1989
When I was 18 I had just completed my freshman year of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign and joined the co-op program. Therefore from Jun - Dec of 1989 I was going to work as an engineering intern at Panduit in Tinley Park, Illinois, about a half hour from my home in Oak Lawn. As a surprise, my father decided to get me a used car to commute to my new job and my mother connected my Dad to a European car mechanic in her network of friends.
So in the summer of 1989, my Dad drove home a 1981 BMW 320i and presented it to me. My eyes just about shot out of my head! I was stunned that my father would find such a cool car and not bring home a sensible four door Honda. (He had turned me into a total car nut via our annual trips to the Chicago Auto Show where I would collect the brochures from every manufacturer and pour over them when I got home.) The 320i was also a 5-speed manual and I was grinning ear to ear as my father showed how to shift gears. I worshipped this car and did my best to take care of it despite the salted-road Chicago winters it went through. I eventually sold it in 1994, after 5 years of ownership, where rust was slowly winning the battle via a growing hole in the trunk and front left lower rocker panels.
I changed the oil on the car, upgraded the stereo system, and polished and waxed it but I didn’t know how to do much else. This was all pre-internet and despite checking out the Haynes manual for the car from the local library, I was mechanically lost. I recall many expensive repair bills via the local BMW/Mercedes dealership (I have no idea why I took a used BMW to the local stealership for repair). I do remember purchasing a set of proper tools from Craftsman to do super simple repair work. To this day, I feel this car always got the best of me. At that time, I was still going through my early engineering and home-mechanic-life-experience learning curve. I eventually earned a graduate degree in Mechanical Engineering and my first professional job was at the Ford Motor Company in car product engineering. However, back in 1989 I was lost and it took me another 20 years to build up my proper wrenching gear head skills. I always think about what it would be like to own this car today, 34 year later, with the know-how I have now. I won’t have to wonder too much longer.
Photographs above of my 1981 BMW 320i from 1990 in front of Assembly Hall at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign