1997 BMW E36 M3

Dinan S3 Sedan

VIN #: EE11636

ENGINE 3.2-liter supercharged S52B32 inline six-cylinder

OUTPUT Approx. 375 hp 

TRANSMISSION 5-speed ZF manual

CURB WEIGHT 3175 lbs

TOP SPEED N/A

BUILD DATE  December 1996

COLOR  Arctic Silver

OWNER  Troy Stepp

OWNED SINCE  2002

LOCATION  Shady Shores, Texas

“I just started getting a hankering that I might like a little more power,” Troy Stepp says. 

A hankering seemed as good a reason as any when, 25 years ago, Stepp “tripped across an eBay ad” for a clean-looking supercharged Dinan sedan sitting on the eBay backlot of a Midwest muscle-car specialist.

In the world of BMW tuners, Dinan sits at the top. Steve Dinan’s eponymous firm began life specializing in suspension and turbochargers; by the 1990s, it had blossomed into a critical pillar of the BMW aftermarket. 

The ad sparked Stepp’s curiosity. He couldn’t afford Dinan’s E36 supercharger upgrade new, but the sale price on the Midwest car seemed attainable. And maybe, to the benzene-addled brain of a kart racer like Stepp, downright intelligent.

“It just looked like a pretty unadulterated, stock car from the outside, except the BBS wheels,” he says. “But gosh, it’s got that supercharger on it…”

So Stepp leaped on the car. Upon receiving his new sedan, he discovered brakes worn to metal-on-metal, shot bushings on every corner, and a front suspension so ravaged by rust, it looked like a write-off. 

Stepp viewed the vast reconditioning process as an opportunity to complete the car’s then-in-progress Dinan S3 “program,” a company-suggested list of modifications that had been kicked off with that supercharger. So he ordered up Dinan’s stage-three suspension: shocks, springs, sway bars, a strut bar. The engine was serviced to fix leaks, with Dinan software and fuel injectors. Stepp completed Dinan’s S3 work believing that someday, his reconditioned (and no longer) budget E36 M3 sedan would be worth the investment.

“This was me being partially ignorant,” Stepp laughs, “and apparently partially right.” 

As Stepp’s competitive days in karts wound down, he vowed to keep his clean E36 on the car-show circuit, far away from the track. Naturally, some draws are unavoidable, and Stepp now uses the car to instruct at driver’s education events for the BMW CCA’s Lone Star chapter.