1982 BMW 323i Baur

1982 BMW 323i Baur
Memorial Day 2010 First Drive 1982 323i BMW Baur Lapisblau M20 5 speed #4154 of 4595 made. The car was imported to California by Dietel Enterprises. I have since changed the wheels, installed the clear turn signal lenses, and I am in the process of installing a new cabriolet roof. I have to do something about those bumpers, too. :) I love this car! To see one of the reasons why, check my post "Score One For the Good Guys" on 6/26/2011.

Thursday, August 15, 2013

Bingo! Mystery Baur at the Vintage--- Nailed!

Bingo, boys and girls! We got him! :)

Thanks to the efforts of many, but most notably dumbclub (E21 bimmerforums) and our friend Jeff D (BMWtyro in E30 bimmerforums) ....

(see this thread for the story)
http://forums.bimmerforums.com/forum/showthread.php?2023855-Mystery-Baur-at-Vintage-at-the-Vineyards-2008
http://baurspotting.blogspot.com/2013/08/mystery-baur-two-baurs-at-vintage-at.html

..... we have now made contact with the owner of the Mystery Baur! And...guess what.... he owns not one, not two but... THREE Baurs!

I had a very nice chat yesterday afternoon with Richard C. of Autobahn Specialists in Hickory NC.   Jeff D, who lives nearby, made the initial phone contact, and set me up for a phone call to Richard. Thanks, Jeff!

Richard owns two E21 Baurs (including the one he drove to the Vintage at the Vineyards 2008 and 2009 that we have dubbed the 'Mystery Baur"), and one E30 TC2.  But that is hardly all!!  He also has 2 745i turbos, a 320i with a Century Turbo, two 3.0 CS and many more.  And not just bimmers, btw.

Richard seems like a real nice fella, btw, quite willing to share his info and his interest in cars and bimmers.  For all you boys and girls in the NC area, he may be someone to keep in mind:  Autobahn Specialists, Hickory NC.

Here is the info on the Baurs:  the Mystery Baur is a 1979 charcoal 323i with 40k on the odometer.   !!! This is the car that we have seen in the pics at the Vintage 2008 and 2009.  Richard brought the car there, and does occasionally drive the car on weekends in nice weather.










His second E21 Baur is one he has in his storage facility (he has built a garage to hold his cars!).  It has no drive train.  I asked if it was for sale as a parts car, perhaps, but he said he has had a plan to put another drive train into it... possibly a V8!  Woo hoo!  We will stay in touch to keep abreast of any progress with that project!

The third Baur is a 1985 E30, complete Euro drive train, with a special automatic transmission.  He gave me the whole designation of the tranny, but unfortunately I did not record it.  The problem with this car is that he does not have the title.  In NC that apparently is a problem.  He is undecided on what to do about this car.

So, the bottom line is that there are three Baurs here, but only one is actually registered, for now.  I will pursue this further.... my phone call occurred in the middle of the business day, so I did not want to take too much of his time.   I do not think he is online much, if at all, so I will perhaps need to correspond with him by regular snail mail.  I would love to get some pics, especially some pics of the Baur plate numbers, which we didn't even get to in our brief conversation today.

Relax, folks.  Have a little faith that we will get to all that in due time.

In the meantime, I need to acknowledge our debt of gratitude to all who contributed to the successful conclusion of this quest!    Great job, boys and girls!

Let us put this in perspective:  while doing 'other things', we happened to spot the pic of an unknown Baur at a show at the Vintage from 5 years ago.  We had no info on this car at all, other than a couple of other obscure pics of an unidentified Baur at a long past Vintage at the Vineyards.  So we put the word out to Baurspotters everywhere, and one thing leads to another.... and sure enough, within a few days:  Bingo! Another Baur --- no, 3 Baurs in this case!--- come in from the cold!

Thank you to all who contributed to another successful Baurspotting!

Stay tuned, more to come!




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