1995 E36 Sport, $5k budget... what to buy?

[qapla97]

Ok, I was out shopping for a 330i Sport and found the prices miserably high and the dealers true, pure-blood jerks. Some soul searching led me to think - if I put about $5k into my car, could I extend my enjoyment for 5 more years?

The car now: 1995 325i Sport Pkg, 4-door, 5 spd. 69800 miles. Dark Green. Really in very very good shape. No upgrades other than speakers. Stuck to dealer recommended maintenence all its life. Looks and handles as it did when I took it from the dealer. Power seems down from new.

Current Known Problems:
Driver's Seat Leather is badly worn. Passenger seats are like NEW.
Catalytic converter is shot. Rattles and smells of rotten eggs.

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1. Exhaust upgrades? Air Flow? Chip?

The car seems to have lost some of its power, esp. in the Summer. How should I divide my budget amongst the performance upgrades possible so that I get best bang for dollar, and don't hurt daily reliability. Recommendations?

Should I do a full exhaust replacement when I do the cat? Will that make enough difference to be worth the $?

I don't want the car to be noisy, but I like an aggressive sound.

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2. I am happy with the handling and brakes. This car is perfectly balanced.

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3. Freshening the front?

I do not like how the car looks from the front. I suppose it's E46 envy. I would like to subtly change the front to include a slightly different spoiler and possibly some different headlights to set it apart and freshen it up. Recommendations?

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4. Satellite Radio?

I want to put XM in the car and (hopefully) a MP3 CD player. The stock 6-disk player constantly gets jammed.

In closing: Keep in mind that I will have to spend some of the budget on labor, as I do not have the experience or the facilities to do the work myself.

I'll post before and after info on this forum after all is done....



S

[triggrhaapi]

well, performance wise, Jim Conforti chips are the only ones worth looking at. For exhaust, look at AA and eisenmann, intake wise anything that uses your stock sensors is cool, other mods you might want could include M3 camshafts/injectors, headers, high flow cats, etc... you might even want to go F/I.

that's all, good luck!

[StealthBimmer]

Well the reason your car "looses" power in summer is bc it is hot out. When you intake hot air, the car will loose power. I would reccomend a chip,intake and exhaust if you are looking for more power. If you want some nice headlights head to www.umnitza.com they are having a sale now as well on some very nice headlights with dde. As for satelite radio thats up to you, personnaly i dont like it... i always listen to my cds.

[qapla97]

Ok, so this might be the best way to go with my budget:

- High Flow Cat (brand?)
- High Flow Exhaust (brand?)
- Cold Air Intake (brand?)
- Chip Update (what risks are there to my reliability? Can I go back to stock?)

So of these, which ones? I've googled until I'm sick of looking.

Obviously the exhaust mods go on at the same time, but is the 'order' of mods above sensible?

I want to retain stock sensors and engine monitoring function.

I'm getting together a project list to take to my mechanic to price labor. I'll be printing up web pages of the parts so he can look into the install difficulty. Then in a few weeks, it's going up on the rack for the mods.