CraigslistThe seller of today's Nice Price or No Dice BMW is its second owner, the first having bought the car in Canada. A non-U.S. model, this 320i is now somehow registered in California, the most difficult place to license a foreign car. Let's see what that, and its price, is all about.Do you know the connection between Chevy's Corvette and that Pyrex measuring cup you likely have in your kitchen cabinet? Both Pyrex and the Corvette's fiberglass body were developments from the labs at Corning Glass. Corning introduced Pyrex, a form of glass that was thermally and chemically strong, in 1915. Fiberglass, initially developed as insulation in the 1930s, was refined by Corning subsidiary Owens Corning into an easily moldable yet strong material for boat hulls and Chevy sports car bodies.Not only was the 1986 Chevy Corvette convertible we looked at last Friday bodied in fiberglass (or fiberglass for you cheeky Brits), but the rear wing and rocker extensions that had been added after the car left Bowling Green were likely too. Many of you took issue with those add-ons and the car's crazy color-matched wheels in the comments. The personalizations made the car stand out, but severely limited its broader appeal, even when the $8,995 asking price was factored in. While normally, that would have been given an enthusiastic pass, on our custom Corvette, it resulted in a 64% 'No Dice' loss.AdvertisementAdvertisementRead more: These Are The Cars That Let You Down The HardestYour number's upCraigslistConsidering how outlandish and audacious last Friday's Corvette was, perhaps we need a more palatable amuse-bouche to start our week. Of course, there has to be some "it" factor to make a car for sale worth our time, and while today's 2005 BMW 320i looks like pretty much every other E46 on the road here in the U.S., its engine and badge make it unique.According to the seller, they are the car's second owner, with the first having bought the car in our neighbor to the North, Canada. BMW, in fact, never sold this model—the E46 320i—in the U.S., offering the 325i as the entry model for baseball- and apple-pie-loving bald eagle riders.That's probably a good thing since the model nomenclature is a bit of a ruse. Any and all 320s sold in the U.S. had been four-cylinder cars. This E46, however, sports an M54 straight six under its hood, and that's 2.2 liters, not 2.0 as the badge on the car's butt implies. As fitted on Canadian and other market cars, the 320i's mill makes 168 horsepower and 155 pound-feet of torque, well off the numbers of the U.S. 325i, but punching significantly above the weight of the four-pot 318i. Transmission duties on our car are handled by an automatic, but that slusher does have a manual mode, so all is not lost in that situation.Easy commuter milesCraigslistSo this is a Canadian car that has somehow made its way all the way down to Southern California, where it now calls home and, puzzlingly, carries a clean California title and current registration tags. How a non-California-spec'd car newer than 1976 can be registered and smogged in the state is above my pay grade.AdvertisementAdvertisementRegardless, it's here and seems to have been invited to stay and make itself comfortable. According to the ad, the car has 150,000 "commuter" miles on the clock and has no mechanical issues whatsoever, save for a brake pad warning light on the dash that the seller speculates is due to a bad sensor. The pads themselves have been recently replaced. An oil change was also done just 500 miles ago. The E46 is one of the last of the truly analog BMWs, and, save for some cooling system gremlins, has a solid reputation. These are also pretty good-looking cars, pre-dating the Bangle-ification of BMW's lineup.Blending inCraigslistThese are also pretty ubiquitous, meaning that this Canadian ex-pat will blend in without trouble here in the States. According to the ad, the Alpine White paint is in decent shape, but it does show some dings and dents commensurate with having survived two decades in the wild. The most notable of those dents is the pushed-in hood, which has caused the twin kidney grilles to go missing. It looks like it got punched in the nose after ill-advisedly retorting to the wrong person: "Why don't you use your turn signals?" How much that would cost to repair, or even whether it is necessary, on a car like this is open to debate.CraigslistThere appear to be no noticeable wear-and-tear issues in the cabin, although it is laudably parsimonious in its equipment. There are no sports seats, no M badges, or even automatic climate control in here. There are power windows and locks, and steering-wheel controls for the stereo and cruise control, so it's not like riding around in Fred Flintstone's rock-and-roller. All of the vinyl upholstery looks to be in solid shape, except for the driver's seat bolster. That has a tear along the seam and could stand some glue or seam sealer to prevent further tearing.Cheap seats, eh?CraigslistOkay, so far we've discovered that this car looks like every other E46 on the road, but is in fact an interloper from the land of the Loonie. That makes it a bit of a puzzler, as it's not an up-market car that might make its forbidden fruitiness uniquely appealing. What we have to decide is whether its $2,900 asking price amps up this bargain-basement model's desirability.AdvertisementAdvertisementWhat do you say? Is $2,900 a great deal for a weird-but-not-too-weird E46? Or do the car's demerits (low-end engine, punch in the nose, etc.) mean that wouldn't be a deal even if that were in Canadian dollars?You decide!Los Angeles, California, Craigslist, or go here if the ad disappears.Hat tip to James Gryphon. for the hookup!Help me out with Nice Price or No Dice. Hit me up at [email protected] and send a fixed-price tip. Remember to include your commenter handle.Want more like this? Join the Jalopnik newsletter to get the latest auto news sent straight to your inbox, and follow us or add us as a preferred search source on Google.Read the original article on Jalopnik.
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