BMW E93?

Hades

Hades

Hades

Man of Honour
Joined
19 Oct 2002
Posts
29,842
Location
Surrey
Having just inherited a cheap hatchback as a workhorse my plans for next proper car don't require me to get a hatchback any longer.

My brother's wife has a leased 4 series hardtop convertible. It got me looking at cheaper alternatives and I see there is an earlier 3 series which is similar. I think this is the E93?

Any thoughts/opinions would be appreciated. Would this be a good or bad idea at £11k budget? Any particular engine to get or to avoid? Any good or bad years? Are they generally reliable? Any common issues to consider, etc? Thanks.
 
Thanks. I've done a bit more research and the normally aspirated straight six 330i seems to be the model to aim for. So I will see if I can find one to take a look at.
 
There are no E93 with the N52 in the UK. They are all N53.

Not sure I could be bothered with spending all week driving a free hatchback so i could have an old E93 as a weekend car mind, may as well just use the E93 all the time?
 
I had a look at the 330 and struggled to find one with the spec/or service history I wanted/expected and ended up with a facelift e92 325i, a few things however:
- 330s cost the same to run yet have more power, although I wouldn't by any means consider the 325 'slow'.
- 330s are rarer so be patient for a good one
- spec is important for resale if you don't plan to keep for long
- iDrive is a must - don't get talked out of it by people without! (try to go for MY09 or newer I think)
- be realistic with your mpg expectations (avg 19 - 22) London driving
- consider BMW warranty
- if you end up with 313's or MV4 alloys 1) query repairs/cracks 2) ditch the runflats - I replaced 255 30 19 with non-rft 255 35 19, a lot smoother and less prone to cracking.
 
Last edited:
E93 330i (2011) owner here for the past 4 years. I would recommend it as a great daily driver, as said 18-22 mpg for town/city driving. If you can afford to budget to change the run flats to non-flats if running on 19” rims as it’s much more comfortable/less jarring but is not an essential change immediately. Lovely car to drive, fairly good power and grip and feels solidly built. Xenon headlights are a must have. I didn’t go for a 335i as read of too many people having problems with the turbos.

Also take out the extended BMW comprehensive warranty (approx. £50 month with £100 excess per claim) because if anything does go wrong with the convertible roof it’s a shed load of cash to fix (I had one issue early on but fully covered otherwise would have cost north of £2k). If buying from BMW AUC you get 12 months automatically and may be able to negotiate this to up to 24 months but certainly not a given.

However, if I didn’t have kids I would probably have gone for a Z4.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom