Last week, I dropped the teaser that I’d bought another car, literally on my birthday. I did buy a car—but that’s going to have to wait, because the Shark has new shoes. Wait, what?! Sharks don’t have shoes. Must be a better analogy than that. I’ll work on it.

When I bought the ’79 Euro 635CSi last year, the seller had spent a princely sum on a set of period-correct sixteen-inch BBS RA wheels with polished lips. They were beautiful, but part of my deal with myself in buying the Shark was that I had to hold down the price; with 220,000 miles, the wrong engine and transmission in it, and no a/c, it’s never going to be the example that’s worth all the money. So, through several months of back-and-forth, I got the seller to split off the swanky wheels. (Ironically, my friend Phil Rose, a self-professed “wheel whore,” bought them. “I’ve got three sets of wheels for my 635,” he says. This is how other folks must feel when they meet me and my twelve cars. Yeah, I’m normal, but that guy is whacked.)

Because I bought the car sans wheels, I had to take a set when I went to pick it up. On Craigslist, I found a set of five fifteen-inch BBS Style 5 basketweave wheels from an E34 with passable tires and center caps for $250. The guy who had them lived about ten miles from the Shark. He wasn’t going to be home when my friend Tom Samuelson (with whom I was sharing a tow) and I came by, so I’d PayPalled him the money in advance and he said he’d leave the wheels behind a shed on his property. Unfortunately, also behind the shed was a large German shepherd, who, separated from the wheels and interloper me by a fence and perhaps a foot of air, was demonstrably displeased at my presence. But I managed to grab the wheels without getting my butt bit, and Tom and I headed off to where the Shark was. Then I realized that I’d forgotten the can of lug bolts, so I had to go back and brave the Hound of the Basketweaves one more time. I mounted the wheels on the Shark in the seller’s driveway, and trailered the car off.

So, when it was advertised, it looked like this:

And when I bought it and threw the E34 Style 5s on it, it looked like this. It didn’t have quite the same verve and snap, but it was perfectly presentable.

I drove it like this through the fall, worked on it over the winter, and pulled it back out in the spring. I loved the way the car looked. The combination of the early Shark styling, the Euro bumpers, the lack of side-marker lights, the Polaris paint, the black stripe echoed on the front air dam, the black sport interior, and, yes, the basketweave wheels, gave the car an unmistakable presence. Folks would compliment me on it wherever I drove.

And yet, from the garage, I could hear the car crying for what it really wanted: A set of seventeen-inch BBS RC090 Style 5s from an E39.

I am not a wheel whore, but Style 5 simply means a honeycomb basketweave, and even I can see that not all Style 5 patterns are created equal. Unlike other Style 5s, the weave on the RC090s has a three-dimensional component to it, arching inward slightly as it reaches the rim. Plus, it’s a two-piece wheel with a gazillion tiny bolts holding on the outer lip, which looks at once industrial as well as delicate. Finally, many folks have the outer lip polished. That’s a pretty appealing package.

Wheels are a very personal thing; one person’s perfection is another’s over-the-top bling (over beers, ask me to tell the story of my friend Dave Gelineau’s gold BBS wheel rant). To me, the seventeen-inch RC090s look a bit too modern on an early ’70s car like a Bavaria or a 3.0CS—hey, if you like them, rock them and tell me to pound sand—but on a 635CSi, they are sheer perfection.

So I did what I do: I set a budget and looked on Craigslist. Endlessly. For $500, I’d see beat-to-crap wheels with no tires. I wanted a full wheel, tire, and center-cap package. Right, like that was going to happen. I even considered buying a cheap E39 528i or 540i Sport just to get the wheels. (Right, that’s the way to save money: Buy a cheap E39.)

Then I saw a set of RC090s on Craigslist in Nashua, New Hampshire, close enough in price that I thought that, with a little negotiation, they might land within striking distance. They didn’t have a polished lip, but I didn’t really care. They were a very presentable set, with decent tires the right size for the Shark (205/50-17)—and with center caps. A fellow named Corey Knight, who has a small independent shop in Nashua called Ultimate Bimmer, Services had them. We agreed on a price a hair-split north of my budget, and I made an appointment to go and see them.

Then, the evening before the appointment, I typed “BBS Style 5” into Craigslist (what, you think I stopped? To paraphrase Bugs Bunny, “You don’t know me very well, do you?”), and up popped another set of RC090s. And these—well, they were gold. With polished lips. For less than I’d agreed to pay for the silver ones. The photos looked incredible. I called. No answer. I texted “I will come and put cash in your hand right freaking now.” Later that evening the seller contacted me and explained that he was moving and had to get rid of them, and that I was the second caller and the first was planning on coming in the morning. Oh, well. Don’t get greedy, right? Go and buy your silver wheels on Saturday. I didn’t really want gold ones for the Shark anyway; I wanted silver on silver.

On Saturday morning, while I was driving up to Nashua to buy the silver wheels, my phone rang. It was the seller of the gold wheels. “Buyer fell through,” he said. “Do you want to come see them?” I wasn’t quite sure what to do. I explained that I was on the way to buy another set, but that I’d call him back.

I got to Nashua, found Ultimate Bimmer Service, and met Corey Knight. What a delightful guy; if I were closer, next time I needed some repair work I wasn’t able to do myself, I’d totally try his shop. I wound up chatting with him for over an hour, and may do a book talk there. The wheels were even better than I expected, a few very minor scuffs but no outright gouges. I loaded them in the car and headed home, figuring I’d sit, have a cup of coffee, and decide what to do about the gold wheels.

I looked at the photographs again, went back and forth between the gold center and polished silver lip would look totally awesome against my red 3.0CSi and you have Alpina sixteen-inch open lugs on your 3.0CSi, you are NOT going to take them off, and you are NOT going to blow the better part of a mortgage payment on two sets of wheels you don’t need.

I called him and said, “I’ll be right there.”

I looked at the gold wheels with the polished silver lips. They were beautiful. They were a steal. I paid him the money. So, in two hours, I’d grabbed two sets of BBS Style 5 RC090 wheels, one silver and the other gold.

Now, in all honesty, the gold set was a damn good deal, but not the out-and-out braggable thievery I thought it was. First, although they are drop-dead gorgeous, it turns out that they’re not a factory gold set; the seller had taken a silver set and painted the centers gold. Second, I didn’t realize until I got them home that the tires are 205/40-17s, not 50s (he had them on a 3 Series). So I can’t just throw them on my 3.0CSi, even if I wanted to risk angering the Alpina open-lug gods. I’ll decide what to do with them. It’s kind of a happy problem to have.

After waiting for the hub-centric rings I’d ordered for my 635CSi to arrive, I mounted the silver RC090s.

Oh, my lord: They make me weak in the knees. So often you obsess about doing something like this, and when it’s done, you sigh and just move onto the next thing. But this—I can’t stop looking at the car with the wheels on it and smiling. It’s bloody gorgeous.

I’d say they’re perfect, but that misses the point. They’re not perfect. Neither is my car. That’s why I could afford them.. And that’s why the wheels are perfect for the car.

And regarding scoring two sets: I’m not a wheel whore. I’m a Deal Whore.

When Tom Samuelson, who was with me when I picked up the E34 ’weaves, saw the pictures of the newly-shod Shark, he said one of those had-to-be-there-big-circle-of-life things that only the two of us who had experienced the Hound of the Basketweaves would understand: “A German shepherd is going to bite your ass.”

(Next week: Okay, okay, I bought another 2002. Shocked? Shocked!)—Rob Siegel

Rob’s book Memoirs of a Hack Mechanic is available through Bentley PublishersAmazon, and Bavarian Autosport—or you can get a personally inscribed copy through Rob’s website: www.robsiegel.com.