Posted by Chris T. on April 28, 2005 at 13:45:42 from 66.183.136.25
Hi,
I'm the proud new owner of a 1979 BMW 528i. I had it brought up from CA (I'm in Vancouver Canada), as my father who lives down there picked it out(though of course using my cash!). It's a bit rougher around the edges that I had hoped, but I think its got potential.
In brief - it's a standard, stock save the wheels, 126k miles, very good interior shape (not perfect though) original paint, but it has a decent number of nicks, dings, scrapes etc..., so it really does need a new paint job and some very minor body work to get it looking very sharp.
It was a blast to drive for about a 1/2 hour, until it decided to die right on top of a major bridge up here -thankfully it wasn't rush hour! It seems it's a fuel feed issue - my mechanic wanted to change both fuel pumps 'just to be safe' (he says 'they' shut off when warm - is that typical?), and wanted way too much to do it. So I'm just going to have the main pump changed as that's definitely gone, and go from there.
I'm not a do-it-yourself type, but I am buying a repair manual, and I plan to learn as much as I can so I can at least do the simple jobs myself. So its sort of a new learning hobby.
Getting to my point, when in the shop I had it up on a hoist to check for rust. I was told by my old man and the PO 'no rust' though of course I didn't completely believe them, and I was right. The good news - some very light superficial rust here and there - most where paint was chipped away (the bottom edge of that metal strip behind the aux.lights, a few scratches that has some light rust grow, a little surface spot behind the front bumber - a little amount of very minor surface rust on an edge or two on the underside. I have to make it clear that this is going over it with a fine tooth comb, and its all extremly minor - All could be removed in very short order. No bubbles anywhere, and I've seen 1999 plus Japanese cars with more rust.
The towers all look 100% ok so far looking from both top and bottom - nothing in the truck, incl. spare tire well, nothing in the wheel wells, nothing in or around the sunroof, nothing in the engine bay, and I didn't notice anything around the windows or rear doors, though I have to check again to be sure. Overall, very clean.
Saying all this, I did find one spot which may be worrisome - ie rust growing from the inside out. I'm not sure how to describe the location - there are two chassis channels or 'raised bars' underneath the car that run from the front of the car to about the front seats. Both have what look to be oval drainage holes in them roughly under the where the seats are. The one on the passenger side is fine and clean, the driver's side drainage hole has some rust on it, but worse, there is about 3-4 inch line of rust (doesn't look too bad) running along the seam where the 'raised channel' meets the body floor. Now this to me means that some rust monkey is growing inside there, how much is hard to say. On the one hand, because its completely under the car, I could do nothing for years and it would never alter the cosmetic appearance of the vehicle. Of course though I want to fix it, but:
a) if this is part of the drainage system, could there be rust growing further up into the car?
b) is it worth fixing, or should I sell her off? Keep in mind that e12s are almost non-existant in BC - I see one maybe every three-four months. So with a good paint job, its almost a unique car - I don't even know there are any in the local chapter of the BMW Car Club of Canada. Those that do exist have rust, and some more rust, and keep in mind that even though we really don't have any snow, I only plan on driving mine in the summer/fall months.
Wow, that's way more typing than expected! But this is fairly serious - keep it and proceed and dump massive cash, or dump her based on that one fairly minor looking but potentially significant rust money.
I should be able to post pictures soon.
Take Care,
Chris
86 535i
79 528i