Just like Jorge Goncalves' VR6 elsewhere in this issue, this '86 BMW 325e is the first car Chris McGuire owned. Nine years later, it's the only car he's ever owned and, like the VR6, it has been continually upgraded.
The 24 year-old accountant from Chicago got the car when he was 16. His father bought it new, and Chris got it as a hand-me-down from his brother, so the car's always been in the McGuire household.
By the time the BMW E30 was his, Chris had become attached to it, despite 90k on the clock, a rough interior and a few "dents and dings." However, it was bone stock and a great canvas for a young man's imagination.
Inevitably, Dad was initially opposed to any mods but Chris was able to talk him round with some well-chosen parts including a chip, intake and exhaust. But as he learned more about the car, he realized the low-revving 121hp stock motor wasn't going to cut it. From that point on, he vowed to do a motor swap and future mods were in preparation for that day.
He started on the interior because it was in the most need of work. The simplest solution was to swap in a set of E30 M3 seats plus some 325i door cards. These were black leather and meant he could discard the stock tan cloth. He also added an M steering wheel and shifter to give him the modernity and comfort he sought.
The next task was the suspension. Upgrades in this area would allow him to enjoy the car more with its stock power. So he contacted BMW performance and race specialists Ireland Engineering in California. He bought stage 3 race springs, sway bars and reinforcing kits, adding additional plating to the sway bar mounting points. He initially ran this set up with Bilstein dampers, but later swapped to Koni dampers to better match the springs.
A search online turned up a Rieger show car in Germany with a wheel design he liked. It took six months to track down a set of CR2000 wheels but he imported them himself. "I wanted everything to be unique, and at the time nobody else had these wheels. However, you can now get them quite easily from Tuner Shop," Chris said.
The 17x8.5" wheels originally ran 235/40 tires, but Chris swapped to 245/35 Falkens after the engine swap. "With its solid bushings, the car turns in so well and the tires really bite," he said.
Over the next couple of years, he concentrated on the exterior of the car, but also found brakes while waiting for parts.
The first problem to overcome was the exterior color. Most people hated the factory Bronzit beige metallic, and Chris went through stages of tolerating then loathing it. In the end, he decided it was so despised by the E30 community he'd be the only person with it, so the original paint remained.
The mods started with the removal of the aluminum bumpers, which were replaced by plastic bumpers from the '89-on facelifted E30. The front also got a Rieger front spoiler, splitter and side skirts.
On the rear, the facelift bumper wasn't to his liking, so he bought a bumper from Autovogue in Britain. Above it, he placed a BMW M Technic 2 bi-plane spoiler from Germany.
The M Technic 2 Sport package also included plastic exterior door panels and Chris decided to use these on his 325e. However, he didn't realize they'd require so much effort to align with his Rieger side skirts, requiring the skirts to be moved out almost 2".
Following lighting upgrades, Don Kuhlmey at Patrick BMW Collision in Schaumburg, IL painted the new parts. "Don really helped me and I couldn't have built the car without all the friends I made along the way," Chris told us.
The carbon parts came later, including a hood and a special set of mirrors. The latter were molded from a pair of Schnitzer mirrors and only four were ever produced.