This is a bad take. It’s always easier to say that someone outside of your sphere owes you something ... until it happens to someone in your sphere. The Schumacher family is likely having to deal with 24-7 nursing care and all the environment changes associated with that. Go visit a hospice wing and you’ll get an…

No one here knows the net terms on their accounts payable. Their cash burn is nothing if not consistent. TSLA has $5B for the next 1-2 years and then we’ll see who is still willing to lend them money.

TSLA hit 188 b/c they reported a $700MM loss, and Musk was steadfast in saying that they didn’t need to raise cash when everyone and their dog KNEW that they needed to raise cash.

Lol. 3rd gen RX-7 owners can monitor the health of the turbo seals by how much blue smoke pours out at WOT. Oil cooled twin turbos on a rotary ... fantastic design. /s

As a current and past owner of several oil-thirsty BMW and Mazda rotary engines, my general thought is “damn ... that’s a fair bit of oil consumption.”

You might have missed the original thread where this car was acquired. That’s an M3 donor car, not an E36 with M3 bumpers and side skirts.

Damn you.  I have split my beer.  Take your star.

Suzuka ... best driver’s track on the schedule. Where all the action in the WDC used to happen before F1 got, how do you say ... less interesting? It saddened me those years when they went to Mt. Fuji.

Oy.  Another missed opportunity.  BMW M models had a similar feature as a dealer installed option where the light is a shift light/rpm indicator.  Super cool, if not superfluous.  Would have been totally appropriate on the V line of yore. 

Oh it gets better. They quoted transmission inspection and repair due to a missing bolt. I was like WTF? So I crawl under there, and guess what ... they’re saying I need to overhaul the transmission because the cover was missing a bolt.  Guess I need to explain to their inspection guy what a real emergency need is…

Gotta be careful with your Indy too. There are many who claim BMW expertise and fail doing seemingly simple jobs.

Classic BMW dealer awfulness. Require replacements for things that can be R&R’d, and full book hours on simple jobs. 6 hrs for floating rotors and pads? At $200 per shop hr? But of course!

This is where the logic needs to expand. Average human beings can squeeze into most cars. Now factor in what most sedan purchases are motivated by ... kids and baby carriers. Suddenly it’s damn near impossible to find a reasonable sedan that you can comfortably load/unload a baby seat into without being bludgeoned…

FWIW, the chief engineer on the ATS-V stated that the LT1 will fit just fine.  Not that Caddy will dare to explore that market ... sigh.  They could tap the Corvette parts bin for the 7-speed manual and still hit the CAFE targets, but nooooo ... everybody needs a turbo.

Like any car out of the warranty period, if you can do your own maintenance, you will mitigate the costs exponentially. As a fellow older M3 owner, I can commiserate on the unbelievable overcharging that dealers and indy’s charge these days for stuff that is just not that hard to do.  Parts are typically the problem…

Depends on the car, and your level of upkeep. My 11 yr old and 21 yr old M3’s require less than $300/mo in maintenance. That said, I’m ok with TPMS sensor alarm issue not fixed on one and the clunk from the worndown driveshaft bearing on the other. I’m under no illusion that these will ever be collectibles and/or…

In stock form, I feel like it lacks the torque that I would like for sideways stuff, but it does make up for it on the top end. I’ve only experienced that kind of upper rpm acceleration in heavily modified turbo cars. However ... intake, test pipes, and a tune give the S65 a fairly healthy torque bump that…

I plan on keeping mine for as long as gas remains a thing I can afford to buy. The S65 is a special motor. It happily sings across any rpm range, and it gets very racecar-ish at the upper rpms ... especially with a tune and aftermarket exhaust parts. The e9x M3 gearing in combination with the S65 does that…

Right, I forgot ... auto-xers know everything about cars and the racing line. Look bub, I competed in the auto-x world many moons ago; even have a Nationals SS-class trophy ... but you lost me with this wheel-to-wheel racers under driving their cars and the new M3 isn’t really an M3 nonsense.  

Yeap.. maintenance on an E36 M3 is not for the faint of wallet. I have to imagine that these have already been done ... but water pump and radiator —> upgrade and save yourself the pain of having to do them more than once.