If there’s one thing car enthusiasts want from their vehicles, it’s more. They’ll dump tons of money into power-boosting parts, suspension upgrades, premium tires, engine tuning, and a whole slew of other fun stuff to make their cars faster off the line and quicker through turns. But for this Autopian Asks, I want to know about the other end of the spectrum: How much money have you spent on optional, not-repair-related stuff that doesn’t make your car perform better?
A funny thing about me is that, despite spending oodles of money on buying, storing, and fixing so many cars, I don’t actually like spending money on modifying them. Sure, I’ll happily blow $17,000 on a brand-new Smart, but then I’ll fight myself about spending $500 on a modification. That’s why most of my cars are almost completely stock. I want to put a set of VW GTI wheels on my Jetta SportWagen, but can’t convince myself to spend the money. I even fight myself over window tint, even though I hate driving around in cars that feel like fishbowls in the summer. So, it’s usually a pretty big deal for me when I do spend a lot of money on a modification, especially if it’s purely cosmetic.
Thanks to folks like the Bishop and Thomas Hundal, I’m deeper into BMWs than I have ever been before, and that’s dangerous. Thomas introduced me to a shop called ID4Motion, and all they do is make plug-and-play digital clusters for old BMWs and cars like the Honda S2000. ID4Motion’s instrument clusters were utterly amazing, and really help modernize a BMW E46 or similar.
I’m a huge fan of BMW’s clusters from the 2000s, but I still wanted to see what one of the nifty ID4Motion clusters would look like in my E61 wagon. Then I saw the price. I couldn’t believe people were blowing $1,000 just to have a digital instrument cluster. I’ve had the ID4Motion tab open on my phone for maybe two years now, thinking maybe one day I’ll spend the cash … but I just couldn’t justify it.
ID4Motion recently closed its doors, which made me sad. Thomas then informed me that sellers in China have been slinging their own digital clusters for years, and theirs were more like $300 or $400, not $1,000. So, I bought one.
I still feel weird about spending $400 on a purely cosmetic mod, but I did it. I’m also going to spend another $160 or so to give my E61 an Android Auto system. When I’m done, the E61 will feel at least a decade newer. Yes, I know I said I was going to sell that car, but every time I drive it, I fall in love again, so here we are. You’ll get to read about these things at a later date!
Am I the only one who feels this way? What’s the most you’ve spent on car mods that didn’t do a thing for performance?
Top graphic image: Mercedes Streeter