History
Out of all my past cars, this one I miss the most.
During the late 1980s, I remember watching the e30 M3 racing in Bathurst on TV. Every year I used to go to the motor show and even as a kid, used to get super excited about seeing the BMW stand - although I was let down on a few occasions because they were not there. One of the years that they were there, I fell in love with the 318is because to me it was the closest thing to the M3 which we could not buy in Australia. I promised myself that one day I would buy that car.
When I purchased this car it had only 56,000kms. The previous owner traded it at the local Mazda dealer in Ballarat on a Mazda 3 SP23. The previous owner of the car saw it later and told me how much they regretted selling the car.
When I was working in Melbourne and just did not have the time to service it myself, I had it serviced at Southbank BMW. When I came to pick it up, the service manager said to me that the mechanic has requested to speak to me - oh no! what was wrong??? Upstairs where the workshop is, there were a few mechanics around my car and when I went up to them, I found that there was nothing wrong - they were just keen to buy the car! I had to let them down that I was not ready.
I drove the car for many years and when I sold it, it had about 175,000kms on it. Very few things went wrong with the car and never let me down. I do recall replacing wheel bearings a lot - the rear ones were really hard to do.
I would like to see this car again so if you know the person who has it, let me know so I know the old girl is going well.
