E31 840/850 ahead?

[Ferret]

Well that was an eventful weekend :(

Managed to take out two cars on the M25 motorway yesterday afternoon and turn the subaru into a smear!

If they write it off (which seems likely,) I think I'm going to consider a slightly more sedate 8 series as the second car, but the eternal dilemma, v8 or v12? the v8 has the advantage of being able to be found in tiptronic, but the v12 has awesomeness attached free of charge.

I still need to drive a v12 at some point, but I've heard these can be electrical nightmares!

[shogun]

Try to get a 850 CSI
840Ci 286 hp V8, 4.0l 07/1993 - 02/1996
840Ci 286 hp V8, 4.4l 01/1995 - 05/1999
850i 300 hp V12, 5.0l 05/1989 - 12/1992
850Ci 300 hp V12, 5.0l 01/1993 - 10/1994
850Ci 326 hp V12, 5.4l 02/1994 - 05/1999
850CSi 380 hp V12, 5.6l 08/1992 - 11/1996
Alpina B12 5.0 350 hp V12, 5.0l 06/1990 - 05/1994
Alpina B12 5.7 416 hp V12, 5.7l 11/1992 - 12/1996

The following amount of 8-series cars has been manufactured from May 1989 until May 1999:

Type.. 830i 840Ci 850i...850Ci. 850CSi 850s.Total 8-series Alpina B12 5.0 Alpina B12 5.7
qty......18..7803..20072.1218....1510..22800...... .. 30621......... 97.................. 57 ...

Only 1510 units of the BMW 850CSi were built from August 1992 until October 1996. Because of stricter emission guidelines from January 1997 on, the production of the 850CSi ceased as further development, because of the few cars sold, would have been too expensive. So it has the same destiny as the Aston Martin V8 Vantage. By the end of 1996, all dealers still having a CSi, were instructed to license them - and if it was for one day only - because with the new guidelines it would have been impossible to do.

[Ross]

V-12s are way more expensive to maintain so tend come as neglected used cars.
Know for sure what you are buying, surprises come in thousand $ increments.
Jeff will soon chime in

[whiskychaser]

Have you researched the correlation between the number of cylinders and the number of cars you can take out? ;)

[repenttokyo]

are you ok?

[632 Regal]

Yep my 8500.00 850 Ebay special is around 12K now with all the parts I bought. Haven't installed the normal wear parts yet like the inner wheel wells, sunroof parts etc. Did the cap/rotor and wire thing, brakes/rotors, cost a little bit there but when done I should be able to get what I have invested. I enjoyed them 136 miles so far that I did run it. If interested in it your welcome to check it out, at least you wont have to spend all your time messing with this crap.


V-12s are way more expensive to maintain so tend come as neglected used cars.
Know for sure what you are buying, surprises come in thousand $ increments.
Jeff will soon chime in

[Ferret]

are you ok?

Aye, It wasnt a major collision, I blinked and the E60 in front of me had deployed its legendary 5series anchors, nothing I could do about it. Got it down to a slow enough speed that it didnt deploy the airbags, but it was still too late...

My own fault entirely, though a bit of bad luck shunting it into the car in front :/

I have a sneaky suspicion that the bmw actually had run into the back of the car in front of it before I hit it considering how suddenly it piled to a stop, but alas the man at the back always gets the blame.

[Ferret]

Yep my 8500.00 850 Ebay special is around 12K now with all the parts I bought. Haven't installed the normal wear parts yet like the inner wheel wells, sunroof parts etc. Did the cap/rotor and wire thing, brakes/rotors, cost a little bit there but when done I should be able to get what I have invested. I enjoyed them 136 miles so far that I did run it. If interested in it your welcome to check it out, at least you wont have to spend all your time messing with this crap.

Hmm, the oldschool tech on these worries me, especially when getting parts for them is a total nightmare and bits like the ignition leads cost the earth.

May consider a later 4.4 M62 powered 840i with tip, there's a few out there at the £4-5k range that are the full sport models too!

[SnakeyesTx]

+1 on the 840

That engines a lot more common and easier to work on, cheaper parts, more accessible to get at them. With the money you save on maintenence, you can just call up dinan and supercharge it :D

[shogun]

I presently have an 850i in my backyard, built 1990, less than 100.000 km on the clock, with nice Alpina wheels, original M rear spoiler, MK front spoiler, almost 2 years MOT, plus additional 4 wheels and winter tires.
Engine runs smooth as silk, no oil drops, black paint.
Got it from a guy who wanted to trade it in against a VW Scirocco under the cash for clunker program here, just paid him the amount he would have got for trading it in.
Roughly $3.000.
Now I do not know what to do with it ;)

Actually I rented a small truck and went with some friends there just to rip out as much as we could from the car in one day, before it should go to the scrapyard. But when we arrived there we found a nice 850 in perfect condition + too good to be parted, so we decided to get the whole car and now it is sitting in the backyard.
Have already asked the guys here from the E31 club, if it can get a new home.
Probably on next Saturday it will be picked up by someone.
He will just pay for the amount we paid plus the expenses for the truck rental and fuel we had.
The world is crazy now, wonderful cars are coverted to frying pans just because of these programs. :(

[Ferret]

Well, just had a call from the repair centre, they've stopped assessing at £4200 (USD6923) worth of damage on the £6000 (USD9890) subaru, pretty much game over there...

Time to start hunting!

[Interceptor]

Personally, I would go for the 840Ci/6 with the M62 engine (MY 96+). Chipped, it's faster than any 850i, cheaper to maintain and consumes less fuel.

[Ross]

Personally, I would go for the 840Ci/6 with the M62 engine (MY 96+). Chipped, it's faster than any 850i, cheaper to maintain and consumes less fuel.

Good choice. That's a rare bird on this side of the pond, perhaps a few more in the UK or Europe.

[Interceptor]

Good choice. That's a rare bird on this side of the pond, perhaps a few more in the UK or Europe.

It's much more common in Europe since it was produced till 05/1999 ;)

[Ferret]

It's much more common in Europe since it was produced till 05/1999 ;)

It's still a bit too rare for my second car :P

There's a nice silver M62 4.4 tiptronic popped up which I may go and have a look at actually...

However there's also an awesome black 850 appeared in the local area that I may be severely tempted by, complete with the mtech wheels that 535isport seemed so fond of!

Unipart do a full ignition wires set for about £100 as well...