Hello Once Again

Hi Guys,

I thought I may never talk to any of you ever again. It feels great to be wrong!

So what happened to the original BEN? Did Gus run out of funding or time? I loved that place. There were a lot of good people with good ideas floating around. Quickly, for those who remember me, here's my car history from the past 6 years or so:

The e30 has taken the side stage for other daily drivers, but I still have her sitting outside, waiting for a thorough restoration. It probably was never a good idea to have it as a secondary car. She wants to be driven! With the various modifications on the car from my teenage years (and maybe early 20s), I didn't feel safe having it as a daily driver. I changed the seat mounting points and seat belt mounting bracket with custom designs to accommodate e36 m3 lightweight seats (which are anything but lightweight). On top of that, I was waiting for the day the fuel pump went out on me. Also, the fuel gauge was not working at that point, the AC system had been empty of refrigerant for years, and just a general sense of what might happen next? That led me to an awfully beige/bland/dull period of driving a Chevy Prizm (Toyota Corolla). It was a reliable 1.8L FWD automatic for nearly 4 years. Oh how I wish I had those years back. Now I'm in an e39, and if everything gets sorted out right, it should be a very enjoyable car, especially on long road trips.

It's nice to see some big names still around. Ferdinand and Jose are still here. Has anyone heard from Ove Kvam?

Give me a day or so to catch up on reading the board here, and you'll see more of my name splattered around the board.

Cheers,
Eric

Hi Eric and welcome home

We went through a couple of changes with servers etc. The last time some Russian gangsters hijacked the URL and we were down for a bit. Nobody could get through to Gus; I guess he just lost interest.
Anyway Dave G took the bulls by the horn and created this new BENN with updated software and a save server. Other than the occasional spam post, which gets taken care of very quickly; things are pretty regular again.

Once you had a read through the posts; you'll get a feel for who is still here and who is missing.

Ove moved up to a 318Ti and a new cupholder(who we believe he married). His interests seem to have shifted from BMW and maybe even cars
At any rate, we haven't seen him in several years.

Many of us have changed cars and even lost our E30s. I was forced to sell my iX a couple of years ago to pay my property taxes after the US banking fiasco killed my livelyhood.
I now drive a Toyota Echo which is not an E30 by any stretch of the imagination but it is a fun little car that sips gasoline like it was being rationed

Rick is into an E39 now and so are a couple of others.

Cab parked his E30 sometime before his family expanded and they have an E46 TXi. Last we heard he was driving a Mazda 3 as his commuter.

You will discover other changes in your reading.

Enjoy and it's good to see you back.

Hey Peter. Great to see you're still around as well. Sorry to hear about your car loss, amongst other things. I thought your hand crafted boats and other woodworking could help you get out of a jam, but this last one hit everyone hard. I picked up my first long-term job out of college about a month before Lehman went under. Talk about lucky timing. The Echo was also amongst the candidates for me, but they are pretty rare around here. At that time the Yaris was only a couple of years old, and was out of my price range.

Do you remember back at BEN you offered me a beer should I ever make it out to BC? Hopefully that is still on the table! The 2010 Olympics had me seriously considering a move to that area. The company I work for now does the ticketing for arenas in Abbotsford and Penticton. Unfortunately there is no reason to send me there for an on-site visit as only the IT guys travel to fix network bugs.

Forgive me if I get some stories and names mixed up as it's been a while.

Was Cab the guy from Massachusetts with a family of St. Bernard puppies? I think I was still around while he was looking at the e46.

And Ferdinand was the guy from either Ontario or Quebec that did the night rallies in the snow?

I can't imagine Ove losing interest in cars or auto-xing. I do remember him moving into a 318ti, as he said it was the only suitable replacement for the e30 as it shared the same rear suspension. Good for him if he settled down with Ms. Anonymous. And I bet his robot designs are painting Ferraris as we type.

I see Rick is around as well, also some posts from Jaffar (never knew his first name was Dan), Darren M stopped by (his black m3 was pristine), and I'm sure there are others that I haven't seen yet.

And this is where it ends for tonight. It's 1:17am, and work on short sleep is never fun.

It's great to be back

Quote
Eric Gomolka
Hey Peter. Great to see you're still around as well. Sorry to hear about your car loss, amongst other things. I thought your hand crafted boats and other woodworking could help you get out of a jam, but this last one hit everyone hard. I picked up my first long-term job out of college about a month before Lehman went under. Talk about lucky timing. The Echo was also amongst the candidates for me, but they are pretty rare around here. At that time the Yaris was only a couple of years old, and was out of my price range.

Do you remember back at BEN you offered me a beer should I ever make it out to BC? Hopefully that is still on the table! The 2010 Olympics had me seriously considering a move to that area. The company I work for now does the ticketing for arenas in Abbotsford and Penticton. Unfortunately there is no reason to send me there for an on-site visit as only the IT guys travel to fix network bugs.

Forgive me if I get some stories and names mixed up as it's been a while.

Was Cab the guy from Massachusetts with a family of St. Bernard puppies? I think I was still around while he was looking at the e46.

And Ferdinand was the guy from either Ontario or Quebec that did the night rallies in the snow?

I can't imagine Ove losing interest in cars or auto-xing. I do remember him moving into a 318ti, as he said it was the only suitable replacement for the e30 as it shared the same rear suspension. Good for him if he settled down with Ms. Anonymous. And I bet his robot designs are painting Ferraris as we type.

I see Rick is around as well, also some posts from Jaffar (never knew his first name was Dan), Darren M stopped by (his black m3 was pristine), and I'm sure there are others that I haven't seen yet.

And this is where it ends for tonight. It's 1:17am, and work on short sleep is never fun.

It's great to be back

Hi Eric,

The beer offer is always open

After the banking crash; I went to work in kitchen cabinet making. I spent two very financially stressful years at that(pay is only just above minimum wage) but I learned a lot and enjoyed the work.
It's a cyclical business and when the last one hit its summer slow period; I got laid off. But I got back into the hi tech electronics business without missing a day of work. Since then; I've managed to climb back out of debt and things are looking pretty good for 2013 as well.

Yep, that was Cab but I think he has just the one dog. It's a Burmese Mountain dog that sort of looks like a mini St Bernard. At last count they had two kids and 4 cars.

Ferdinand has graduated to the rally circuit. He is co-driver/navigator with a fellow by the name of Martin who runs a Nissan 200X. They are big time contenders; always duking it out with the leaders and often placing in the top3. Ferd has posted pics and videos of most of the rallys; so there is many hours of footage to watch .

We miss Ove but people often change their interests.

Rick is just wall paper here; always around; always ready with a story or advice...the evr present smiling face that folks see when they rediscover BENN

Jaffar doesn't post much but does try to make a visit at least once a year. His latest toy is a nice shiney new crotch rocket. Hope he hasn't killed himself yet

Darren M.; like yourself only recently found us again.

Seems like a lot of the old crowd has rediscovered BENN.

Hi Eric,

I remember your name from the old BENN, welcome back!


My 323i had to go years ago due to financial hardship, and things only got worse since then on that department...
My current car is an old beat up Mercedes-Benz w124 ex-German, ex-taxi and ex "God knows what else" that I bough from my uncle and gave me over 10 000km already. It still has the beige livery as a taxi, and I am not painting it soon, and will avoid at all cost to buy a newer car to be in debt for decades after...The previous car is still with me cause it's so beat up, nobody would buy it.

Ove is married and moved on to a BMW f20 that he races successfully as ever, I know that from facebook.

I guess the e30 is now an exotic antique, and few are used as daily drivers as when this forum was really busy...

Welcome back Eric!

Latest I heard about Ove is that he's driving a 116i.

Seems there is some nostalgia going on, several former members are dropping in lately.

This "Community forum" sometimes feels like our parent's, a place you know you can go back to anytime you want.

Or just the pub where your old friends go.