Jay_bee

iTrader: (1)

Rannoch,

I know you suggested steering away from the Clubsport because of the premium but the one above doesnt look to have too much of a premium and the mileage looks good, have you any thoughts on the handling? As per my previous post, according to the Evo review it understeers and didnt handle as well as the M Sport?

Jeff

P20SPD

iTrader: (1)

David

The first chap we spoke to at York was very down to earth, he just couldnt take us out for a test drive, as he had a customer coming in the next 10 minutes for a new car handover, but he seemed genuine.

His colleague on the other hand fell into your description, reason i couldnt test drive any of the 3, they had taken deposits on them that day apparently! Amazing. He also TOLD me that the car i actually wanted was a 130i

WTF!!!!!! Needless to say we left, with confidence they wouldnt contact us!

Will try Malton, its a nice drive out there anyway

Steven

carl

The way petrol prices are now, the diesel will retain its value far better than the petrol. Large-engined petrol cars are depreciation nightmare these days. The smart money, even on BMW and Merc coupes, is on diesel. If you prefer petrol, personally I'd go for a cheaper one.

Trout

iTrader: (1)

I would go with EVO as they are usually on the money

The premium has clearly been depreciated out which is also a clue as to whether it was worth the extra money

Jay_bee

iTrader: (1)

Dream Weaver

The M Sport looks much better than the Clubsport IMO.

When you test the CD Jeff, try and take it on some rutted roads - we have the same 18" wheels on ours and the tramlining on rutted roads, and motorways (the wagon grooves) is quite frankly dangerous, and very annoying!!

According to posts on BMWland its the wheels/tyres rather than any geometry/tracking issue. You can pay BMW £200 to do the alignment, but it doesn't help much from what i've read.

Jay_bee

iTrader: (1)

Alright Simon,

Hows tricks?

Sounds like you've not had too much luck with yours matey? Yeah, after having looked at a few more pics of the Clubsport Im really not keen on the spoiler on the back, looks like a real after-thought or Halfrauds special!!

I think thats helped narrow it down to the 330 Ci & Cd M Sports now

They have a petrol Ci M Sport in but its an auto, so Im not too sure whether its even worth taking out to compare?

At the end of the day, its a work car (although I still havent bought something for the weekend from Japan yet) so I suppose its not the be all and end all if one is a second slower to 60 on paper and doesnt rev as well... hmmm.. <ponders>

Jeff

zip106

We've got a 320d Sport on a 54 reg, and I know the 330d is heaps quicker. All I'll say is that at last the engine has really freed up ( 38000 miles), the gear box is sweet but the tramlining is really poor!. The 18" wheels are not the only reasons for this - the M suspension ( slightly lower than standard 3' s ) that is fitted on the Sport model is quite firm and makes the car bounce around on rutted roads. If you're doing motorway miles it's not really a problem.
We get around 45 - 50 mpg on a fast m'way run and not much worse when I'm thrashing it around the country roads ( holding on tightly ).
One thing to look out for is the inside edge of the front tyres - they wear down quicker than the rest and ain't cheap to replace!
zip.

Jay_bee

iTrader: (1)

Yeah, not too fussed about that, I had 18's on my STi Type R and fortunately, a mate owns a tyre and exhaust shop

MattOz

I've done the 330d thing to death. I've had 4 so far and counting. Probably the best all rounder on the market today. Either in E46 or E90 guise.

I stupidly changed my E46 330d Sport for an M3 last December. In 6 months of driving the M3 just didn't live up to the hype. Sure it sounded great and went well, but there was always something not quite right. I'm now back in an E90 330d M Sport and loving it.

They're a great car. Not STI or Evo quick, but fantastically competent. My current E90 pulls hard all the way to an indicated 160 at 4.2k rpm! Set the cruise control at 140mph and the instant mpg reads 25-30!

A house move means the end of my E90 days, but the replacement will most likely be either a 330i or 330d. Finding the right car is always tricky, as people tend to hold onto them. I just need to dig out the phone number of the chap that bought my last one and see if he fancies selling it back to me! LOL

Matt

Dream Weaver

Things are good here, you at Prosport tomorrow?

Ours is still under warranty so the engine was replaced gratis (thank god at £6k), but its had a few more niggles since then. It is on 91k though, 2004 model :O

Only had it a few months, but it will have to go soon, hopefully for a Scoob Sportwagon as we have a mini DW on the way in March

Jay_bee

iTrader: (1)

Sweet lord!!!!!!

Congratulations my good man!!!

Nah Im not going to be there, got some test thrashing to do tomorrow

Have you had the pug on the rollers yet?

Jeff

Dream Weaver

Its on tomorrow. Had it mapped but the TB's were playing up so it only came out with 173bhp. Hoping for more yet though

Jay_bee

iTrader: (1)

Ah wish I was going to be there to see the beast in action, or at least getting to see you annoy some of the lower powered scoobs on the way home

(do i need a flame suit at this point )

Jeff

Jay_bee

iTrader: (1)

Update:

I've been out in the 330Cd (manual) and a 330Ci (auto). Liked both cars although I wouldnt buy an auto.

The petrol engine has a lovely note to it and if it'd been a manual I might have bought it. Common sense says I should get a diesel with the amount of miles I do but I really liked the petrol

Anyway, I've been put in touch with a local company that can chip the diesel for under £500 and they recon that should give around and extra 40bhp and better economy. We didnt quite agree on the price so I left it there to see if they can do any better. Got it down to £21,800, the car was like new to be fair.

Jeff

J4CKO

iTrader: (1)

Funny how people forgive BMW's major component failures, if it were anything else it would be classed as ****.

Jay_bee

iTrader: (1)

So basically, the same as Subaru ownership then?

P20SPD

iTrader: (1)

Have a word with Pat.

My understanding is that Guinness' 330d teaches M3's a lesson on regular occassion.

Karl-AL

i had the same dilema i couldnt decide between a 330d, 330i after selling the scoob (05 sti) i wanted somthing a bit more economical, i have finally made my mind up and came up with this, M3 with an LPG convertion some of you will think this is a stupid idea but i dont care because you can pick a good one up on about a 02, 52 with all the extras now for about £18000 the convertion will cost £1650 and there is no performance loss now a days as technology has moved on, so you have a luxury sports car that you can run on fuel that costs 38p per litre the only down side is that you lose your spare wheel compartment but hey for 38p a litre the spare can go in the boot.

Dream Weaver

I'm not forgiving it, we're swapping for a Sportwagon in Jan

BTW Jeff - 199bhp and 167 ft/lbs from the 205 today

carl

Think about the practicalities for a second here:

1) The M3 engine is highly-strung, producing more than 100bhp/litre. I doubt it will take well to being LPGd.
2) You'll be lucky to get 20mpg out of an M3. So that's about 16mpg on LPG (lower calorific value). The wheel well tanks are about 45 litres, and you can only fill them 90% full, so you've effectively got 40 litres of fuel at 16mpg, i.e. a range of around 140 miles.

Don't get me wrong, I think LPG is a great idea. But you really need the sort of car where you can fit a decent-sized tank in the boot. Something like a 5.7L Monaro would be ideal, and has the bonus that at around 50bhp/litre the engine's so unstressed it would probably run on anything combustible

Jay_bee

iTrader: (1)

Ha ha, thats brilliant

Well, they still havent dropped the price on the Cd M sport to what I want it to be at, so no deal. They've knocked £800 off the asking price, which for a straight sale is pretty pants IMO

Also, as Im only planning on keeping the car for 12 months max, I worked out that the diesel is only going to save me around £1000 a year on fuel, so paying the premium for the diesel doesnt seem that great any more as I can pick up a petrol for £2/3000 cheaper.

Jeff

Karl-AL

The tank that they are going to fit in mine is a 60 litre donut tank, he said he had done a few m3 ,s in the past and put in contact with the people who had, had it done and they said that there cars are fine and they would highly recommend it

carl

Well good luck, and (seriously) let me know how you get on. I could be well up for something like this in the future.

Jay_bee

iTrader: (1)

Right, I've narrowed it down to 2 but I cant quite make my mind up as they're both quite similar!

330Ci M Sport
December 03 (53)
28,751
Silver Grey
Black Leather (heated memory etc)
6 Disc CD
£20,450

330Ci M Sport
July 03 (03)
26,012
Silver Grey
Imola Red Ind Nappa (heated memory etc)
Single CD
Tracker Retrieve
Rear Side Airbags
Grad Tint Windscreen
£19,995

I havent seen the Imola Red leather in the flesh and on the photo it kind of looks a bit garish and Im not sure if its going to be one of those stupid things that put people off when it comes to sell? Any thoughts guys?

Jeff.

P20SPD

iTrader: (1)

1st one IMO, hate the red elather seats.

Tone Loc

iTrader: (1)

Agree... only get the red leather if you dress like David Hasselhoff

Tony.

carl

I love titanium grey or black cars with red leather seats, so I'd go for the latter. Ferrari 550s look particularly good in this combo.

But I think you will find the 330Ci a bit of a depreciation disaster. People looking for one a few years down the line will either want economy (330d) or the M3.

Trout

iTrader: (1)

Errrr....is that true?

I sold my four year old 330Ci Sport with 60k miles on the clock for 55% of its original value. Not exactly horrendous depreciation (and in theory it was a depreciation disaster as it did not have leather seats!). Only high end CLKs better this for coupes.

carl

I dunno, I've seen a lot of 4 year-old 330Ci's (coupes you understand, not convertibles) going for sub £10k.

Actually you'll always be better off getting a convertible because demand for them is usually higher.

Don't really have time to do a proper search, but this one is 5 years old and OK it's an SE not a Sport:
Fletchdale Cars : BMW 330 Ci SE Coupe Manual