After seeing your tease post on Facebook I wondered when you'd update us properly here. Have to say I was very surprised to see a non 3dr GTI but I get why. Is this 1.6 or 1.8?
I'm fairly certain I have a CE1 rev counter going spare. :-D
Yeah I was surprised too - only a little 1600 with a Weber! Ah gotcha, thanks for the offer! I’ll shoot you a message!
If you have been following my E30 thread recently you will know that I had sold the car due to my impending open-heart surgery and putting the money towards a house purchase. Being honest, I was getting a bit bored without the E30 to tinker by the next day so started to annoy Mr & Mrs Mac, Ben Straker and the Wagars with anything I found online for sale. I had a bee in my bonnet about wanting a 3 door GTI although realistically this was out of my budget. I started enquiring about many cars which after some digging had issues with paint, bad corrosion or in some cases bad sellers.
I ended up missing out on a pretty perfect late spec Tornado Red 8v big bumper which sold at £6200 on eBay within 12 hours which I was fairly disappointed about. I was looking at weird array of cars from Ford Model A’s, BMW E28’s and E30’s to old Rovers etc. So, there I was being sensible (ish) looking through Facebook marketplace when early Sunday morning which had only been listed for about 12 hours, I came across this -1988 Marine Blue CL - 47k approx. on the clock and 2 previous owners:
I sent a message on the sale ad - and got a reply that it was pending viewing and I was third in the queue. Thinking at this point that I had lost the car, my search continued on - I came across a tired grey late 16v 5 door - arranged the viewing for 3pm Monday afternoon. About 12pm, I get a text from the initial seller saying his viewing cancelled and if I was still interested in viewing the car and wanted to arrange for coincidently at 3pm. The 16v was in Kent and the CL in Suffolk, being slap bang in the middle in Essex - I had to make a choice of fate.
I went with my gut to pick a 'cleaner base’ to view the CL with Mr Mac and set off to Ipswich to which I was greeted with this:
So got to view the car – found loads of little issues immediately which need rectifying but no massive issue. However, was faced with this upon arrival and looking round which seller did not mention. It was a bit of a big bubble and soft which I mentioned to which he pushed, and it went through. So, this is a main area that I will look to fix.
Happily, James Cope has offered to help me out with this for free (what a guy!) if I cannot sort it locally! Another issue was this weld patch that hasn’t been painted – so I’ll get this sorted the same time as the rear:
Overall, bar the major obvious details which need to be rectified this is a really honest solid car. The seller mentioned that the GTI grill was equipped from factory although the bill of sale does not confirm this so it will be replaced for a genuine CL grill.
The history is immense and has every MOT printout, every bit of servicing from new – original brochure and a little piece of history:
Replacement badges straight from VW addressed to the original owner in 1988, shame that they’re incorrect but it’s a nice touch:
Looking at the whole picture, I thought it is unlikely I’ll come across a car like this again so thought the little bits that need doing are worth the struggle. The previous owner was very sad to see it go, and I told her I’d look after it and not slam it on cheap coilovers.
Anyway, got it back to Ali’s to show Jo and made it home without any trouble – I think the next mechanical jobs are to sort a slight bind on the rear driver’s drum, need to change and engine mount and the linkage bushes could do with a refresh. New clutch is perfect however and it is really peppy with the new weber on!
Just like to say thanks to everyone who helped out - Mr & Mrs Mac, Ben, Wagars and the many other people I annoyed!
Sam, the car looks great even if it had the wrong badges on it (not VW and Golf). .The new owner has got a car to be proud of. I've never had a BMW but the quality of german cars of that era was way ahead of the British rot boxes. I find myself browsing Merc 190 2.6s and CEs for sale of that era. The prices of are still depressed but on the rise too.
Thanks! Appreciate the kind words - I believe a 2.6 190E would be a good buy. I remember reading that 2.5 cosworth really has to try to leave one comfortably at least.
I was getting a bit bored and thought I'd start to do some jobs which annoyed me so started with the adhesive glue left from the padding under the bonnet.
It started off looking like this - attempted it for one day using WD40 and some weird plastic scraper but wasn't getting anywhere quickly.
Amazon Prime came to the rescue so bought a new plastic scraper and blades with some sticky solution remover which really helped!
I did a little for the next day over a couple hours and then finished it off the day after. I think it came out relatively well!
There was some stange waxoyl smeared across each of the subsections - I accidently chipped into it on the passenger side so you can see it a bit more clearly in the pics. I left it in the middle and drivers side.
Thought I might as well give the bay a general clean at this point:
Proceeded to giving the inside a hoover and wipe although the carpets really ruin the perfectness. They need redying ideally.
At this point, I was enjoying working on the car and taking my time.
Decided to give the car a good wash with Carbon Collective Lusso and started compounding by hand with Megiuars Ultimate:
Came out much better!
Started then giving it a hand polish - tried Autofinnese Tripple Polish but wasn't happy with it. Tried something more aggressive and landed with Autoglym Super Resin.
It was then waxed with Megiuars Professional Hi-Tech Yellow Caranuba Wax and topped with Auto Finnesse Spray Wax:
I decided whilst the car was clean and looking great that I would put the car up for sale:
Cat trying to help!
Sale ad was written and listed on Friday 26th March at £7000. After a lot of initial interest and many messages going back and forth - a young lad from Staffordshire said he would put a deposit down immediatley and take it at full asking price. He said he would look after it so as promised he sent a deposit and left straight away and took it away on a trailer.
Bittersweet sale for me but it's going to a good home which gives me sollace and its money for my house.
An abrupt end to this chapter but hope this was of some interest at least.
No massive updates as I've been in and out of hospital regarding heart surgery and not really "allowed" to do much.
I had noticed that the passenger headlight was loose so thought it was missing a bolt - turns out it had just come lose from a mounting point so got it back on with a simple push. However, whilst the grill was all off it was worth a clean down.
Much better!
Also, Jasmine changed the wheels on the car for me today whilst I was "supervising". It is annoying that I'm not able to get stuck in myself at the moment but I think this small change has such a big impact!
That's it for now!
I think I might have to consider selling this one really - with the recent surgery news and my first operation already being canceled, it is more than likely that with 12 week recovery time that I won't get to drive this in the summer. In addition to taking it off the road for winter means another year it's not being used properly. I was looking to buy my first house at the end of the year/ start of next year so really doesn't make any sense for this to be sat when someone can enjoy it. That's my thought process on it at the moment, shame really.
Mate had a 318iS when they were new, same colour and wheels too... always had a soft spot for them since.
Genuinely amazing what is done nowadays... from someone who's a few stents, you'll be in the very best of hands, no luck needed!
I agree, style 5’s look perfect! The caps are very expensive though so it was crucial I bought them combined!
Would love a genuine 318is but for the step up in cash to find one in the same condition and mileage isn’t worth it - I do like having something different though being a touring!
Thanks for the kind words, technology is a marvel, luckily I’ve had open heart surgery about 15 years ago and some stent work in between! More so, just annoying for the loss of time and money as I’ve just finished my MSc but I suppose due to the pandemic everyone’s in a similar situation regardless!
Managed to pick up the wheels today, they came out really nice:
One of the wheels needed quite a bit of weights to be balanced correctly - this might be demoted to a spare if it proves troublesome.
My friend owns Carbon Collective so sealed them up with Platnium Wheels Cermaic Coating - awesome bit of kit!
Also got my new BMW centre caps through the post - can't wait to get everything back on although this might not be a while due to open heart surgery pending in the next fortnight or so. Hopefully after I've recovered then the updates will keep on coming!
One of the guys on the E30 club enquired about buying my 14" wheels, therefore, I've moved up the timeline of getting the 15" wheels sorted.
The factory tyre size is 205/55/15, however, due to the limited choice, I started looking at 195/50/15. After finding limited pictures, I then decided it wasn't the look I was going for then after much deliberation decided on 205/55. However, again the choice of brands were limited. I wanted to go for Michelin PS3's but nothing in this size. After annoying literally everyone in my group chats about nelgible pros and cons between AD08RS and Sportrac5's - I decided to go more risk averse.
Hopefully they'll look and perform well.
In the meantime, I've taken the 15's to be refurbed in my local at Rolling Rims - so awaiting getting them back and awaiting them to collect the new tyres.
My mate said he had a few ECU performance chips spare, so thought I'd have a look to see if mine was stock or not.
Started having a look:
Found this bodge...
ECU out:
Bit dirty - needs a clean:
As I was taking it apart, the tabs on it were so soft, luckily the screws hold it tight but annoying nevertheless.
Turns out it already has one, result!
Anyway, it's back together now but need to sort the cable tie issue out.
I managed to source a new tailgate switch and more importantly a genuine IS splitter. Apparently, according to the dealer this is the last one in the UK - not sure on the truth of this but gave me a justication to order it anyway.
Winston, the cat trying to help.
Fitted the switch - all interior lights working now as they should. Little things like that really annoy me when you actually use the car.
The splitter will await paint and will be fitted with new clips when the car goes for paint!
Had a bit of time to have a look at the E30 and sort out some niggly issues.
Firstly, looking at the rear wiper motor - removed because the sweep has its own mind. I've never taken a wiper motor apart before so had to figure it out as I went along.
Investigated by taking apart the motor:
Rubber block slightly split - although the grease looks really fresh - perhaps someone has been here before!
From what I can work out, this rocker is the derivative of the wiper park position - I had to take it on and off a few times to discover this. However, I can't get this rocker to park back at the same position and therefore will land anywhere on this scale once parked. I still need to work out where to go from here because it's quite annoying. As you can see from the picture below, sweep has gone onto the bootlid and scratched the paintwork before so want to avoid this when the car is repainted.
Speaking of repainting, whilst I had the car under the barn under the light I discovered this:
I know the the first forum thread listed in the first comment, Mick painted the car which was a bit of a while back so was quite surprised that this came up. Therefore, it looks like the front end is going to bare metal painted at the very least. I need to work out what else is going to be painted as I ideally don't want to spend 6k on painting this.
Back outside - can barley see the blistering unless you're looing for it!
Next job:
The interior light wasn't working when the drivers door was opened. Commonly, this is a door switch which is normally broken.
So had a little look - trim off and speakers out:
The reason - nothing was plugged into the back of a switch:
Using the internet and the help of Ben's experience in reading diagrams - it was worked out that there were two possibilities:
Plugged it back in - actually had to do this twice as left one unplugged to find out that this car has a timer delay optioned.
Great success!
Drivers mat temporary glued whilst I find a OEM replacement:
.The new owner has got a car to be proud of.
