The diesel BMW is one of the nicest of the Euro diesels, highly desireable. Unfortunatley it is a complete orphan when it comes to parts for the engine. It is dealer only, really pricey and not everything available. A great car for BMW collectors but not a daily driver , if anything breaks you are waiting months or more to get back on the road. Cheers Dan
There are a few online parts sources I have found so far for things like timing belts, seals etc. The engine was also used in 1984-1985 Lincoln Continental
My friend has to look into it for me and probably construct one good car from two that took a small hit on opposite sides.
http://parts.autopartsonlinecanada.com/parts/apocanada/parts.jsp?year=1986&make=BM&model=524-TD-001My friend even said it appears to use a normal bosch pump IE in use on old VW/volvo 6cyl so I might be able to send it to giles if needed for a rebuild...as long as it isn't 50% more do to the extra cylinders
j/k
Anyway this is again all just supposition and talk, my friend must procure the vehicles from his place of employment first.
If you look at the engine parts that are available you will find that most of them are soft parts ie gaskets and seals. The hard parts pistons, rings, head gaskets. valves , bearings, timing gears, oil pumps etc are not available or dealer only. The rest of the car is basicly a 5 series BMW so most everything is easy to get. But if you are counting on a 22yr old vehicle with a couple or three hundred Ks on it there is a good chance that you will be needing some engine parts sooner or later , that is where the problem lies. I wanted one in the worst way but after 6 months of looking only a couple of real beaters showed up, not very promising as a nice reliable daily driver for the wifey. I would have got unmarried in a hurry had I pursued that path. Cheers Dan
I guess that is true about the hard parts
I'll have to see what happens
Worst case I give up on it entirely. I really just wanted a second car that was a bit roomier than the Golf for some trips/when the golf is broken lol, then all these interesting options pop up.
hehehe if was unmarried I'd be even less able to afford anything at this point with 2 kids hahaha...don't want to go down that road!