Just bought a 1971 BMW 2800CS

[Paul Roupas]

I'm proud to say I am the new owner of a 1971 BMW 2800CS. 86,000 miles, 4 speed manual, silver exterior and blue interior. Body is very good shape with very minimal rust. Bought it for a great price from someone who was getting divorced and he owned it for 30 years! The bad news, it has a rebuilt tittle and doesn't currently run. Looking forward to bringing it back to life.

Here are some pics

(more pics under the e9 section of bimmerforums.com)

 

[Paul Roupas]

Here are some more pics

 

[Paul Roupas]

OK a few more

 

[30csl]

Looks like a nice genuine straight car. What are your plans for it?

 

[JohnHein]

Congrats Paul. I just bought a '71 2800 myself about 60 days ago. I am enjoying the journey and all the insights in this forum. Good Luck!

 

[bmw art car]

nice car

very nice actually...
make sure you take the valve cover off and tun the ca over by hand
and see if there is oil flow going on before you try any starting

 

[Paul Roupas]

Looks like a nice genuine straight car. What are your plans for it?

Thanks :-D

I'd love to fully restore it and make it look similar to Atan's Jabberjaw (looks so nice), but I'm not able to spend that kind of money at the moment. I'm going to see what's wrong with the car as it currently doesn't run. If the motor is working fine then I can move on, if its shot I'm going to replace it with a 3.5L and do a 5 speed conversion. I'm also going to go over the whole body and make sure I address all the rust on the car. The interior is last priority. Not sure if I should just get rid of the seats and replace them with modern racing seats or keep it original. My friend insists that I should strip it down and make it a batmobile, but I don't think that will happen.

Plans for this car is to be a street car with some balls Nothing too crazy, something that will be fun to drive and look nice. I'm a noobie when it comes to the E9 so I'm learning as much as I can about these beautiful cars.

I have a couple questions about these cars though. I noticed some E9's have two pairs of side marker lights in the front, some only have 1 pair. I also noticed some have the side mirror(s) are at the front of the door by the A pillar, and some have it further back by the window that rolls down. Any reason for these differences between cars?

 

[atan888]

Very nice. Congrats on the new car Paul.

 

[craterface]

marker lights

US vs euro cars. Yours looks like a US car like mine. US cars have the extra lights, which some owners remove for a cleaner look.

 

[GK-E30M3]

yes you scored a good one what you paid for it

 

[jmackro]

I noticed some E9's have two pairs of side marker lights in the front, some only have 1 pair. I also noticed some have the side mirror(s) are at the front of the door by the A pillar, and some have it further back by the window that rolls down. Any reason for these differences between cars?

As Craterface wrote, European-delivery e9's have their mirrors farther forward on the doors, and have fewer side lights. Many owners of US-delivery e9's make one or both of these modificatins. The side light thing is aesthetic. I found that once I began getting nearsighted, the position of the door mirrors on my US e9 just didn't work - they were too close to my left shoulder. Moving them forward (particularly the one on the driver's side) made a big difference.

Don't do the racing seat, batmobile thing. Stock e9 seats are comfortable and will hold in place for the level of cornering an e9 is capable of. The batmobile look may be OK for a track-only car, but if you plan on being seen in public, I'd think it would be sort of embarassing.