325ix BAUR

[Baur]

Epoch 6

Baur TC2 316i

After having reached the car heaven on earth with my BMW 850 (I wanted to keep this car till the end of my life in those years), in the end I decided to sell the car, because the car so perfect. For city driving, I owned a Ford Fiesta – but this was a miserable car and did not make much joy.

A better car must be bought to have at least some fun in city driving.

So I thought which car in my car-life had made a real impression on me.

Beside the 2002ti no doubt, it was 3-series of BMW.

The choice between E21 and E30 was easy.

In my opinion the standard E21 is not really a safe car. Only when installing an ALPINA-suspension the car will be a safe car. So I considered the E30 which I had liked as a 323i in automatic form quite well. It should replace the Ford Fiesta for city driving. A 4-cylinder engine should be enough with my very short trips in and around the City.

A Cabriolet was not suitable as the repair cost on damages of the roof were quite high.

An on the other hand the car was standing in the company parking lot for the whole day out in the weather.

One day I looked around in Ebay and saw a lazur-blue metallic 91’ 316i Baur TC2 with hardtop. Especially the hardtop was the option which suited me well for my purposes.

Accessories were quite scarce with no electric windows and such. Thus I could expect that the repair cost will not be excessive with this car.

With a car of an age of 12 years no further loss of value could be reasonably expected.



The color lazurblue-metallic was ok and the original grey interior quite well kept. The car was not too distant and thus pick-up was done easily.

With exactly these wheels the car was shown in Ebay, however not sold with them.

On a rainy day I got my car. In order to transport the hardtop I quickly learnt my first Baur lesson. The canvas top has to be dismantled and stowed inside the car. The hardtop was installed easily. All work was done within an hour.

The car had two women-owners, the seller as the third ownder was the only male.

The condition of the car both optically and technically was pretty ok.

Well, as with every used I bought the complete program was done by my BMW dealer.

(For explanation, I did not have that much time and expertise to do mechanical or electrical work myself).

Braking fluids (for safety)

Undercoating (for rust precaution)

Change of all oils (engine, transmission and rear differential (for longevity of the mechanics)

Powerful stance with its styling 10 wheels; they sure look good with this color.

Because the Options were scarce, some had options for convenience had to be added:
Bordcomputer BC1
better BMW-loudspeaker
Radio Becker Mexico
Automatic antenna
Later I detected that it did have some desirable works-options:
Power steering
M-sport suspension
Leather steering whell
Adjustable headlights (which were not present any longer)
rev counter
Repairs up to now:
New hydraulic lifters 2 months afer buying the car (they were not really necessary, but I felt better)
Exhaust
Brake pipings


By chance I could buy a very good blue cloth sport seats arrangement nearby in the Black Forest.

One day the grey carpet will be changed against a blue one which is waiting in the garage already.

I heard from the seller of these new seats, that the seats came out of a Baur TC2 325iX which had been crashed in the Black Forest.

Up to this moment I did not know that a 4-wheel drive BMW Baur had been built. He guessed that only a little number - around 10 cars - had been built (now we know better and exactly which number).

The advandtage of my Baur 316i was, that I now had a car, where I could drive everywhere with without fearing nasty people scratching cars or damges in the supermarket lot.

I like the car. It is inexpensive in maintenance and you enjoy all of the Baur features.

Essentually you own a car with four personalities (winter - in hardtop form, spring – opening to top hardtop oder the back window, summer – opening both, autumn – start closing the back window).