BMW car is on seventh generation of 3 Series to date, with 50% more curb weight and 50% to 400% more horsepower levels than we saw when the first 320i two-door sedans appeared at BMW USA. authorized dealer at the end of 1976. E21 . platform 320i is still on sale here until about to become an E30 legend replaced it for the 1984 model year and I found this 200k-mile example of a mid-range E21 in a self-catering Boneyard near Reno, Nevada.
Well, this car only hit over 200,000 miles in its lifetime. That’s pretty good for a Unstable times the machine is not built by Mercedes Benz.
Mt San Antonio College, known to students as “Sac Mountain,” is located in Southern California. Life in California and Nevada would account for this car’s lack of rust.
This car appears to have been purchased with the Luxus Touring Group option package, which includes a sunroof (considered a status symbol of power in 1980) and is priced at $1,545. That’s about $5,920 in 2022 dollars, or enough to buy about 50 grams of cocaine back then.
The sticker price on this car was $11,810, or about $45,230 today. One New Chevy Camaro Z28 only cost $7,121 that year.
While the E21 is available in a variety of models in Europe, from Deutschemark-pinching 315 all the way up to six cylinder 323iAmericans only have 320i.
All US-market E21s come with a fuel-injected 1.8-liter or 2.0-liter version of the M10 engine that powers the 1602s and the years 2002 in previous years. If this is the original engine, it’s a 101 hp 1.8. The car weighs about 2,300 pounds, only slightly more than New Mitsubishi Mirageso it’s pretty fast for the times despite barely hitting triple-digit horsepower.
Each successive generation of the 3 Series has become more luxurious and powerful as the decades have passed, but the E21 still has many of the characteristics of the lightweight 02 Series.
