The seller of today’s Nice Price or Crack Pipe Pandem-bodied 325it says it’s an awesome STANCE beauty. We’ll take a stance on its price, one way or another.
There are two types of country here in the U.S.. There’s the “country” for the well-heeled, exemplified by places like Up-State New York and California’s wine country, and then there’s the other kind of “country” where the bumpkins live.
Yesterday’s 1990 VW Golf Country Syncro was not necessarily priced for the former, but 78-percent of you felt you’d have to be the latter to pay its asking price, which dropped the high-riding Volkswagen in a Crack Pipe loss.
That Golf represented what was basically a factory custom—a regular car taken to some extreme by the people who knew it best and had access to a vast OEM parts bin. Consider or a moment, what if those same factory know-it-alls built a keenly desired custom edition of a car and then for some reason decided not to share it with the world? What then?
That was once the case with an M3 edition of the the E46 3-series Touring. BMW built such a car but then apparently decided that the mad mix of M3 performance and touring body usability was too much for mere mortals to experience. Besides that, the term “Sport-Utility” was already being appropriated by tall wagons so why bother?
Why bother indeed, and perhaps in answer to that question today we have this 2001 BMW 325it that has been turned into some sort of an M3 Touring. It’s also been fitted with a Pandem body kit, and then was unceremoniously dropped to the ground like the proverbial hot potato. Actually, I have no idea whether or not a ceremony was involved, I’m just spitballing here.
According to the ad the car started out as a plain jane 325it automatic, just like what you might expect to see a yuppie couple attempting to fit an Eames Chair into the back of while antiquing in the “country” of the well-to-do.
Since then it’s gotten M3-i-fied with that model’s front clip, mirrors and skirts, and apparently its S54 engine and ancillaries too. A Getrag five speed runs through a refreshed clutch and feeds a one-piece driveshaft to an M3 pumpkin in back. There’s also a good bit of M3 parts as well as aftermarket goodies in the suspension, chassis and brakes, however we don’t get to actually see any of that. Instead we get pictures of parts list.
I’m guessing popping the hood and snapping a shot of that hot six would have taken away one of the hipster angle shots in the ad, which is presented like it’s an episode of the old Batman TV show with the car canted in a number of the images in an action-implying slant.
The exterior is in Laguna Seca Blue, which bleeds into the interior by way of the dashboard and doorcard trim. Inside there you’ll undoubtedly notice that the seats are still 325 and not M3, however that the steering wheel has made the leap. The beer tap shift is a glaring nod to nonconformity and plays to the seller’s suggestion that this slammed wagon’s true calling is... to drift.
He suggests that, or just using the car to blow minds at stance-ins. Yes, the car is slammed, and the SSR Vienna wheels are so deep dished Chicagoans might start reflexively smelling pepperoni and cheese at the mere sight of them. Camber doesn’t look too insane however, and the wheels and tires fill the fat Pandem flares like Alison Brie fills out a sweater. Out back the bumper’s been cut and fitted with an aero tray so watch out when you back into a parking spot!
Mileage? Who knows? The quality of the build and the receipts for its work? That too igoes undivulged in the ad. In fact, I can’t even find a build thread for the car, which surprises the hell out of me as that’s almost de rigueur for custom beasts like this. The title at least is reported as clean.
Okay, let’s get one thing out of the way up front: you are pissed off at the way this car has been dropped. Hell, you might have your pantaloons in a pretzel over the Pandem body kit and the suspension compromising wheel spacers necessary to fill them. I don’t know, call it a hunch.
Ignoring your Internet ire for all things not the way you like them, what do you think about someone—someone else, let’s say—paying this custom BMW’s $32,500 asking price? Should they do that? Or, are you going to take a stance and recommend they not take this stance?
You decide!
Orange County CA Craigslist, however the car appears to be in Henderson NV, or go here if the ad should disappear.
H/T to Drivingimpaired for the hookup!
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