Rare Rides Daily
Where Automotive Oddities Live.
Where Automotive Oddities Live.
You know that feeling when you spot something that should obviously exist, but doesn't? That's exactly what happened to Alex every time he looked at BMW's E46 range back in the early 2000s. There was the brilliant M3 coupe with its howling S54 engine, and there was the practical 330i Touring for families. But somehow, nobody at BMW thought to combine the two.
It seems mad when you think about it. The Germans love their fast estates. Audi had the RS4 Avant, Mercedes offered AMG versions of their wagons, yet BMW left this obvious gap in their lineup. The 330i Touring was decent enough, but it was missing all the good bits. No wide arches, no quad exhaust, and crucially, no proper M engine under the bonnet.
For most car enthusiasts, this would just be one of those "what if" conversations down the pub. Alex decided to do something about it.
Alex's issue was straightforward: he absolutely loved the E46 M3 but couldn't live with a coupe for daily duties. Personal preference, really, but when you're spending hours behind the wheel, these things matter. The M3 had everything he wanted from a performance car, just in the wrong body style.
His solution at the time was a rather special 330i Touring Individual in that lovely Techno Violet colour. This wasn't your average estate car either. It had already covered more than 200,000 miles and came with some proper modifications: Bilstein suspension, a Quaife limited-slip diff, and a quicker steering rack. Basically, someone had already started the job of making it more interesting.
For well over a year, this purple wagon served as Alex's trusty companion. It was practical, looked good, and handled better than most people expected. But every time he saw an M3 on the road, that little voice started up again. What if BMW had actually built what they should have built?
The turning point came when Alex found Britain's cheapest M3. An Imola Red example with serious miles on the clock and bodywork that had definitely seen better days. Most sensible buyers took one look and kept walking. Alex saw opportunity knocking.
Converting a 330i into a proper M3 isn't a weekend garage project. This needed people who understood what they were taking on, which led Alex to Reedish Motorsport down in Bristol. These weren't just any workshop. They grasped the scale of what this conversion actually meant.
Everything would need swapping. The entire drivetrain, obviously, but also suspension components, brake systems, interior bits, and a substantial amount of bodywork modification. The M3's wider track meant the arches needed extending, mounting points required strengthening, and even the boot floor had to be changed to fit the quad exhaust properly.
The tricky bit was making it look right. This couldn't end up looking like some bodged kit car. The goal was creating what BMW would have produced if they'd bothered. That meant getting obsessive about details most people would never notice, from how panels lined up to making sure the paint matched perfectly.
James at Reedish knew exactly what Alex was after. This was about engineering a proper solution, not just bolting bits together and hoping for the best.
These ambitious builds never go to plan, and Alex's project proved no exception. The original S54 engine was supposed to get a rebuild but ended up being beyond saving. That meant sourcing another engine, which added months to an already lengthy timeline.
Watching your daily driver stripped down to a bare shell takes nerves of steel. There were definitely moments when the car looked more like scrap metal than anything roadworthy. Friends probably questioned Alex's sanity. These are the points where normal people would cut their losses.
But Alex had committed to seeing this through. The conversion work was extensive: changing from facelift to pre-facelift styling, fitting BC Racing suspension, upgrading to EBC brakes, replacing bushes throughout with PowerFlex items, and ensuring every single component met proper M3 specification.
The bodywork transformation was equally involved. Once all the welding and fabrication was finished, everything had to go for paint in the Touring's original colour. The end result needed to look like it had come from Munich's factory floor, not a workshop in the West Country.
Two years is a long time to be without your main car. Plenty of opportunity for doubt to creep in. Had this whole thing been worth the hassle? Would the finished product justify all the expense and aggravation?
Those questions got answered the moment Alex saw what Reedish had created. James had already put a couple of hundred miles on the completed car, making sure everything worked as it should. The transformation was remarkable. This genuinely looked like something BMW's design team had always intended.
That first drive confirmed what the visual inspection suggested. This wasn't just a clever conversion job. It felt like a real M3 in every way that mattered. The steering had proper weight to it, the gearbox felt precise, and the whole thing delivered that engaging character which made the original such a legend.
Better still, it kept that understated quality which E46 fans appreciate. You could drive this thing on the motorway without drawing unwanted attention, but it would reward you when the road got interesting. Perfect daily driver material.
Llandow Circuit provided the ideal place to find out whether all this engineering effort had been worthwhile. After months of careful running-in, it was time to discover what the car could really do when pushed.
The circuit session proved everything Alex had hoped. That famous E46 chassis balance worked just as well in the Touring body, while those EBC brakes provided serious stopping power. Running 18-inch wheels all round in a square setup gave just the right combination of grip and adjustability.
What struck people watching was how natural everything looked. The E46's reputation for making drivers look good was clearly intact. Despite a few teething problems with the well-used gearbox, the overall package delivered exactly what you'd want from such an ambitious project.
You could see what this meant to Alex. This wasn't just about building something unique anymore. It was about proving that a vision which had consumed years of his life actually worked in practice.
Dreams don't come cheap, and Alex is pretty upfront about what this all cost. The final bill hit around £70,000, which is serious money by any measure. Put like that, you might question whether it made financial sense.
But that's missing the point completely. This was never about finding the cheapest way to go fast. It was about creating something personal, something that represented his idea of automotive perfection. You can't really put a price on that level of satisfaction.
The work continues too. There are interior upgrades planned, plus some spicier camshafts for a bit more power. That's how proper project cars work though. They're never really finished, just paused between improvements.
Looking at the completed car, it's actually hard to fathom why BMW never built this combination themselves. Everything works so well together. The proportions are spot-on, the stance looks factory-correct, and all the details flow naturally from the basic design.
Maybe that's the best praise you can give Reedish's work. They haven't just created some wild one-off custom job. They've engineered what feels like a missing piece from BMW's official range. Something that should have existed all along.
Alex ended up with something pretty special: M3 performance in a practical package that doesn't scream for attention. It's the car BMW should have offered but didn't.
More importantly, it proves that sometimes the best ideas come from enthusiasts rather than corporate marketing departments. When somebody really cares about getting something right, amazing things can happen.
The E46 M3 Touring finally exists. And it's every bit as good as we all hoped it would be.
Check out @Autoalex for the full story of this build and plenty more automotive adventures that'll make you question your own project car ideas.