friend (more on him later) is bodywork and paint, so finding something that was still in great shape despite the relentless heat and sunlight here was high on the list. Rust here is not a problem, but E46’s tend to come with their own problems but nothing that can’t be fixed if caught early. The biggest problem was finding a manual gearbox here in the land of the automatic. The second problem was a lot of sellers thinking they were sitting on the rarest car on earth and massively over valuing. The 330 was the most powerful E46 that wasn’t an M Car and uncommon compared to the less powerful versions.

Quick tangent: Yes, after this car is said and done it’s probably going to have into it the current cost of a decent M3. The reasons I chose not to just save up and get an M3 are as follows:

• Saving up.
• Good example E46 M3’s are going to be much sought after in a few years, and I want to enjoy the crap out of this car and not worry about resale value later. That game is for people that love cars more than they love driving.
• Where’s the fun in buying a car you don’t really need to project the crap out of, and kill the resale value in doing so? No. Money will be burned here, but not that needlessly.

Anyway, back to people thinking their 330 is a valuable rarity. Yes, it is actually not common because the other versions were cheaper initially. However, a car worth under $8000 is a car under $8000 and in a few months time there are going to be four or five people I met that will realise their $8000 car isn’t actually an $8000 car.

This particular specimen was repainted a few years ago at the same time the M Sport bumpers and boot lid were installed, so that meant the game was on. At 160,000 miles it’s definitely broken in and there’s a rebuild in it’s future… but he maintained the oil at half the recommended intervals and it pulls very strong indeed for now. The interior was grey, and that will irritate me until everything’s sorted and it can be changed up). The seller was planning to fix the oil leak and the diff bushings before the actual sale, but I told him not to until I had seen it. That turned out to be critical as he was happy to take off what he had been quoted to fix the issues and save himself the hassle of doing it. In turn, I’m happy to enlist the services of a friend who is a mechanic and eager to get involved in building something fun. He also happens to be a forced induction expert amongst other things, but let’s not get too carried away yet.

One thing that was quite a nice bonus are the original 17” M Sport staggered wheels. They are in great condition and definitely refinish worthy. I’ve been toying with putting something else on but I like the time appropriate look of them, smaller diameter also means they are lighter and effect the end ratio in favour of acceleration. The option later will be switching to square stance and get some more grip at the front. We’ll see.

So, close as damnit to four grand and I’m now the owner of Project Heinz. Not the most original name, but apt as he is bound to end up being a bit saucy* and built with 57 varieties.

Update 1 is here

*In the UK ketchup is called sauce… and explaining a joke never makes it funny.