[kiley_sean]

Did I mention it was a hot day? Well, we get back from the test drive and he had more questions about the window regulators. From that point on, I knew that he didn’t have a clue to the mechanical operation of automobiles.


He asked about the shaking in the steering wheel. I explained many, many times that the 18” wheels were all bent (CMT from DTMPower can attest as it was his shop that repaired one of them.) I never had shaking problems with the 17”s Fikse, but since I installed the 18”s up front (valves in the Fikse crapped the bed) it would shimmy at certain speeds, but then after awhile of driving, it would smoothen out (I suspect flat spot on the tires). Regardless, My new MR shakes at 80mph. It comes with the territory when you have a short ratio steering rack (Z3 rack in the hatch is shorter than the quick steering rack of the evo). Vibrations are amplified.


He seemed to not believe my explanation, so I offered to jack up the front tires and spin them to show him how bad they were warped. It was a hot, day!!!! So I jacked up the right side and spun the wheel. Even an old, one-eyed lady could see the wobble in that wheel. Add that to the fact that they were wrapped in old, low-profile tires, so there was a lot of feedback in the steering. I was basically trying to illustrate to him that the wheels were bent.


After watching the wobbly wheel go round-and-round, he said “That’s only a few millimeters….that’s not going to cause it to shake like that....there is something wrong with the frame” That was the comment that set me off. I explained many times that the car did not have a bent frame and that this wobbling steering was never a problem until recently.


Sooooo……while I was bent down on the ground, with sweat pouring down my face, and the tire iron in my hand I said, “Evan…you said you have a round trip ticket, right?”

Evan: “Yeah..Why?”

Kiley: “Because if you don’t believe what I am telling you, then you should walk away from this car. If you are not 100% confident, then don’t buy this car....I wouldn't. Fly home”

Evan: “Dude…don’t get offended because I am asking questions”

Me: “Well..I worked my azz off on this car, put a lot of money into it, and I really don’t appreciate someone inferring that I am hiding something. I don’t need this and I don’t have to sell the car “

Evan apologized, and said he still wanted the car and to not worry about it.


So that was that. We went inside, signed the title over, printed up a bill of sale, and then it came to his name. He had a different last name than his brother who sent the paypal payment. “I changed it”, he said. If anything was “shady” it was that part. The person sending the money didn’t have his last name..how convenient. I was starting to smell a scam, but took him at his word. **The Payment did clear two days after he left**

So we packed the car up with the rear interior, and extra parts. I apologized again that the car was not clean, and that if I had enough notice, it would have been thoroughly cleaned out and everything ready to go. He basically said “Don’t worry about it…it was short notice. I understand. The first thing I am going to do is clean this thing really good and fix all of the little quirks”. ***I guess he doesn’t remember that part when he was badmouthing me about how dirty it was***


Fast Forwarding a bit:

He drove it all the way to Wisconsin. Other than the rear driving lights going out on him, the engine ran “smooth” and “perfect” to him. He got home and all was well……for a little bit.

That following Friday or Saturday I received a frantic phone call from Evan. “Hey, Dude. Something is wrong with the car. I revved it up kind of high and all of a sudden I hear noise…kind of like a ticking noise. I limped it to a shop and they are looking at it. Do you know anything about this?” ***He had a tone that seemed to me like he was interrogating me.

Me: “Uhh…how high did you rev the engine? You might have over-revved it. I don’t know, dude, I just bolted that head on and everything else was straight. Did you overheat?"

"No", he said.

A couple of days later the mechanic dropped the tranny and found that the diaphragm of the pressure plate had exploded, sending the “fingers” all over the bell housing which subsequently cracked the bell housing.

That’s strange!! I installed that UUC 8.5lbs flywheel and Sachs E34 M5 clutch myself in Sept. It had roughly 7-8K miles on it and I never had a problem with it. Autox’s, drag racing….it clamped like a champ. I guarantee that if we could find the torn (from shrapnel) clutch disc that his shop replaced- it would show probably 75-80% of meat left on it.

You have to question the possibility, that this 19 year old, who has never owned a “fast” car, might have been playing a little hard to show off to his friends. He did brag to me about his top-end run and drifting/donuts he did in his 1.9L Z3. Look at the time frame. He got to Wisconsin, and of course all of his buddies were like “Hey give me a ride…let’s see what it can do”, etc. Next thing you know, Mr. “I can’t shift for ****” power-shifts the tranny by accident. Maybe he decided to try a “side-step” with the clutch.

Shoot....just the way he was shifting during the test drive was enough to destroy something. He was basically shifting without disengaging the clutch (power-shifting) while I was in the car....lord knows what he was doing back home.

That is the only thing I can fathom, because a simple slip launch will not destroy anything...Maybe glaze the flywheel up a bit, but that’s it. Now if he said the clutch was slipping three days after purchase, then I might have been sympathetic, but that was not the case.

Pointblank: He forced something while shifting and shattered the diaphragm. Not my problem, especially after he wrote a post on Bimmerforums about how crappy the interior looked just a day before (Evan, did you really think I wouldn’t run into your posts?)

To be continued VVVVV