I think it's sage advice not to try and daily drive any "project" car - regardless of the brand. Even the guys here on this forum with their "super reliable" Hondas have all kinds of problems with their turbocharged cars. I can only imagine how much tinkering and upkeep it would take to daily some Frankenstein BMW.

 

So true.

 

I agree with the guy a few posts up, for the most part. When cars get to that 15-20 year old time frame, things you don't replace on newish cars start to go, parts you don't normally think of repairing if you owned cars than are new to 7 years old. My 240sx with a redtop sr20det was bullit proof as far as powertrain went, but it's the little things. Alot of your suspension pieces start to show wear, I replaced literally every part of this suspension, but did so for reasonable prices because I live near godspeed projects headquarters and was one of the first people to buy from them. Interior pieces that look nice to you only seem so because of your excitement associated with buying a car. a 23 year old car is an OLD car. Thats 4 lifetimes in car years. If you browse forums though, you can keep it running and have it looking good, running well, and functioning well for a reasonable price, but don't think it will be as reliable as even the cheapest modern car. Powertrains are one thing, it's the other parts that cause problems.

That being said, I am in love with the e30 bmw. A client of mine just purchased a cherry red 318, fun little four banger in it, car looks and handles great. Whoever says e30's don't handle well aren't real driving enthusiasts. It may not be an evo x with ayc, edc, pyt, opp, whatever, but they can handle beautifully and progressively with a nice koni yellow/good springs combo, really progressive and controllable over steer.

Here is my favorite e30, i've been drooling over it for 10 years.



amazing cars

And my extra sleepery 240sx, but this was without it being slammed, it sat 2.5inches lower than this

 

For the sake of being arguementative as well...

Anyone find it odd how you tend to find a lot more older cars rolling around in poorer neighborhoods? For how expensive they "should" be to maintain, you tend to find a lot more el caminos, older mustangs, camaros, old pick up trucks (pre-90s), bmws, benz, lexus, all sorts of buicks and cadilacs in these neighborhoods... Yes, they are in varying conditions from total POS, to well maintained (appearance anyway).

I'm guessing it's a matter of time and self labor. Older cars tend to be easier to work on and maintain for the DIYer. The inital upfront cost is lower than a "newer" car as well, and when newer cars break (yes they break too, less, one would hope), they are more difficult to DIY, which in turn leads to higher labor for a fix.

Granted, this does not apply to swaps...

Anyway, I think SOME older vehicles can be reliable, but I certainly wouldn't keep one as my only car. Eventually an older car becomes an OLD car. It's not a matter of reliability but finding replacement parts when things do break, which is why the cars disappear from the road. People don't want to deal with that. Newer cars break, but parts are readily accessible for around 10-15 years. Once cars start approaching that 20+ year mark, that starts being the cutoff, and that's when the "reliable" cars (when they were newer) start to disappear (the unreliable ones from the beginning tend to disappear much sooner than that - when was the last time you saw a chevy cavalier???).

 

Thanks everyone who has posted. Yeah, I do realize that I'll never get the reliability of a new car but I think as a daily driver it'll be a great car, not only because it'll be fun to drive but because it'll be something I can work on and have fun 'fixing' when stuff does break. I know that these older cars have little things that go wrong, but the experience and time spent learning the ins and outs, the "quirks" are part of the joy of ownership.

Yeah, an S2000 would probably be a bit more steadfast in terms of reliability because it'd be 10+ years newer, but I'd like a new experience on a new platform. The E30 has always had a special place in my heart and I think it's the kind of simple, pure car that'll keep me interested and that I'll be proactive in learning about. I definitely have the funds to take care of repairs and also have the ability to seek out guidance on any issues I can't quite take care of myself. Living in SoCal means there are a lot of members in the community available to talk to and seek help from if the need arises, and there's also quite a few expert shops like Castro that know the ins and outs and can cover repairs that I don't have the time/space to do.

Worst comes to worst, I have enough money sitting around that I can buy a cheap beater if the need arises and use that as a backup. I don't really expect that to be necessary since I'll be careful with the E30 and do as much preventative maintenance as possible. The current owner has put a lot of time and money getting the car sorted, upgrading the suspension, engine, all the mounts, bushings, wheels, tires etc so I have a good platform to build off of.

It's definitely interesting to see the varying opinions from you guys about the 'viability' of getting such a car. I know quite a few of you are older and therefore might be more into the 'convenience factor' and may not enjoy fixing things or putting in the time to upgrade parts on the car, and can afford to just go buy a bad-ass Z06, Lotus, etc turnkey monster DD which is a huge step away from where I'm at in life, and yet I totally understand your perspective.

Here's what I figure: I'm 22 years old, in college, and have a voracious desire to change things up, have fresh experiences, and learn as much as I can. I could get another S2000, but I figure it's worth giving something classic like the E30 a shot, albeit with a more modern engine. I used to think 'old cars are boring/crap', but I've come to realize that the engineering and ingenuity put into some of these older cars is truly astounding and with the right upgrades, they can be competitive with newer cars.

Also, the E30 is now appreciating and swapped cars are in high demand, especially well-sorted ones. Even if I own it for a year or two, I can easily re-sell it for what I paid for it or likely more. I don't have to worry about depreciation because the cars bottomed out years ago and clean examples are appreciating. It is a great platform to improve my mechanical skill, driving skill (since it's a more raw, skill-demanding car ala my AP1), and to have fun with. I mean, I can pop the diff on an E30 (a tough task without tons of power or acting retarded), for example, and buy another one for $150-250! A far cry from the $350-500 that it costs to buy a new S2000 diff should you break yours while launching, and far more unlikely (axles will go before the diff on an E30).

Sorry for the essay, but I feel like this is an interesting, fun route to take with my next car and that it's a nice change from my 6-speed TL while combining some of the things I liked about the TL with a more pure driving experience like my old AP1. The insight offered in this thread has definitely not been ignored or short-changed, so thanks for the input.

P.S.

Also, it is extremely appealing to have a dirt cheap car that will be very easy to reliably/cheaply supercharge and have some fun with newer, overpowered cars like my friend's (another ex-S2000 owner) new 380 whp Evo X. I'd love to get to the point where I'm familiar enough with the car that I could turn it into a 350 whp, 2600 lb RWD sleeper that can pop out and surprise Vettes, Evo's, STI's, and other beautiful beasts while daily driving.

And I may still yet buy another S2000, I think it'd compliment an E30 nicely.

 

Well, the nice thing about the E30 is that there's TONS of parts available, and not just from E30's! E21, E34, E36, and more have various parts that'll fit right on an E30, much like other Honda's have parts that work on an S2000. There were 2.2 million E30's produced worldwide so there's quite a lot of parts supply available.

Also, the S50 engine is an upstroked M50 so a LOT of the M50 parts fit right onto an S50 in case anything needs to be replaced/fixed. There is a ton of parts available for M50/S50's, probably more than are available for F20/F22 for example. Hell, even transmissions are dirt cheap and interchangeable, you can use an E30 or E36 transmission with no problems. The M50/S50/S52 are widely known as the most reliable BMW engines ever made, and shouldn't give me much more trouble than a Honda engine as long as they're treated right.

It's kinda funny how older BMW's resemble Honda's in design and simplicity. Even VANOS is extremely similar to VTEC. When I asked Chris @ Castro how he'd compare the reliability/complexity of the S50 to the S2000's engines, he said that the S50/S52's are even simpler designs and should line right up with what I know about working on the S2000.

I wouldn't buy a new BMW due to the complexity and over-engineering, but the old ones appeal to me for the same reasons the S2000 does.

 

Thats funny because there have been dozens of successful tsx/jdm/euro accord based race cars and only a couple of tl's - and it's weird how real time has been winning with there tsx's since day 1 while abandoning the RSX as uncompetitive.

And that's because the TSX is not a 4 door RSX - the rsx and the TL and all other new Hondas have a strut front suspension. This was done supposedly to save space, but it's really a cost cutting move. Watch some slow mo of a stut front car straight line curbing on track and you will see the front wheel moving up and down in mid air. That excess wheel motion from the strut causes under steer and tremendous work has to be done to get a car to handle on par with a wishbone front and usually it means making the car much stiffer and using larger sway bars for rotation. Companies like Spoon and Mugen have gone on the record to discuss the problems with handling on the new generation of strut equipped Hondas.

By the way the production Brembos on the TL are lip service they are just another OEM and if you think you are getting there Ferrari quality work lol - Mugen sells the standard Nissin Calipers as racing parts re-branded as the active gate system so they are quite capable.

When you said people who don't know what there talking about - knowing what your talking about doesn't include a 30 second slalom test in a magazine to determine handling for track use. There are several other things here but if you think the TSX is a piece of shit compared to an e30 with a motor swap for track use...well, ok have fun.

 

I somewhat agree with you, but i think th reason why you see older higher end/interesting cars is because of all the things you said and also due to a situation similar to the old cliche of making lemonade when life gives you lemons. Alot of those folks would rather buy something newer and nicer but are forced to buy older and beat up. They will stick with whts populr and relatively easy to work on, and if its a cool car all the better. I say this because i live around alot of those areas, trust me, theyre settling.
That said, another reason why u dont see alot of the older cars running around after a while is due to accidents and having failures not warranting the cost.

 

Because I'm looking for a race car, right? LOL. TL is far superior to the TSX for 99.9% of purposes. Let me guess, you've never driven a 6 spd TSX vs a 6 spd TL. The TL destroys it. TSX doesn't even have LSD, nor the power to match its weight. 3G TL 6-speed has incredible handling, even with just new wheels + tires: I threw my NT03's + 255mm Nitto NT05's on it and it was an absolute monster.

Since I'm sure you haven't directly compared the 1G TSX 6-spd vs a 3G TL 6-speed, I'll just assume you're going off what you've read for heavily modified TSX's, which isn't relevant to what we're discussing here for daily driving/track use, now is it?

And I guess the STI and Evo Brembos aren't real Brembos either? They use the same caliper as the TL Brembos, so I guess you're wrong. For the record, E30's have won more road races than the TSX. If I remember correctly, the E30 M3 has more wins than any other other model of car.

I can't believe anyone would think a TSX would be better for track usage than an E30... then again, I have always found your posts to smell of BS, Duke.

 

FWIW, the brembos found on most stock cars are just lip service, they aren't the 10 pot monster calipers made from unobtainium coupled with vented and drilled 22" discs (exaggerating) that people grown to love, theyre just rebranded components. I mean I'm sure they are indeed brembos or whatever, but theyre no different than if say honda wanted to put in a decent 4 pot caliper onto their cars. Nissan made the switch back, note their sport package brakes on the Z that used to be brembos are just nissan brand calipers, and there wasnt any change IIRC. It's sorta like recaro seats in the stis and evos, oh cool they're recaros, dont see any real benefit other than having the name stitched into the head area, and the new BRZ seats are very comparable coincidentially. Or it's like the Bose system in alot of cars, they really arent the top shelf stuff that you're used to getting with Bose. The power of marketing.