Site Update on Oct 2, 2008

[Cindy]

Guys and Gals,

Just wanted to let you know to check out the front page of DavidandMaddie.com when you have a chance. We have FINALLY gotten around to posting this incredible in-depth piece of work that Tony Gray put together on the Blue Moon BMW. He really knows his stuff and we are delighted he wanted to share this with all the fans.

It is one of the feature pieces on Maddie's HAVING FINE YET? section of the site davidandmaddie.com/havingfine.htm

The actual article with photos is found here. www.davidandmaddie.com/bmw635CSi.htm

Post here your comments about the article; Gray posts here and I know he would love to hear from you about it.

[honeyblondenoggin]

Oh, this is a very cool article. I'm not a car person, so I think a lot of the technical stuff is lost on me, but it was very interesting for me to learn about all the cars used in the series. Like the smell in the car David destroyed in the garage. Or the fact that it WASN'T the beemer in the pilot, where the dead guy is found in the back seat (I never really noticed, I just assumed it was the beemer). It would be so cool to get your hands on one of the show cars today off ebay or something.

Thanks to Tony Grey and all the folks at DavidandMaddie.com for bringing this to us!

[graycav56]

Thanks for the kind words Cindy. I just went to the post and gave it a quick read. Not too bad, if I do say so, although now I see some poor syntax. All in the rush to share with my fellow ML addicts.

Well, what do you want...I'm a product of the public school system!

I'd love to hear from others so I can improve the product.

[honeyblondenoggin]

Tony Grey/greycav...I get it now Nice work. You're one of those "ssed" words too

[graycav56]

Honeyblonde: Cindy shared with me an eBay post about 5 years old where a guy was selling what was reported to be the car used in the later episodes. I did a check on the VIN and the options matched what I would have suspected would have been found on the vehicle.

I am not sure what eventually happened to the car. I restore old vehicles as a hobby and would be interested in getting it and putting it back to showroom condition....although that cost would be significantly more than the car would ever be worth on resale. With the mileage and assumed condition the ML car would be worth somewhere in the 5K range, even considering its movie car heritage. It's not the Monkeymobile.

[lin212]

graycav ~

It seems that most, if not all, of the cars I see on the road today are "ci". Was the 635 circa 1985-86 the only "csi"? By the way, what did the "csi" mean?

[graycav56]

I always thought it meant "Cybill Shepherd Inside"

BMW has a wide variety of letters they place after the numbers and their usage is not always uniform.

In the old days they just used usually three digits to denote the model. With some exceptions (the 2002 and 3.0 for example) this is what they stuck with for most passenger car models in the past few decades. They added letters to designate special models or features from time to time.

The CSi roughly translates to Fuel Injected Sport Coupe. Earlier CS models had carburetors, thus no i. They haven't used the CSi designation since the 850CSi of the 1990's which never was a solid replacement for the 6 series.

I think they have gotten away from using CSi in recent years with the rise of the M designation they use on their high performance versions. They just use the series designation (3 or 5 or 6 or 7 for example) followed by a two digit number that usually represents the engine size in liters of displacement (28, 30, 40, etc). And they maintain a bit of tradition by throwing the i at the end, even though every car on the road now is fuel injected.

The new 3 series does not designate their cars differently if they are a sedan, coupe or the new hardtop convertible...they are all 328i or 335i. The previous E46 generation did have two separate designations for these such as 325i for the sedan, 325Ci for the coupe and cabrio. The earlier E36 was even more distinctive by using 328i for the sedan, 328is for the coupe and 328ic for the cabrio.

I do miss seeing CSi, even on the back of my current 2004 325Ci. It just ain't the same.

[rose35]

Wow thanks for the info on the BMW! I was a proud owner for a short while of the 1986 bmw, but mine was metallic blue color not grey. It ran great for the first couple months then started having problems , my mechanic would fix it and then boom something else and then i couldn't take the time out anymore to wait for it to be fixed and such all the time being mommy to twins i had to devote my time there. My mechanic actually bought i back from me and fixed it up good he said and was selling it again whe i moved out of state in May. I couldnt have brought it with me anyway, no room for it in driveway and money being tight to insure another car. I was devastated i couldn't keep it cause i sure felt like Maddie while driving in it and it made me so darn happy for the time i had it. I sure felt like i lived part of my dream. I have a pic of it and wish i could get it up on here to show you all but it's not on some digital thingy to do so. Just wanted to share my story

[Cindy]

Rose,

I too owned a Bimmer but mine was a 320i Canary Yellow in color and well before the Moonlighting days. I got mine in 1981 and it was a 1980 model. I loved that car with a passion and it turned on a dime. It was a five speed with a sun roof. Just the best driving, best manuvering car ever. I had it for about 6 years and when it started having mechanical problems reguarly....keeping it running got very expensive. So I traded it in for a Honda Civic in the mid to late 80's.

But I do know the glee of owning a BMW. They are great cars!!

[graycav56]

Ah, the 320i. That was the first Bimmer that I fell in love with as well. Classic lines and very easy to toss around. Not overly powerful (most BMWs these days aren't either) but fun to drive.

I just found an old photo of me leaning on my 86 316i that I used to tool around Germany in when I pulled some army duty there. I think I'll recreate that with my current 325Ci and compare/contrast. Of course I'm sure I don't look ANY different!

A Bimmerhead told me once that Japanese cars are designed to be repaired alongside the road by anybody with a swiss army knife, whereas German cars are designed to be maintained by factory certified technicians in spotless workshops using specially calibrated tools. I have completely torn down and rebuilt US cars....yet my Bimmer goes to the dealership for oil changes!

[ryangie97]

Wow, that was very interesting Graycav. Thank you!