German engineering was always considered to be top notch, but after working on the 1985 318i classic and seeing it evolve almost 30 years later we have a slightly different opinion. Its the adage of whether forms follows function or function follows form. I believe in this case it is the former. The 80’s 318i looks amazing even to this day. It is elegant yet sleek and racy. A car you can take to a formal banquet yet dash down the Santa Cruz mountains in. One thing that did peev me was the distributer cap. Now sufficed to say all parts of a car are important. Technically they all work harmoniously like all the instruments in an orchestra. Can it be said that a spark plug is more important then the piston? It pretty much needs both for the thing to chug along.
Yet there is something about the distributor cap that is synonymous with an orchestra conductor. It is responsible for the firing order of the spark plugs and is preferably tuned to fire off just right. Slightly to the left or right and the distributor cap provides a less then optimal performance. Now inside the distributer isn’t much on German Cars. It is just the cap and the rotor, unlike their Japanese counterpart who stuff the low and high voltage coils in as well. Yet the cap on the 318i BMW isn’t bolted on rather held in place by 2 small clips. It’s notched to sit in place but in our opinion easily bumped a few degrees non-the-less. Awww common, just bolt the thing on! It’s an uneasy feeling to know such a sleek automobile racing down the scenic 280 among the mountain slopes can so easily be off its optimal timing marks. Well let me tell you, they figured it out 30 years since then. The sexy and sporty 2012 models are up to German Spec — Goodentight.