Car S.O.S E30 ALPINA

[nealpina]

"Sytner of Nottingham do have all the information". Not correct, they may have some information. Reason being back in the day the job card was a white cardboard sheet and hand written. These were kept in a cardboard box, over the years some people it is alleged were allowed to look through them as no appointed person was looking after them or had the time to check queries.

Consequently a number of documents are "missing", there may be a sporadic number of people with information that either worked there or have collated information, but it is by no means a given that specific information for every Sytner ALPINA exists.

How do I know all this? A pervious ALPINA Brand Manager explained and showed me the box with the documents in when I was looking for some specific information which I did not find.

Oh, ok.

I seem to remember years ago with E30 and possibly B10 3.5 owners needed to pay a small fee to Sytner of Nottingham to verify their car. I either assumed, read, or someone said, that the bare minimum on their confirmation letter will be matching BMW chassis and engine numbers. However if some of the job cards are now missing this is no longer true. It is a shame that this was never filed electronically or sent to Buchole

[bss325i]

Pre 1995 sytner was the sole distributor along with John Clark London & croyden to build Alpina under licence

Sytner Nottingham
L&C (Croydon and Tunbridge wells)
John Clarke Aberdeen

They were the three Franchised BMW dealers in the UK that were official Alpina retailers in the 1980's but I have seen other BMW dealers that have sold Alpinas new (Bluebell Wilmslow, Cronk of Chipstead for example) after being converted by Nottingham.

Out of the three official dealers, as far as I know all the major conversions such as C2 2.7's, B9 3.5's, B10 3.5's were done at Nottingham where as some of the smaller ones B3.5, C2.5, Alpina sport pack and Alpina 3 were also completed by the other two official dealers.

One of my old Aftersales manages Graham Booth was in the late 80's, the contact for Alpinas at L&C Turnbridge wells where the did some of the aforementioned smaller conversions.

[bss325i]

"Sytner of Nottingham do have all the information". Not correct, they may have some information. Reason being back in the day the job card was a white cardboard sheet and hand written. These were kept in a cardboard box, over the years some people it is alleged were allowed to look through them as no appointed person was looking after them or had the time to check queries.

Consequently a number of documents are "missing", there may be a sporadic number of people with information that either worked there or have collated information, but it is by no means a given that specific information for every Sytner ALPINA exists.

How do I know all this? A pervious ALPINA Brand Manager explained and showed me the box with the documents in when I was looking for some specific information which I did not find.

Oh, ok.

I seem to remember years ago with E30 and possibly B10 3.5 owners needed to pay a small fee to Sytner of Nottingham to verify their car. I either assumed, read, or someone said, that the bare minimum on their confirmation letter will be matching BMW chassis and engine numbers. However if some of the job cards are now missing this is no longer true. It is a shame that this was never filed electronically or sent to Buchole

Incredibly, a few years back Sytner Nottingham were about to dispose of all the old paper records until the majority of them were rescued by someone in the community.

[Norrie]

Yes, they were rescued by someone, but it is not reasonable for their information to be revealed as they may be swamped by persons asking for information and they are not holding the information for commercial reasons.

[JohnW]

I wonder how many records there are and the physical size of the archives “someone” is holding.

If they aren’t held for commercial reasons then perhaps a few volunteers might be allowed to scan and index them? The data can be lifted these days with the right software.
Then if they are forum members it could done as a forum service for Alpina owners, a small fee is charged for the scanned information? Never as much as the service charged by Sytner or Alpina themselves in Germany. It would generate an income for the forum and preserve the records practically forever. The register could even offer a certificate of authenticity.

Total must be in the thousands, but certainly not over 50k.

Sorry I’m racing ahead with my business head on now and probably it’s not that simple to do legally perhaps without permissions. A slowly shrinking market by its nature, but surely that would stimulate the Alpina classic market even more for Sytner, Alpina themselves (when they begin to offer their classic service), help the owners and the Register/Forum too?

[Norrie]

I am unsure if the records are officially "handed over", I don't mean they were taken without permission, but if they were just "given" then any commercial use of them, not matter how justified the cause may present a whole can of worms.

In all probability someone at Sytner just got too busy to answer questions from enthusiasts many who were never intending spending a penny with them and probably not buying a vehicle from them? Therefore (just speculation) the easier route was or is "sorry we not longer hold any of those records".

When ALPINA as we know it disappears into the world of BMW and every dealer that fancies selling an ALPINA has a B7 or XB7 in their showroom any previous history or contacts will not doubt be even harder to find? Most main dealership dont know an ALPINA from a fitted kitchen so who knows where it will be come that day.

[simon13]

I wonder how many records there are and the physical size of the archives “someone” is holding.

If they aren’t held for commercial reasons then perhaps a few volunteers might be allowed to scan and index them? The data can be lifted these days with the right software.
Then if they are forum members it could done as a forum service for Alpina owners, a small fee is charged for the scanned information? Never as much as the service charged by Sytner or Alpina themselves in Germany. It would generate an income for the forum and preserve the records practically forever. The register could even offer a certificate of authenticity.

Total must be in the thousands, but certainly not over 50k.

Sorry I’m racing ahead with my business head on now and probably it’s not that simple to do legally perhaps without permissions. A slowly shrinking market by its nature, but surely that would stimulate the Alpina classic market even more for Sytner, Alpina themselves (when they begin to offer their classic service), help the owners and the Register/Forum too?

John i'd wager its 100's of cars that sytners Built in their time or if its over 1000 it wont be 2000! I'm led to believe that some job cards are missing also

[JohnW]

Just seems a shame all that documented Alpina history going practically to waste.

[Norrie]

Shame yes, but thats Sytner's decision.