I sincerely hope that within the next 11 months, one of our M3âs pistons goes rocketing through the hood. Or we receive a service bill for a mysterious $2,000 âvalve adjustment.â Short of such calamities, itâs likely that Iâll continue to believe that I should buy this car when its year is up. I donât need a car, certainly not a $30,000 one, but the thought enters my mind every time I drive it. As much as I love the Ferrari, it does not generate the same response...
Ed Hellwig, Senior Editor, Inside Line @ 51.107 miles
desmolicious says:
01:05 PM, 01/18/08
Awright, see now if you do want to buy it at the end of the test period, you wanna make sure that it has as few miles as possible on it. Convince the other editors it's poop, so they don't want to drive it. I suggest pulling random fuses and damaging them (make sure you have spares for yourself) so when the others use it, things seem to be broken. Also pull off one of the coil caps. Make it seem like its missing on one cylinder. Then plug it in when you drive it, and have it in that condition when you volunteer to take it to the shop to get fixed. Then you'll get a report that they couldn't find anything wrong, which will annoy the other editors some more, which will lesten the likelehood of them wanting to drive it.
Or.. do none of the above and watch them rack of the wheel spinning miles on YOUR car...
;)
tmanz says:
01:35 PM, 01/18/08
Edmunds needs to host a ride and drive event. I can imagine myself in the Ferrari but the M3 doesn't creat such detailed daydreams. I guess we need to drive them :)
solid80 says:
02:21 PM, 01/18/08
Thank you edmunds! I was contemplating if I should buy a used m3 in the near future. Considering it is about 30k with average miles, to me it'll be a better buy than per say an Accord. Please continue to write more as it is very informative!
ewilfong says:
02:23 PM, 01/18/08
Desmolicious, that's classic! Might I add that Ed should work into conversations how he tinkers with German cars on the weekends and loves a challenge. That way the disappointing M3 will seem like the perfect "project" car at the end of the test period.
texases says:
02:56 PM, 01/18/08
Just make sure they repair any broken turn signals, horns, fuel injection systems, etc. before you buy! They're known to cheap out...and seem to have a poor track record with transmissions, too! And, judging by the mileage they get, they're leadfoots, so it'll be well-worn by then...
louiswei says:
03:17 PM, 01/18/08
I love how the 20-plus-year-old Ferrari 308 was better than the $25k Camry and now the 6-year-old M3 is better than the $30k Accord...
hondacura4 says:
03:21 PM, 01/18/08
"and seem to have a poor track record with transmissions"
I thought the bad transmissions were related to the regular (non SMG) automatics on non ///M cars? I know several M3 owners that have SMG and manual trannys and havent had any issues that I know of.
bennetpullen says:
04:20 PM, 01/18/08
I think texases was referring to Edmunds having a bad record with transmissions, not M3s.
texases says:
09:31 PM, 01/18/08
Yep, I'm not worried about the M3, I'm worried about Edmunds' drivers! only half kidding....
ahightower says:
10:02 PM, 01/18/08
Yeah really. Someone will scratch it up in a parking garage within a month.
daytona_500 says:
09:57 PM, 01/19/08
Don't say that! Thankfully it's been a while since we heard of any LT car getting damaged.
areitu says:
03:46 PM, 04/30/08
The $2000 valve adjustment can actually be done at home for a tenth of the price, some BMW tools and a lot of patience. There's a writeup with pictures, in a Word doc floating about somewhere that explains the procedure.
Unfortunately there isn't one for spontaneous crankcase ventilation.