And now for something different .....m535 CSI

[Chris71]

Many questions

Anyone ever owned one of these? Are they a practical everyday proposition? Can you still get hold of parts? Presume they're about the same size as a modern 3 series... what are they like to drive?

[mmm-five]

Never heard of that before and I thought all CS/CSI were coupés? i.e. 635csi, 850csi, M3cs

[Olf]

Diven't exist.

[Chris71]

Trust me it does - forerunner to the M5.

[Olf]

Chris71 said:

Trust me it does - forerunner to the M5.

Trust me it doesn't

M535i but nver a CSi

Whoops, judging by google I'm going to have to eat my words.

Edited by Olf on Friday 25th May 14:13

[Rochester BMW]

Never heard of it...

The M535i yes... but (as far as I know) theres never been a 5 series CSI...

It stands for Coupé Sports something.... so its only found of coupé's.. the M535i is still a nice car.. theres one in Readers car at the moment that lovely..

Edited by Rochester BMW on Friday 25th May 14:14

[Chris71]

Found some info.....

http://www.m535i.org/e28info.html

Ok, sorry - wrong name, I meant the M535i. Sure I'd seen one adverstised as a 535csi (not a '6 a '5)

Appologies for the confusion, back to the original question .......are they any good?

Edited by Chris71 on Friday 25th May 14:16

[Olf]

Maybe not

http://www.bmwmregistry.com/registry.php

There is some guy in internet land with m535csi@ as an email address but no technical details anywhere or picture.

Diven't exist.

[Olf]

Chris71 said:

Found some info.....

http://www.m535i.org/e28info.html

Ok, sorry - wrong name, I meant the M535i. Sure I'd seen one adverstised as a 535csi (not a '6 a '5)

Appologies for the confusion, back to the original question .......are they any good?

Edited by Chris71 on Friday 25th May 14:16

Not as good as the Coupe Sports version which is uber rare

Edited by Olf on Friday 25th May 14:19

[Chris71]

This appears to be a 2 door. Maybe they only made the csi as a competition car.



Anyway, back to the matter in hand, should I buy one over, say an E36 328i coupe?

[Rochester BMW]

Chris71 said:

This appears to be a 2 door. Maybe they only made the csi as a competition car.



Anyway, back to the matter in hand, should I buy one over, say an E36 328i coupe?

for an everyday commuting car??? No.

or maybe yes....

depends how much time you want to spend looking after it..?

both are good cars. it depends what you need it for

[bob1179]

I have one, I only bought it last week but have been after one for years! Before that I had an E28 525i and 520i.

They are fantastic motor cars, 218 bhp, the m30 engine makes a great noise when you put your foot down.

60 comes up in 7.4 seconds and onto 142 mph though it feels much faster. I have an '85 car. I certainly won't be getting rid of it anytime soon!

The one thing to look out for is rust. They do rust badly, especially round the jacking points, inner wings, sills, boot, bottom of the a-pillars, sunroof etc. The bodykit can hide plenty of it too.

Also look out for worn suspension bushes, under heavy breaking it can feel like you have warped front discs, but this is usually a sign that the front tie bar bushes are dead and the bottom of the struts are moving about under the weight of the car. The manuals are also much better to drive though the dogleg five speeder can be quite notchy. The engine must be well serviced too, especially regular coolant changes as they will start to overheat and you end up with head gasket failure.

They need looking after, but are well worth the effort!

The metric tyres cost a fortune too!

Here is a linky to my baby:

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

Edited by bob1179 on Friday 25th May 14:29

[Chris71]

That's a nice looking car Bob....

If I got one it'd have to face a daily commute and probably have to live outside too

[mmm-five]

I'd prefer the M5 of the same era - the M535i is just like a modern day 535 Sport in that it has the sports suspension and the sporty wheels, but only had a normal engine. The M5 (same size engine) had 286bhp and was about 1.5 seconds faster to 60 and limited to 155.

[Mustard]

mmm-five said:

I'd prefer the M5 of the same era - the M535i is just like a modern day 535 Sport in that it has the sports suspension and the sporty wheels, but only had a normal engine. The M5 (same size engine) had 286bhp and was about 1.5 seconds faster to 60 and limited to 155.

but 4 or 5 times the price, both great, an M5 is undoubtly an 80's Icon

[Chris71]

Yeah - from what I can tell an E28 M5 would be out of my price range and frankly I couldn't justfy spending the price of an M3 on one.

Thing is, I suspect something like an E36 328 or maybe even a non-evo M3 if I'm feeling rich would serve me better and only misses out on character.

[hugoagogo]

the M535 CSI is a special edition that comes with body parts in the boot and suspicious stains on the seats (only visible under UV light). It was built by special mechanics under laboratory 'clean room' conditions - except for their hair which was allowed to flap about freely

they also did an M535 CSI miami special edition, only available to gingers that came with free shades to be put on and taken off at random when making.........dramatic..... 'deep'...... statements.... with.... big.... pauses

Edited by hugoagogo on Friday 25th May 19:21

[bob1179]

Mustard said:

mmm-five said:

I'd prefer the M5 of the same era - the M535i is just like a modern day 535 Sport in that it has the sports suspension and the sporty wheels, but only had a normal engine. The M5 (same size engine) had 286bhp and was about 1.5 seconds faster to 60 and limited to 155.

but 4 or 5 times the price, both great, an M5 is undoubtly an 80's Icon

Plus they only built 187 UK cars! They are pretty thin on the ground nowadays and the few I've seen for sale (except for a minter at Munich Legends with 46k on the clock!) seem to have intergalactic mileages now and seem to need a lot of work.
The E28 M5 wasn't limited either, it had a top speed of around 156mph which was really down to the aerodynamics of the car. It was actually quicker than BMW's flagship M635csi due to the fact it was lighter, this was played down by BMW and they gave a slower 0-60 time in their brochures for the M5 than it had actually had to give the much more expensive M635 a bit more kudos.

Cheers Chris. I'm glad you like my car! I reckon an M535i will be OK for the daily commute as long as you are willing to put a lot more effort into maintenance. All the parts you would need are available through BMW main dealers or through people like GSF.

Now you just have to find a straight one...