Classic cars can do the everyday: 2500 miles in my E30 BMW 325i

How did you celebrate 50 years of the BMW 3 Series? I may have taken it a bit far by buying this E30-generation 325i Touring from 1990. Ever since selling my Porsche 944 four years ago, I've had a hankering to own an old car again. Something simple, light, moderately interesting and, above all, fun. The E30 ticked the boxes of being a relatively compact car (it's narrower than a current Mini Cooper C) with an interesting engine, rear-wheel drive and a manual gearbox. It strikes that balance of being purer and more mechanical than modern cars but still comfortable and refined enough that you can take it on big trips quite easily. My parents got a 320i when I was two years old, so it was the first car I was really aware of, and my own first car was a 316i Touring too. When I saw the ad, I immediately knew this was the one. It's a good colour combo and has factory air-con (which doesn't work, yet). It's also a manual car that's had a few choice performance upgrades over the years (a limited-slip diff and Bilstein dampers). Some people say E30s are really expensive now. Compared with 10 years ago, when you could pick up a 325i for a few thousand pounds, I suppose they are. On the other hand, this very nice example cost me less than a new Renault Clio. Just how nice is something I intend to find out soon by taking it to a classic BMW specialist to try, and hopefully fail, to poke holes in it. Not just an MOT Almost any 35-year-old car will have lived a life, and even though 91,000 miles is relatively low for the age, that's still plenty of time for components to wear out and rust holes to form. You can read all the buying guides you want before you view a car, but in the end you can never know everything. Very soon after buying my E30 BMW 3 Series, I booked it in with Classic Bahnstormers for one of their 'appraisals'. Initially I was a little startled at the cost (£456), but then this isn't just a superficial MOT. They take it for the day for both the mechanics and bodywork guys to dig into it, take parts off and do a test drive. The result is six sheets of A4 listing absolutely everything you could do to restore it to showroom condition-from the major stuff (leaky radiator and perished fuel hoses-eek!) to impossibly minor stuff (no rear ashtray illumination) - and an hour-long phone call to come up with a plan. The takeaway is that my car is a really good one with next to no rust and I could probably get away with just doing some essentials. The trouble is I'm permanently in road tester mode, finding every functional fault. I've kept old cars going with ad hoc repairs and just ended up frustrated. This one is probably a keeper, so it has to be right. I can live without ashtray illumination, but the air-con, suspension and central locking all need to work perfectly. This might get expensive. A-B testing The trouble with old cars is that you’re never sure whether a particular attribute is down to design, or that particular example with 92,000 miles and a mix of old original, new original and aftermarket components. If I’m honest, I’m slightly disappointed with the ride and handling of my 325i. It has a slightly lazy front end and a crashy ride. I had suspicions that the Uniroyal tyres (decent quality but not very sporty tyres) and the H&R lowering springs weren’t doing it any favours. I needed some A-B testing to know for sure. Fortunately, Autocar shares an office with Classic and Sports car, whose deputy editor Aaron McKay owns a very tidy 325i Sport, albeit a saloon from 1986. A plan was hatched for a car swap. Aaron’s car has the same Bilstein B6 dampers as mine, but with standard M Technic springs, and rides much better, with no penalty in handling. The steering also feels a bit lighter but tighter and more incisive, and the gearchange is more precise. It feels a bit quicker too, with less valvetrain noise (although it may just be masked by the naughtier stainless exhaust). Detail stuff, but all together, it really does tie the driving together. It was really interesting driving the two back to back, and reassured me that there are gains to be made with my car. Between the tyres, the springs, some suspension bushes that need replacing and an overdue service, I think my car can easily be lifted to the next level. Still a do-it-all car even after 36 years I've been delinquent in writing about my E30 BMW 3 Series, but not because I haven't been driving it. My intention was to get a usable classic to actually use, and that's what I've been doing. So as I near a year of ownership, here's a rather-too-quick round-up. A while back, I was attending a launch in the south of Portugal and, instead of flying, decided to drive there by way of the Portsmouth-Santander ferry. Because the Autocar long-term garage was full of plug-in hybrid SUVs, it had to be the E30. It was at Classic Bahnstormers in Gloucestershire for a load of deferred maintenance, because the previous owner drove it about 1500 miles in six years and it had sat idle for 10 before that. I begged them to hurry up, they obliged and I set off on a 2500-mile road trip. There's no better way to get to know a car, and the E30 turned out to be exactly what I wanted it to be. It doesn't feel like a modern car at all, but it does have the comfortable seats, noise isolation and grunt to eat miles like one. It will sit happily at whatever fast motorway speed you like. Then, as the roads of central Portugal got more interesting, it turned fun and engaging. It's practical too, yet also narrow enough to fit through the alleys of medieval towns. And it returned 30mpg, which I think is pretty good The MPG readout on the 'on-board computer', by the way, is dead accurate. Of course, it will still do old car things. The heater matrix started to leak blue coolant over the beige carpet, the headlining got soaked after a rainstorm, it now requires a lot of cranking to start and the driver's door needs a secret handshake to open. Nothing that stopped progress, but clearly those issues need addressing soon. Finally everything works. I think…. After my 2500-mile continental road trip – more than my 'E30' 325i Touring had done in the past 10 years – a few things needed sorting out. When I'd told the classic BMW specialist to hurry up before my road trip, they hadn't got round to fitting a new radio and fixing the air conditioning. But they have now. By far the biggest cost was the heating and ventilation. A company in the US makes a kit to convert the E30's air conditioning to modern R134a refrigerant, with a new compressor, condenser, filter-drier and a bunch of lines and brackets, although fitting it to a right-hand-drive car is apparently a bit of a pain, as is replacing the leaking heater matrix. Anyway, that was sorted out, along with the temperamental central locking system, the aerial that was letting water into the roof, and the slowly failing fuel pump. To finish things off, a new radio went in. I couldn't bear a modern one with blinking lights, so I went for a retro Blaupunkt Frankfurt, which looks exactly like the kind of thing it could have come with new, except it has Bluetooth and DAB.. It all took a couple of months because sourcing parts for old cars can take a while, and I did tell them to take their time because I wasn't going to drive it through road salt anyway. I think I now have a 36-year-old car where everything works, but that does draw into focus other areas for improvement. It's still on aftermarket sport springs that are too hard and too low, and for a car that has a reputation for swapping ends, I find it disappointingly inert in the dry. I suspect the Uniroyal RainSport tyres aren't doing it any favours. I see some original springs and better tyres in my future. It's just like a regular lease payment on a new car…

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Classic cars can do the everyday: 2500 miles in my E30 BMW 325i

All eyes are on BMW's Neue Klasse era, but touring in my Touring shows the Old Klasse still shines

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Classic cars can do the everyday: 2500 miles in my E30 BMW 325i

All eyes are on BMW's Neue Klasse era, but touring in my Touring shows the Old Klasse still shines

More from Autocar

Top 10s

Latest car reviews

Top manufacturers

Quick search

We recommend

Legal bits

About Autocar