COO vs JOO

[marcopolo650]

Since we all are bimmer heads, and we appreciate the golden era of BMW unlike the rest of the flock that have gone astray, drank the kool-Aid and joined the riders (not drivers) that are looking to own the latest and the “greatest” iPads on wheels. We still want to experience that 💯driving engagement that puts a smile on our faces from ear to ear. There are no new Bimmers out there now (few M exceptions if any) that you would turn back to look at after walking away from just to appreciate what you have and the way it looks every time you look back at it or decide to get in your garage or driveway out of the blue just to take a peak to satisfy that inner child in you. It’s kind of pinching your cheeks to make sure you are not day dream and in fact you own something that was a dream from when you were younger when it debuted or just a blast from the past that you regreted selling to get into a newer model of the same series or went rogue and got into something completely different.
Now that the above is out of the way, let’s dive into the main topic of this thread and that is Cost Of Ownership vs Joy Of Ownership. Which direction the needle pints in this two sided gauge? If you own multiple Bimmers from that era then what are the common issues you faced, facing or you are going to face at sometime. As we are all aware with Bimmers, it’s not if but when 💩 will go wrong, that is why Bimmers have had bad reputation with common folks due to their lack of understanding that over engineered machines with stuffed engine compartment require preventative maintenance/TLC unlike a 4 banger Japanese lawnmower type of engine driven cars that can go on and on and will require maintenance post component failure.
My common maintenance tickets if we don’t want to be harsh and call them issues or unnecessary and could have be avoided by BMW if they would of copied the Japanese are oil leaks like the valve cover gasket, oil filter housing gasket and oil pan gasket and finicky coolant systems on all of them specially in the E46 with stories of expansion tanks exploding due to engine heat cycles with no exceptions. The symptoms show up esrlier on late 90s early 2000s models than the older generation, specially the ones with stuffed engine bays like the E36, E46, E39, E53,..etc.
my stable has the following golden era models (won’t include the ones I sold for now. I can include them later if you’d like)

92 E34 525i w/4-speed autoTragic
01 E38 740iL w/ Sport Package (yes they did offer it. Less option for more money than the i version)
04 E46 330CI vert ZHP w/6MT (all around well balance and put together bimmer)
06 E86 Z4 Coupe 3.0si w/ autoTragic unfortunately.

Let us see what you have and what you have done maintenance wise so far. I personally have spent over $10K on a certain model. I have spent in the neighborhood of $5K on couple of the above models.