emulajavi wrote great headlights choice!! with the black interior instead of that silver one your car came with (which I don’t know if it’s original or not)
About the wheels, perfect choice! Perfect fit and perfectly OEM!
Since the car is preLCI… do you plan on changing the taillights to the preLCI or are you keeping the LCI ones?
I don’t know if the chrome door handles are part of an exterior chrome package or something (I don’t think original exterior chrome was present on door handles; I think it only came on the kidneys, windows and trunk)…. I would paint door handles in body color.
Keep going with your great work!
Thank-you, emulajavi for your continued support with Project Astrid. I know you initially were worried about me putting some unusual headlights on the car, but trust me, the cars I’ve built are always well-thought. I share the headlights and the wheels within this post…grab the popcorn, friend, it’s a good one.
Yes, I do have the Pre-LCI taillights ordered through my friends at BMW Etobicoke…more to come on that in a future post.
The exterior chrome door handles are a factory item under 345A (Reference:
https://www.e38registry.org/s345a-chrome-line-interieur/). It came on L7s built prior to September 1998. While I’m not usually a fan of chrome, I think it suits the car nicely, and plan to keep them.
[header=UPDATE #4: And So, The Restoration Begins][/header][header=][/header][header=][/header][header=][/header]
Hey everyone and welcome back to my journal!
Before commencing with this update, I appreciate all of the love and support this journal has received from you all. It's truly special to connect with BMW enthusiasts globally. My professional occupation specializes in relationship building and sales commitments within the insurance space — an industry focused on trust. I love every opportunity I can get to talk to people, and share a common passion with such likeminded individuals.
So from me to you all, thank-you for making this journey so much more fulfilling and special. Like I've said many times, my caretaking of this car will primarily focus on showing it as much love as possible, and bringing people together...we are doing that every possible moment.
This update takes place from
December 2025 to July 2026.
[header=Let The Parts Roll In][/header]
Owning a car that's basically 30 years old is new territory for me. One important thing to share is I love the hunt of sourcing rare, discontinued/no longer available (NLA) parts. It's a bittersweet relationship that is frustrating and requires patience, while evermore satisfying and dopamine-pumping when you secure the part you were looking for!
Both my car collection, and the parts on those cars reflect that hunt at the highest caliber. With that being said, it is my pleasure to share some recent scores that I secured thanks to my friends
Gary Virdi who owns
Wheels N Motion located in British Columbia,
Ali who lives in Saudi Arabia,
Islam who lives in Kazakhstan,
Oliver Chevillot who owns
OCR Swiss in Switzerland,
Ryan W. who lives in Florida,
Rawson who lives in New Jersey, and the
global eBay community for hoarding these parts over the years.
Let's start with probably the rarest, most anticipated part for Project Astrid, my
Alpina B12 C88 Hardline Wheels.
An important detail to note is that there are
two Alpina B12s of this generation (the sedan being the E38 Alpina B12, and the coupé E31 Alpina B12), both of which had similar, yet different wheel designs.
RONAL manufactured the wheel designs for both the E31 and E38 Alpina B12.
The E38 Alpina B12 sedan featured the 20-inch “C95 Softlines,” denoted by their soft/rounded edging wheel design, and hidden valve stems located behind the center cap, as pictured:
The E38 Alpina B12 C95 Softlines primarily came in a 20x9+20 front and a 20x10+32 rear setup. Here’s a picture of the C95 Softlines on my buddy Vlad’s former L7, before he sold it to famous musician, Swizz Beatz, who you may also recall is married to one of my favourite artists, the incredible Alicia Keys:
On the other hand, the E31 Alpina B12 coupé featured the 18-inch “
Hardlines,” denoted by their hard/aggressive edging and deep dish wheel design, which also has the valve stems exposed, as pictured:
The E31 Alpina B12 C88 Hardlines primarily came in a
18x9+12 front and a
18x10.5+20 rear setup.
Of the two, I prefer the Hardlines, given that crazy dish the wheels have…although I dislike both wheels for the cleaning efforts I’m going to embark on with all these spokes…ceramic coating these immediately will be a gamechanger for vehicle washes.
Authentic wheels of this caliber are extremely hard to find. There were only
57 E31 Alpina B12s made globally, all of which sported these wheels. I was advised by the gentleman I purchased these wheels from,
Gary V., the owner of
Wheels N Motion, located in Surrey, B.C.,
that Alpina had RONAL make an extra 18 sets for parts only (I presume in the event that some of those E31 Alpina B12 owners damaged their highly sought after set).
While Gary is a global specialty wheels dealer, how did he get ahold of these holy grail wheels?
Gary is
semi-retired, and enjoys travelling the world searching for rare wheels like Z8 Alpina Dynamics. To him, it’s a full time hobby that’s spanned over 19 years that doesn’t feel like work…hence the “semi-retired” occupation I’ve given to Gary.
One day Gary could be in the heavily populated Los Angeles, while the next he could be travelling through the winding roads in the countryside of Glasgow; luckily, around September 26, 2023, these C88s arrived on Gary’s doorstep through a local trade with someone interested in another rare set of wheels he was selling. It took Gary 19 years to come across a set of these, and they are the rarest wheels he’s ever acquired. These wheels however, were in rough shape and required a full restoration; they were chrome-plated by the original owner, and over time, experienced cosmetic damage with the chrome peeling amongst other things…enjoy the pics:
Around October 04, 2023, Gary went on a 2,100km business road trip from Surrey, British Columbia, to Los Angeles, California, and took 8 wheels (3 Z8 20-inch wheels, 1 Porsche hollow spoke 18-inch wheel, and the 4 C88 wheels) with him to get professionally restored by the best chroming and reverse process facility in California.
Here are some after-photos while Gary was still in California of the C88s fully stripped and ready to be repainted:
Gary began the 2,100km journey back home to Surrey with all 8 wheels. He then took them to wheel specialist,
Nu-Brite Industries, to be professionally restored. He had brand new genuine Alpina center caps (with keys) that Nu-Brite used to paint-match the C88s to.
They turned out phenomenal and were quickly put into storage right after:
This 4,200km road trip was well worth it for Gary, because he could now sell an as close to new product that was already impossible to find, to global buyers through marketplaces like eBay. He decided to keep the freshly refinished wheels in his private collection for the time being.
Let’s fast forward a couple years. The day is Monday, December 29th, 2025, I still have not officially transacted for Craig’s L7, yet money is burning a hole in my pocket, and I’m looking to buy things for the car I do not own yet… “
MAKE IT MAKE SENSE!” my parents exclaim.
So I’m browsing eBay and searching things like “Schnitzer,” “E38 rare,” and eventually decide to search “Alpina E38.” I stumbled upon a listing for these Alpina wheels offered by Gary (whom I didn’t know at the time). Gary was initially seeking $15,350 for these wheels, but had a Boxing Day sale that was running for a few days past the Commonwealth holiday. These wheels drew tons of attention globally, with 4 serious buyers that made offers in that range. I reached out to Gary, shared my passion and caretakership with these wheels going to the best possible home that will enjoy them on a timeless E38 L7. We collectively negotiated to $13,700 shipped, and I anxiously awaited their arrival.
The wheels arrived safely and I exactly as described by Gary. An important note is that the Alpina wheels can very easily be an expensive paperweight if I ever lose this special key that is specific to the center caps. Gary recommended I make several copies of them to be safe:
A very special thank-you to him for giving me this magnificent opportunity to acquire these wheels and proudly sport them on the L7. Be sure to check out Gary’s Facebook page for “
Wheels N Motion” located in Surrey, British Columbia, along with his eBay page, for other quality and rare wheels.
I then decided to get the best tires from
Tire Rack for my prized gems, with one caveat: The tires had to be from Japan, as the car is from Japan.
I confidently turned to
Yokohama for my tire selection, and opted for the best tires I could get, albeit totally overkill.
I opted for
Yokohama A052s in the following specs:
- Fronts: A052 265/45/R18
- Rears: A052 275/40/R18
Their tread pattern especially was one of the main reasons why I chose this tire.
Enjoy some pics:
I then paid a visit to my friends at BMW Etobicoke and had
Dean@BMW Etobicoke install the tires on the Alpina Hardlines and they look incredible! Special thank-you to Dean for installing these flawlessly:
Following tire installation, I brought the wheels to my buddy
Tommy, owner of
TFK Fine Detailing. I asked Tommy to complete a
Rim Ceramic Coating.
He used
Ceramic Pro 9H and coated them twice for maximum layered protection. Ceramic Pro does not have a Tire Coating, so I performed a
Tire Ceramic Coating of
CARPRO CQuartz BlackOut 2.0.
They turned out incredibly and were ready to be transported back to BMW Etobicoke for the L7. Thanks again Tommy for doing an excellent job:
I safely brought the freshly coated wheels to BMW Etobicoke and decided to take Project Luna—my 2011 E92 M3 finished in Moonstone Metallic over Rust Brown—out of storage. While I was there, I had my friends at the dealership perform an oil change so I could enjoy the car sparingly throughout Summer ’26.
I was able to snap some pics of the Project Astrid and Project Luna together…it made me so happy taking these shots, please enjoy:
The next set of parts I received for Project Astrid was from my friend
Ali, who lives in Qatif, Saudi Arabia. Ali is most known for his passion hobby of acquiring and selling rare top-shelf JDM parts. His Instagram handle — which I’ve been following for awhile — is
@skyline_racing_rarity.
Over the years, Ali, along with my friend
Chris Ortez (
@jdmcainlab), have helped me acquire rare parts for my various builds, along with general memorabilia collectibles like these two
ARCxEndless Japan bomber jackets:
In addition to viewing these two’s Instagram pages, I frequent Facebook rare parts pages, eBay, and
Yahoo Auctions Japan (YAJ). Well in February 2026, I was on YAJ and stumbled upon an
ARC Combination Tank from a Nissan 350z Z33 platform that I’ll be modifying and retrofitting onto my 2008 E90 BMW M3 racecar build that I’ve named Project Sky.
I also was searching YAJ for E38 rare parts and found an E38 steering wheel with a debossed imprint saying, “
BMW Club of Japan.” The steering wheel colour is a light grey, which I will need to get reupholstered/dyed at some point, while maintaining that imprint.
I reached out to
Ali for his support in winning the auctions for these two separate items, which he confidently agreed to help me with.
We were successful at winning both (although we had a bidding war at 6am EST with <1hr. against multiple people for the 350z Combination Tank)!
Once he received both items from the respective Japanese sellers, Ali shipped everything to me in one package…I even filmed a Youtube video showcasing the parts unboxing:
People like Ali, who are well-experienced in the JDM auctions, along with being passionate for these rare and detailed parts, are those I wish to continue supporting and building relationships with.
Ali, thank-you everso kindly for helping me acquire both of these; you will forever be a part of these builds and a dear friend.
One small, yet important point was I messaged
Craig throughout the following month (March 2026) — who still owned the L7 at the time — and showed him the steering wheel I just acquired for my future ownership of his L7. He politely cautioned me to hold off on buying parts for the L7, as it needed a significant amount of work, which he felt could impact my decision of ultimately buying the car.
We further conversed about the issues, and I tried renegotiating the initially agreed price downward, to which Craig respectfully said, he rashly suggested the initial sale price that we mutually agreed to back in October 2025, especially since Vlad’s L7 sold for over $100k CAD (albeit his was in much better condition and of a rarer spec) but he’d honour that price (no negotiations) given that he’s a person of his word and that it would be going to a good home by an avid BMW collector in myself. Given all the memories created with his family in this car, he would not appreciate me fixing the car and selling it for a profit on BaT (as he could just do that), and wanted a first right of refusal on the car (which means he gets first dibs on it should I ever sell the car), which I graciously reassured him would not happen, as I keep everything I own, and that I would comply in writing with the first right of refusal. While Craig has only known me for a short period of time, it’s hard to accurately judge character. Having said that, in the short time I spent with him and his family at their home when I initially saw the L7, I feel I made a lasting impression and connection with his family and earned their trust and respect, which I take very seriously. I wholeheartedly respect Craig for honouring our deal; he is a person of his word, and someone I am eternally grateful for passing the torch and allowing me to be the future caretaker of this classic. My goal like I’ve mentioned is to restore the car, curate some of the rarest E38 parts for it, and create my own memories throughout the process, while remaining close to Craig and keeping him always a part of Project Astrid.
Having said that, we were both committed to seeing the deal through, and I continued the part purchasing as I neared the official pick up date of my soon-to-be L7.
I started joining E38 Facebook Groups, one of which being
E38 Empire, to find both rare and no longer available (NLA) parts. I stumbled upon some used
BMW Individual Door Sills that were removed from his friend’s LWB (iL) E38 in Russia. It was from a well-respected group member named
Islam Y., who lives in Almaty, Kazakhstan. Islam is known for offering unique E38 parts, given his network of owners with special-equipped E38s.
I got in touch with him for the door sills, to which he shared that only
1,300 cars globally were equipped with these.
We made the deal, and continued the conversation to discuss other parts I was looking for, one of which being a part that Craig has been trying to find for over 14 years!
I remember searching through some of Craig’s posts on Bimmerforums and seeing him mention in December 2021 that he had been searching for a
Lenco TV Unit for the rear extended center console, as the original owner from Japan swapped it for an aftermarket one:
Islam, through his network, was able to find an L7 owner in China that was willing to part with their Lenco TV, and was actually selling the entire extended center console unit. I mentioned I was only looking for the Lenco TV, to which the owner in China was OK to part with.
Here are some close-up shots of the Lenco TV in all its glory:
I asked Islam to ship both items together in an effort to minimize shipping costs. Both items from Islam’s respective contacts safely arrived to him, and were ready to be shipped to me.
Islam was such a pleasure to deal with; I can now see why he is so well-respected in the E38 community. He consistently maintained clear communication, shared numerous updates with photos of the progress, and was kind enough to include
Rakhat Kazakhstan chocolate bars — a confectionary company established in 1942 — for me and my parents…super delicious btw! Thank-you Islam for being a trusted and care-driven, passionate car enthusiast who I am glad to call a friend; you will always be a part of Project Astrid, and I am excited to secure more parts through you in the future for my L7.
Enjoy the photos:
The door sills being used are in OK shape. They are made of plastic, and have lots of swirls and oxidation.
The Lenco TV has some swirl marks on the screen.
I plan to have my buddy Tommy@TFK Fine Detailing perform a restoration on both parts to bring everything to as good of a condition as possible.
The next addition to Project Astrid was through a page I randomly stumbled upon while having just reactivated my social media car Instagram account
@screamer. In an effort to be more intentional with life while being less on my phone, I was enjoying the 6 months of being off social media since October 2025. Given how my Youtube channel was starting to take off, thanks to my detailing videos, and eventually having the L7 in my possession, I made the decision to reactivate @screamer. I was searching Instagram for E38 rare parts and found a page called
@o.c.r.swiss. (OCR standing for Oliver Chevillot Racing). The company is based in Switzerland, has been in business for several years, and specializes in sourcing BMW parts and restorations, especially for the E38 platform. I specifically found a post of a deadstock OEM Front Bumper and reached out to them to see if they still had it in stock. I reached out to them also for a NLA OEM Washer Reservoir Tank, which they also confirmed was available for purchase.
I also went through their story highlights (specifically their “
Parts OEM” highlight collection) and noticed they had
OEM Hydraulic Power Rear Trunk Close systems available, which I thought was pretty cool since my L7 doesn’t have this option.
Unfortunately, they received incorrect information from their contacts and did not have a deadstock OEM front bumper or washer reservoir tank available to purchase; only the hydraulic power trunk system was available. As disappointed as I was, I still had a very pleasant experience with Oliver’s team, and would gladly purchase through them again. They were extremely professional, patient, and made me feel special throughout their communication by doing little things like addressing me as, "Mr. Rei," and just over-communicating to make me feel fully informed. Thanks again,
Team OCR, for the support with this cool part!
The trunk system was packed by the team and headed out to Canada.
It safely arrived to me in mid-June 2026, and I am beyond stoked to have BMW Etobicoke install it.
Enjoy the pictures:
I plan to have all of these parts cleaned up, bolts zinc-plated, and latches sandblasted then powdercoated by my buddy
Ronan@RoRo Designs to look factory fresh.
I then continued to check the
E38 Empire Facebook group, and found a gentleman named
Ryan W., who I bought the following brand new parts from:
- Front Bumper Lower Ventilation Grille (51118125325) — This part is NLA
- Lower Left Engine Compartment Cover (51718150449)
Everything safely arrived exactly as described. Thanks again Ryan for giving me the opportunity to buy these parts for Project Astrid.
Enjoy the pictures:
Around the same time, I received a few parts from various eBay sellers globally, along with a part from
ACER Racing:
- BMW L7 Catalog (digital version here: https://www.e38registry.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/2000-L7-English.pdf)
- Used OEM Illuminated Interior Door Handles Left Side x2 (51218239475)
- Used OEM Illuminated Interior Door Handles Right Side x2 (51218239476)
- Brand New Bosch Xenon Left Headlight (63128376269)
- Brand New Bosch Xenon Right Headlight (63128376270)
- Brand New Left Amber Front Turn Signal (63138352485)
- Brand New Right Amber Front Turn Signal (63138352486)
- Left Front Hood Seal (51718159943)
- Right Front Hood Seal (51718159944)
- Front Bumper Mounting Left Side (51118125307)
- ACER Racing Titanium Lug Bolts M12x1.5x28
Enjoy the photos of this parts overhaul:
[header=Concluding Thoughts][/header]
I hope you all really enjoyed reading this lengthy journal update.
I thank-you all wholeheartedly for the continuous support with both my Youtube Channel and my journal here on M3Post.
Stay tuned for next update, lots of exciting things to come.
Featured on BIMMERPOST.com news
Sutho. I am glad you enjoyed the story of the car. Like my pal also named Alex 
omgzirra_exe mentioned above, having a left-hand drive (LHD) car in a country where vehicles are primarily right-hand driven, is both unique and seen as a status symbol.
