Real or fake? - The Unofficial BMW M5 Messageboard (m5board.com)

Rich In UK · 3rd October 2000, 23:42

Hi,just wondering if a car that turned up at my work today was real or not? It was a UK registered E36 coupe in a dark metallic green, genuine Alpina 20 spoke alloys (wider at the rear)Alpina front spoiler and Alpina badge on the bootlid, but with no model number after. The interior had no plaque on the centre console and the clocks had no Alpina logo either. The other giveaway was the single exhaust tailpipe.
I asked the owner about it and he assured me it was genuine. He said it was based on a 325i, bored to 2.7 and with the speed limiter removed. He also said it had Bilstein suspension and mentioned something about a Porsche gearbox? Did Alpina produce such a model? I will be very interested to find out!

Thanks
Rich

Dirim · 5th October 2000, 00:05

Rich,

There is a difference between a car modified by Alpina or Alpina after market components and a car manufactured by Alpina. In the latter case the car would have a Alpina chassis number and registered under this name and not the BMW name (Alpina is a registered car manufacturer in Germany). There are a number of clues for an Alpina manufactured car (True Alpina?) which are mostly listed at the Unoffical Alpina Homepage http://www.users.wineasy.se/aahl/default.htm You already mentioned the lack of some of these clues like the Production Number Plaque, non Alpina dashboard, etc. which almost certainly suggest that you should look no further to call it a Alpina modified BMW (or a BMW modified with Alpina parts).

P.S. The lack of proper external model identification doesn't mean very much and sometimes left out intentionally or identified wrongly to keep the opposition guessing....

Ufuk Dirim

Erik · 9th October 2000, 21:52

Hi

First of all, all ( almost ) APLINA cars has big twin exhoust. Second they have red instruments and the ALPINA silver label inside with the production number.

An other thing is that on the E 36 they had first and 2,8 liter engine called B6 2.8 and then the B3 3.0 , B3 3.2 and now they have the B3 3.3 with 280 HP. So you where told that the engine was an 2.7 its not correct.