TTAC Commentator JG sent us this link, and the following thought for the day:
I was thinking that the government should really be censoring these videos. If they can stand the test of time, in 50 years people will watch the videos and it will seem remarkable how utterly stupid some people are at this time. You probably don’t have time to watch this, but my favorite lines are @ 2:10: ”Whatever dumbass traded this in probably bought a piece of shit that’s far worse than this thing . . . some Kia or some crap . . . such a waste.”
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”Whatever dumbass traded this in probably bought a piece of shit that’s far worse than this thing . . . some Kia or some crap . . . such a waste.”
EPIC
And FAIL for the fool who traded a BMW for a POS.
Can’t see videos at work, but saw the XJ one, and yes, the way to “disable” the car is retarded.
The BMW proved it’s point. It wasn’t ready to die.
Bought, paid for, becoming more and more expensive to maintain and therefore beyond it’s useful life.
If it was so “valuable” it would be worth more than $4500! Geez. WTF?! Get over it people.
The previous owner probably wanted a smaller, fuel efficient car with a long warranty; worry free. Perfect for them. Leveraged another $10-$15k into the deal too.
Otherwise, the idiots in this video should be happy they aren’t out of job on Monday.
Not crying over this one. I’ve seen way too many BMW’s of this vintage with expensive problems at the auctions.
Now if that were a 1995 Volvo 940 Turbo in great shape… that would be a far different story.
The law says that you CAN trade in your car, not that you MUST trade in your car. If the owner didn’t think that he could get more than $4,500 for that car, then he is the one to blame.
these are all over europe and the uk
they are nothing more than old sedans
it’s no M5 is it?
Mr. Goodwrench becomes Mr. Kevorkian.
Of course, by the same kind of argument, if the smaller, more fuel efficient worry free car were really worth it, the previous owner would have been willing to trade it in without the program. In which case the money was just pure subsidy split between the buyer and seller.
No doubt sent to its fate by an Obama “Death Panel”.
NEXT…
It’s a shame, but is symbolic for the future; ICE’s will eventually be relegated to collector’s items; start your collection now.
Maybe someone can start a “charitable foundation” and run TV commercials showing these videos (much like the Humane Society shows dog and cat faces)…
Save The Clunkers – your donation will save these beautiful classics from the Scrap Heap of History – In cooperation with the Jay Leno Foundation… etc.
The Germans were the first to instate a “cash for clunkers” program, much to Bertel Schmitt’s pride.
I’m sure many more “nice” BMWs and Mercedes are being destroyed there.
People don’t go from semi-rare manual transmission BMWs to Kias. The Guy likely bought or leased, surprize, a new BMW.
A 328i would have qualified him for $3500, which is more than the trade in value of this car. A Lexus IS250 manual would also have qualified for $3500.
I’m just glad that this piece of crap has been destroyed so that some poor naive kid who actually works for his money (trust fund kids get new BMWs) doesn’t buy it and spend his youth getting raped on constant BMW repairs.
I traded a BMW 525ia from the similar era… Lets make a list of the car needed….
-Major Oil Leak(needed a quart a week)
-Differential Leak
-Needed a new radiator(Needed check/add coolant every other day)
-Auto transmission slip
-Tires
-Front suspension work (control arms, struts etc)
-Back suspension work (struts, who knows whatelse)
-Air conditioning needed an overhaul
-Heater barely could keep itself warm in winter
-Cassette player out of action
-Driver Power seat dead in awkward condition.
-Busted fog lights, dead wiring to one of the taillights.
Yes, My E34 ran like that in idle but the picture changed in other parts of the day. And, I did keep up with the maintainance, it just the frequency of the repair almost made me move to the poor house. So before I break your precious BMW hearts, I would like to say good riddance!! May my BMW burn in clunker hell!!
@ johnthacker
if the smaller, more fuel efficient worry free car were really worth it, the previous owner would have been willing to trade it in without the program.
That’s certainly one way to look at it. My guess would be the more likely scenario being that the owner was on the boundary of will-I/won’t-I get a new car, and the extra $$$ on the old car tipped them into a deal.
Hence the liberation of the extra purchase contribution $$$ and a multiplier on the clunker cash.
It’s about as pure a stimulus as you could hope for.
Look through the comments and sort them between the people who have experience with sixteen year-old BMW’s and those who only remember the C/D review they read back in ‘94.
BMW’s, especially the early V-8’s, do not age well. I’d bet my lunch money today that 540 could have devoured at least six grand in needed repairs – and after putting all of that money in it would have still been a money pit. You’ll never run out of expensive things to break or wear out on those cars.
For everyone pissing and moaning about these “classics” going to the crusher – put your money where your mouth is. Offer to buy one of these cars for $4500. I guarantee there’s no shortage of 90’s BMW, Audi, Volvo or (shudder) Jaguar owners in your area who’d love to help you start your collection.
Any takers?
They’ll look back and view it the way we now view book burning.
I wonder when we will have “Cash for Seniors”? They are classics but have become too expensive to maintain.
That was painfull to watch
I have the exact car in red over tan leather with about 110,000 on it. But lo and behold its sitting unregistered as it needs a couple things. Mainly a new rear diff which would make my wallet a lot lighter. It also needs an AC intervention and a new paint job.
The thing was my daily driver… but I was a stupid kid that bought the money pit. But I couldnt get myself to sell it, it just drove too well.
So it waits until I can afford to be its sugar daddy again.
And FAIL for the fool who traded a BMW for a POS.
Well, now I probably know how my 95 540i6 fared on the execution table.
But I’m driving no Kia krapkar. My new ride is a brand-spanking-new Jetta TDI Sportwagen with DSG and huge panoramic sunroof.
The old car? 200K on the clock. Running great, but burning oil. Seats worn, and NO ONE else liked sitting in them. Oh, and that rust on the lower door edges, like MOST E34s? The peeling clearcoat? The sagging headliner? Please. I’d have been lucky to get $2500. I was into that car for around ten grand total over two years, after buying it for an initial $3500. That’s doing almost all the work myself — just parts.
Did I mention the 540 liked the gas pump? I averaged 18.5 mpg. The TDI gets almost double, before it’s even broken in. It will get better.
I can carry all my stuff and then some. I can carry adults in the back seat. I have a warranty. It handles highway passing requirements just as well as the 540, no joke (if I wanted to pass anyone in 6th gear, forget it. 5th? Better. But the TDI stays in 6th and accelerates almost as fast).
If I lived in the back road twisties, maybe I’d miss the 540. Maybe.
With CFC and diesel-related tax breaks, if I really want another used BMW in a few years I can sell the TDI. With depreciation, interest, and other expenses factored in, I’d come away no worse than if I’d kept the 540, and probably better. After my first two weeks with the TDI, I’d be surprised if I ever sell it.
Without CFC, I would NEVER have bought ANY new car. But the program made it work for me. So I guess I’m a fool.
If the owner thought he got a good deal, what’s the problem?
Most 15+ year old cars are a mess, and BMW’s are no exception. If it’s not pristine, an M car, or otherwise rare it’s likely not worth $4500.
I have a ‘93 325is with 150k for the first person who’ll give me $4500!
Anyone?
Yeah, that’s what I thought….
@ dingram01
Just to clarify. You recently accessed C4C from a ‘96 540 into a Jetta TDI?
You would seem to be an ideal “conversion” (if I might be allowed to use the term). Thanks for your post.
You mean that little BMW got worse than 18 MPG.
Crush that little POS twice.
Sure, the BMW in question isn’t the greatest car (nicasil v8?), and who knows what the person bought; it’s the big picture that I’m trying to portray here. No one knows what the future holds, but chances are resources are going to become more and more scarce, the resources we now want to use to make someone a new car every 3 years. Waste is one thing but the reasoning behind C4C, saving the automakers and boosting the “economy” by spending a bunch of taxpayers dough, could turn out to be equally interesting looking back.
For now have this bizarre circus show, blowing up cars behind dealerships by holding the long pedal to the floorboards. (Obviously many disregard the 2000 rpm guideline in the interests of expediency.) What a bunch of Cavemen!
Wow, sad video. When it was new it was an amazing car. BUT… the 3.0L V-8 (and the 4.0L but less so…) were not that well engineered in their early days. I believe it was an issue with nikasil (sp?) cylinder liners. BMW ended up replacing quite a lot of these engines even after warranty. A car like this is really hard to turn around because of the exact reasons other posts have laid out. This car was probably a money pit for the owner.
Now, if you watch the other videos from the videographer you will find that he says over and over “F**king Obama”, etc. He should think of the wider view of the program and stop ranting about the following facts:
1. He still has a job. (though if I was his boss and saw any of these videos I would fire him)
2. Even though it is sad, most of the cars they “C4C’d” were less safe, less economical, and probably money pits.
3. The profits (even if slim) from the sales of the vehicles that replaced the C4C’d cars are keeping his dealer open… *see #1*
4. The USA is not the first country to enact a program like CARS… several EU countries, and the UK have also done them to surprising sales success.
I guess my rant on this is over for now. I think that I would be less harsh on this d-bag in the video if he just kept his rants on the fact that some of the cars were rare and interesting… not the politics.
If the UK (if it hasn’t already) adopted C4C, “Wheeler Dealers” would go off the air, as many of the cars they “shift” would qualify… ;-)
You act like this BMW was a brand new M3 or something like that, its a 16 year old car with what one can reasonably infer are sky high repiar bills and shitty gas milage, and who is to say that this person didn’t trade it for a new bmw?
Nothing like “saving the environment” by taking something servicable to someone else (either for spare parts or home mechanic who wants to invest the time) and purposely destroying it so that a new one has to be made (with much more environmental impact than running the old one).
Our govt. keeps creating bubbles with these incentives, creating false demand or taking future demand and accelerating it. Eventually, debts need to be paid, people run out of money, etc. and the bubble deflates. Brilliant to recover from the last popped bubble by making a new one. How about no incentives and let the market normalize.
it’s the big picture that I’m trying to portray here. No one knows what the future holds, but chances are resources are going to become more and more scarce, the resources we now want to use to make someone a new car every 3 years.
What resources are you speaking of? The metal in the cars will be recycled, with at least some of it winding up in another car, which is much more efficient than creating new steel and aluminum from ore.
The energy to make the new replacement car? That does take a lot of electricity, but not nearly as much as will be saved by replacing a car that gets 15mpg with one that gets 30mpg.
According to a study by the Argonne National Labratory, it takes 100 million BTU’s of energy to build a 3200 pound vehicle. Heavier cars require more energy and lighter cars use less, and their formula takes in the cost of hybrids.
A hundred million BTU’s sounds like a lot, but it’s not. That’s equal to the energy in 870 gallons of gasoline. So if you trade your 18mpg clunker for a car of equal weight, every gallon saved above 870 over the course of its life will cause a net energy savings by buying the new car.
But let’s look at a real world example. Dingram01 traded his ‘94 540i for a Jetta TDI wagon. The Jetta has a curb weight of 3230 pounds, so it’s almost perfectly lined up with the 100 million BTU manufacturing cost from the Argonne study. Ding’s getting a diesel, which has 139K BTU’s per gallon, and that means he only has to save 720 gallons of fuel to become energy neutral.
The EPA combined number for the 540i was 17mpg and the Jetta gets 35mpg combined. At 15,000 miles per year he’ll save 450 gallons of fuel every year. This means buying the Jetta will generate a net energy savings, including the energy to build it, before its second birthday. Over its expected 180,000 mile life, it will save over 900 million btu’s of energy.
Book Burning?
That is the attempted destruction of ideas, ideas that can change the hearts and minds of people. The destruction of some BMWs and other “collectables” is nothing like burning a book. There are cars that are works of art, and these would be a true loss if they were destroyed. A mass produced mid-90s BMW (whose owner no longer wants to pour money into it) is not one of these cars. Be upset if you want, but please, burning books and melting down used cars like this one are not similar.
Those are good numbers BHF, if that’s the whole picture I guess you’re right.
I’m guess I’m just old fashioned and hate seeing stuff go to waste, just as I believe everyone should work for their own money so they can buy the stuff they want. Thing is we’re all living in a subsidized society (roads, schools, etc…) so if I accept this I must accept that. Huh.
It’s an old, mass-produced machine. Why are you guys weeping and crying like old women over it?
If he replaced it with a Kia, good choice. Likely has great mileage, great warranty, and won’t randomly explode and leave you stranded for the next six years at the very least. That’s three things this old BMW cannot give you.
I too am old fashioned. If those are good numbers, then anybody with fundamental math skills could have figured it out.
And they could have figured out how to pay for it with their OWN DAMNED MONEY.
baldheadeddork,
Hah – don’t try and use logic on these people. I had this argument before and some people are convinced it takes $30,000 worth of energy to build a $20,000 car.
Those are good numbers BHF, if that’s the whole picture I guess you’re right. :
I’m guess I’m just old fashioned and hate seeing stuff go to waste, just as I believe everyone should work for their own money so they can buy the stuff they want.
Get off my lawn!
Thanks for the compliment. I put over 150K on a Kawasaki EX500, so I’m familiar with riding/driving until it turns to dust.
But that said, the very high majority of the cars traded in under C4C were not long for this world. The practical economics of owning a daily driver this old pretty brutal. You could get a couple of grand for trading in the car. If you have to put more than that into it to keep it running, it’s going to the crusher.
In all likelihood this BMW was one steering rack or water pump away from being scrapped if there was a C4C or not. And with a car this old, that next big repair bill is never far away.
About working for your own money…this isn’t buying someone a new car. You still have to put up three to five times as much as the C4C incentive.
Hah – don’t try and use logic on these people. I had this argument before and some people are convinced it takes $30,000 worth of energy to build a $20,000 car.
You can’t stop trying. Like Bruce said, you gotta kick at the darkness till it bleeds daylight.
Just to clarify. You recently accessed C4C from a ‘96 540 into a Jetta TDI?
You would seem to be an ideal “conversion” (if I might be allowed to use the term).
That’s right. Actually, a 95 540, as there were no 96s technically speaking.
Thruth is, I never could quite reconcile myself to the crummy gas mileage of either of my two E34s (the other was an 89 535i 5 speed), so leapfrogging into the Jetta has set my mind at ease on many fronts.
According to a study by the Argonne National Labratory, it takes 100 million BTU’s of energy to build a 3200 pound vehicle.
It’s not clear if that study includes ALL energy consumption, including mining raw materials, transporting them, refining and shipping them, shipping the car to final destination, etc. However I’d assume this additional energy to be minimal.
Regarding this particular car, I have one word: Nikasil.
Now if it didn’t have that problem, it undoubtedly had many more as these cars don’t age well. I know.. I owned one, and while I LOVED how it drove and looked, it was always needing repairs.. and my copy only had 80k miles on the clock.
Having said that, taxpayers have no business subsidizing the trade in value for this or any other car.
The EPA combined number for the 540i was 17mpg and the Jetta gets 35mpg combined. At 15,000 miles per year he’ll save 450 gallons of fuel every year. This means buying the Jetta will generate a net energy savings, including the energy to build it, before its second birthday. Over its expected 180,000 mile life, it will save over 900 million btu’s of energy.>
Uhh… news flash…. That BMW had 120,000 miles and everyone is talking about how useless and expensive it is. How do you think a VW (the company with several models on JD Power’s ‘least reliable’ list) will EVER make it to 180k miles? That poor VW will be LUCKY to make it to 90k before the owner trashes it because of the high repair costs. So your argument about its “180k life” is a bit exaggerated.
Around here VW TDI owners tend to hang on to their cars for a long time and boast about their durability.
I don’t think that the TDI will have much trouble staying on the road as long as a typical BMW would.
That poor VW will be LUCKY to make it to 90k before the owner trashes it because of the high repair costs.
Once the warranty expires on this TDI, I’ll simply get out my amply-stocked automotive tool chest and turn a few nuts and bolts myself. And/or use the vag.com diagnostic tool which permits me to do EVERYTHING my dealer does and more. TDI engines are diesels. DIESELS. You know, the stuff of 300,000 mile service life and counting?
Not like the BMW was a paragon of reliability according to every automotive survey in the known world. But since I know how to take care of my cars, it really never was a problem.
No matter how much repair work this car may eventually require, I can virtually guarantee you it’ll cost me less to run than someone’s Haiondzaru on which they pay out the nose for labor. I won’t be doing that.
I tend to believe that a lot of the ironclad reliability statistics Asian of cars has much to do with the obliviousness of their owners when it comes to problems. If you drive a sterile, boring, uninteresting car and you are yourself uninterested IN the car, you probably won’t notice that knocking sound, will you? A crappy-running Honda seems fine if you don’t know what crappy-running means.
Uhh… news flash…. That BMW had 120,000 miles and everyone is talking about how useless and expensive it is. How do you think a VW (the company with several models on JD Power’s ‘least reliable’ list) will EVER make it to 180k miles?
The example I was using was Dingram01’s and his 540 had 200,000 miles when he traded it under C4C for the Jetta.
About the future value of a Jetta and its 180K lifespan – unless it’s destroyed in a crash it is actually very likely that this car will be on the road with a number of owners for the next fifteen years. It takes a long time for any car to reach the point where one major repair costs more than the car is worth.
Also, there is a point about half way through the life of a car where the initial quality becomes much less significant. A twelve year-old Toyota can nickel and dime you to death as easily and quickly as a VW of the same age. At some point the cost for keeping almost any car in a given class on the road equals out.
Most of the qualifying rides are SUVs and pickup trucks. It’s hard to find a car with mileage bad enough to do a deal with C4C.
I have it on good authority that wheels, tires, stereos, and other goodies are being spirited out of these cars on the back lot. Look for ebay auctions for a lot of stuff.
A mechanic I know saw a truck come in with newish tires and alloy wheels and a few minutes later it was on the lift getting his treadbare steel wheels installed. Managers are looking the other way, just as long as the engine gets toasted and the car stays on the lot.
Steven Lang…if you don’t mind, wrt to Volvos, got any good ideas for ridding oneself of a large supply of surplus Volvo parts?
Back to the Bimmer…seems like an odd choice. Looking at trader.ca the owner should have been able to do better.
Baldhead -
I agree with your basic calculations, with one exception. If you look at CR’s tracking data for repairs over time (which they present), cars do not converge on the same repair rate after the passage of sufficient time. Rather, cars with a high repair rate from the get-go, continue to outpace those with lower rates. So, one shouldn’t buy a 10-year old Land Rover instead of a 10-year old Land Cruiser in the belief that both will require the same amount of repairs.
While it was sad to see the apparently pristine BMW in the video get destroyed, given that the vehicle appeared to have been well cared for, it’s reasonable to assume that the owner did a transaction that made financial sense to him, IOW, he would not be able to sell the car for more than the $4500 he got from the government.
That said, the logic of his action depends a lot on what he replaced the BMW with. If he replaced it with some P-O-S tin box on wheels from the Far East that gets more than 30 mpg, it might not have been such a smart deal. I say that because the comparisons on the posts above ascribe zero to the value difference between a BMW and a KIA or a Fit. This, obviously, is false. People pay more for a BMW than a Honda. The apples-to-apples comparison for this BMW owner would work only if he bought a similar “prestige” car, like another BMW or maybe one of the smaller Acuras, which would qualify for the program. As against the cost of keeping the old Beemer running, the smart buyer would figure in the added annual depreciation (much greater for a new car), the opportunity cost of the extra cash investment (it costs to borrow money for a new car) and the additional insurance premiums on the debit side of the ledger . . . to be netted against the fuel savings. Of course, you can buy a Honda to replace the BMW and save money . . . but you’re trading down (i.e. getting less value)!
Where the young get tripped up with buying high mileage prestige cars is that they assume that, once they’ve put some miles on and have depreciated, they’re cheaper to own. They’re never cheaper to own. But, if you accept the value proposition, (which new car buyers obviously accept), you get more from owning them.
If I owned the car in the picture (which appears to have good paint, no dents and, I assume, has a good interior), I might very well keep it. I don’t drive very many miles annually, so the fuel economy is not a big issue. And I’m driving a BMW! What’s a new 5-series go for across the lot . . . $45,000 — $50,000? How much does that puppy depreciat the first year I own it . . . 10%, 20%. $5,000-$10,000 buys a hell of a lot of repairs on the old car, which is essentially fully depreciated.
Sure, at some point parts availability becomes an issue, the interior gets ratty, the car gets so unreliable you can’t depend on it . . . and then it has to go.
I just sold a 1991 Volvo 740 with 140K miles to a repair shop to part out (combined EPA rating of 20 mpg; doesn’t qualify for CFC). The problem with the car? It wouldn’t pass emissions and needed a new cat converter. Dealer said that plus needed brake work on all 4 wheels would cost about $800. Otherwise, the car ran great and the body was good (the paint, however, was flaking off the horizontal surfaces, down to the primer). The interior, however, was a mess. My dad had given me this car in 2004, which I gave to my daughter to take to college in Virginia. She graduated 3 years ago and now lives in New York City. The only reason I kept the car after 2006 was that my youngest daughter (who just graduated high school) was driving it. I don’t trust the car, even repaired, to go all the way to Wisconsin, so I no longer need it. However, had she gone to college closer by, I probably would have fixed the car and let her use it.
Which is a very long way of making two points: (1) it is almost always cheaper to keep and maintain an old car than to buy a new one and (2) if you’re going to do cost comparisons, don’t compare the cost of keeping an old luxury car with the cost of buying a new economy car (unless, of course, for whatever reason, you’ve decided that a car to you is now going to be nothing more than a way of getting you from point A to point B).
BMWs become horrifically expensive to keep in good condition as they age. A 15 year old BMW in the hands of someone who has to pay for it’s repair and maintenance is a money pit. The person who ditched it was probably being entirely rational.
As far as the person who ditched it for $4500 being an idiot, what happened to the idea that people are free to choose what to do with their own stuff? As a normal trade-in the owner would have been lucky to get $1000 for the car. Manual transmission sedans are very, very hard to sell in the US.
I sometimes lust after BMWs, but after reading the posts about frequency of repair, I’ll happily hang onto my ten year old Accord. (It has a stick)
(1) it is almost always cheaper to keep and maintain an old car than to buy a new one
Unless that gov’t is adding $4,500 to the calculation. I could imagine someone trading a ‘95 Cherokee in for a Versa and coming out ahead at the end of the first year between gas savings and maintenance.
I am european.
This man is very stupid.
This was a good car. A very good car. More fuel efficient than a new american car
Why did he destroied that piece of artwork?
Why american buld dinosaurs like the Hummer H2?
I posted this on another thread, but it’s appropriate for this one, too.
One of the local Honda dealers has all of the cash-for-clunkers trade-ins lined up behind the dealership. It is two rows of vehicles that seem to stretch forever. (All of the vehicles were marked as cash-for-clunkers trade-ins, and therefore not for resale).
I would estimate that 90 percent of the vehicles were SUVs and pickups from the 1990s. No BMWs were to be found.
Some of the more interesting cash-for-clunkers trades:
1989 Mustang GT hatchback (very worn, but I still felt an urge to save it)
1989 Chrysler M-body Fifth Avenue (had a big driver’s door dent, and paint peeling from the roof, but was otherwise surprisingly clean)
1996 Saab 900 Turbo hatchback
2001 VW Passat wagon (in very good condition; surprised that it didn’t bring more than $4,500 on a trade)
2001 Honda Odyssey minivan (never thought of these as a gas guzzler)
2001 VW Passat wagon (in very good condition; surprised that it didn’t bring more than $4,500 on a trade)
Could be very high milage. If you were like me a few years ago putting 25k to 30k a year on a car – the ‘01 could have nearly 200k miles on it.
2001 VW Passat wagon (in very good condition; surprised that it didn’t bring more than $4,500 on a trade)
Could be very high milage. If you were like me a few years ago putting 25k to 30k a year on a car – the ‘01 could have nearly 200k miles on it.
I am American
This man is very smart
This was a bad car. A very bad car.Less fuel efficient than a new American car
Glad he destroyed that piece of S***
As for the Hummer? Built originally as a military vehicle to defend Europeans.