Looks clean, not keen on the rear spoiler and super skinny tyres but it looks a good example.
If history has no receipts for coil packs just change them all, normally eurocarparts or carparts4less with discount codes are very reasonable on coil packs, think I changed all six on mine for around £110. Also if it uses any oil change the air oil seperator again about £25 and easy to sort.
Your clunking will be backlash from the diff or worn diff bushes, I suspect the car is around 80-100k miles? If so the m-differential being clutch pack based is passed it best after 60k miles and can become clunky at lower speeds, emphasised more if an SMG car. One of those things to put up with ideally as a full diff rebuild will cost around £250-£400 and mean taking car off the road. Differential bushes cost a lot less and easy to do.
Enjoy the car, still one of the best M engines ever, I still love taking mine out and enjoying the S54 at full chat and some S6 gear shifts.
Different beast of course but a clunking on my old e46 turned out to be a torn rear floor, the diff carrier was moving when under load hence the clunk, I'd get the floor checked out prior to purchase.
Good point the M3's suffer from it quite badly most have cracks around 100k miles and a good MOT station will fail the car on this, but not all MOT stations will spot it or even think of checking.
Thanks! The floor was replaced / reinforced and resin injected by main dealer 12K Miles ago (£4k Total), of all the 3 cars I have driven, this only has a very tiny clunk when in reverse, it's silent otherwise..
I'm just going over things carefully now and I'm very fussy, something I hope owning an M3 will temper, because the immediate thing I noticed driving a few (all just over 80K Miles) and reading a lot of forums is that whilst they can be quite civilized and refined in some ways, they all seemed to be a little raw in many ways, but a lot of the minor quibbles do seem to be almost normal behavior.
After I've sorted out the geo/tracking/see if the lowering springs are not buggering anything up, I'll hopefully have the diagnostics lead/software so I can check out if it's complaining about anything, get anything easy sorted, then get it in to the garage for a thorough going over to see what else might need doing later on..
Overall the only niggly point I had with all 3 cars is that I think the gearboxes are for the most part very smooth and slick but I do know synchro wear is a feature as mileage creeps up and occasionally it can feel a bit notchy if you don't time the clutch just right since the CDV seems to introduce a bit of lag which I think you 'learn' over time.. (Not a problem for SMG!) My previous car, a Mazda CX-5, reknown for having a smooth mazda box was actually exactly the same, it has a dampener on the clutch and funnily was very notchy first to second, I had it in the dealers to check and only gave in and accepted it when I drove another..
The good news is, getting it for £8K with the boot floor/quiet vanos etc, I have £4K I've shoved in the bank for anything drastic.. clutch/2nd hand gearbox/HGF or the like..
One thing that has surprised me is that many aspects of ownership are fairly cheap..
The insurance for an old git like me is under £300 and only £60 more than my mazda..
Annual road tax is £290
Tyres are £120-£160 rear, £100-£140 front which is not ridiculous. Speaking of which, the tyres on there are 'budget'.. will be changing them at some point.
Even services are ridiculous.. oil services are between £170 and £220, Inspection I is circa £450-500 and Inspection II is circa £700 but that's every 50-60K Miles..
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