There’s an argument currently in progress at crankandpiston between myself and Phil concerning this: a BMW E36 Cabriolet.

Now before you get the wrong idea, the argument doesn’t concern the car itself: timeless styling, ‘dolphin shape’, a 90s classic, and 190hp at the top (317hp with the M3 model). Marvellous, excellent, thank you very much.

No, the argument concerns the aftermarket modifications made to this particular example. To my mind, the style and presence of the E36 – which proved extremely successful in its day – is arguably stronger and thus more memorable than any other 3 Series variant. True, being the company car special at its height may have dinted its status a trifle, but all told this particular 3 Series was all it needed to be.

Then there’s Phil’s belief that the BBS alloys and lowered suspension morph this cabriolet from a standard albeit quality cruiser to a badass icon. ‘Presence’ becomes ‘attitude, and ‘timeless’ is now ‘unique’. Since the E36 was so popular, why have another factory-stock example tooling down the street? Why not chop, swap and drop? And he’s quite keen on the red too.

So here we are. At loggerheads. Well reasoned comments have been thrown back and forth and, when these have proven fruitless, petty name-calling hasn’t got the job done either.

Once again then, it comes down to the crankandpiston massive. Who would you side with? And what would you do with an E36 cabriolet?

Shots courtesy of VWVortox