roots

If you couldn't tell by the picture, I'm back in Ireland for a while. I haven't seen my family in about 3 years so this serves a double-purpose if you want to say that. I always knew I had to go back for family reasons, I just never thought I'd be staying for a lot longer.

It's nice to have a break from just Japanese cars all the time too, since there is a pretty big euro scene here. Also a pretty big change in scenery, and car style.... and lots of other things. But never mind that.
I'm gonna be staying with my cousin Conor for the next couple of weeks as we go to meets, drift days etc. He has a 2 car garage thats big enough for the both of us so he let me stay. He drives a yellow Altezza, which he has owned for 12 years so far I think. You might remember it from when I used to be in Side to Side, it was blue with a stickerbomb roof and trunk, absolutely slammed and abused. Since then its gotten a full TRD kit and some other things I will talk about later.

Now its time to talk about my purchase. I stayed away from Japanese cars and bought a 1993 BMW E36 325i for V$1,550 from Donedeal. BMW's are pretty cheap in Ireland for some reason. This E36 has a set of coilovers and a welded diff, apparently it was gonna be used as a track car but it never got started properly. I plan to track it too but keep it streetable because its my only car as of now.




I bought this E36 in Naas, Kildare which is about a 2 hour drive from Galway, which is where I'm currently living.
It looks to be on a set of newish springs, a welded diff and some shitty budget tires.
Body is in good enough condition for its age, no rust or major scratches because the last owner gave it a 2 stage paint restoration so it looks kinda shiny.
Engine is running good, no knocking and has never been overheated which is a good point because a lot of people boil BMW's here.




So after about half an hour I turned up at Conors place. First thing I seen pulling up was the bright Yellow Altezza... its kinda hard to miss tbh.
Snapped up a quick pic before heading inside and parking properly.




Conor's Altezza has been through a lot. It came from being a stickerbombed drift bitch to basically show-car condition.
It currently has a full TRD kit, 18" XXR 527's (popular on Altezza's here), custom exhaust made by Conor, Recaro semi-bucket seats, Driftworks steering wheel, TRD LSD, BC coils, bigger brakes, Haltech ECU, blue HID's, Garda scanner and yellow fogs. I've probably forgotten something but oh well.
Conor is the main organiser of Galway Cruises (meets), so he's pretty well known to the Gardaí. He's organising a meet pretty soon so we hope to have the 325i ready by then so he doesn't have to risk getting another court summoning, he's just back on the road after a 6 year license suspension for "reckless driving"....you can probably assume what that was.



So thats basically it for now.... took one last "beauty" pic of the 325 before heading out for the night and "celebrating"

(more like getting fawked)

Started to get dark anyway.
More tomorrow when we start working on it.

Money:

---

Plane ticket paid for by parents
BMW: -V$1,550
Fuel: -V$35
Chinese food: -V$6000
Parts: -V$600

weed: -V$20

Remaining: V$V$29,494