I kinda disagree. If all you have is a stick, then you learn how to drive it out of necessity. The advantage is that then you are starting out having learned how to drive basically any passenger vehicle later in life, whereas if you start with an auto, depending on the person, you may remain only with automatics. You were different obviously.

Useful later in life if you need to drive someone elses car for some reason. Im having an issue right now as my fiance does not drive stick while her car is being fixed, and I can't lend her my car to use in the meantime (I can take the bus easy). Our schedules are different, so I have to get up 4 hours earlier to give her a ride to work.
The rest of her family either drove manual or in her brothers case started out with something manual so learned out of necessity, but she started with an auto.

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My son started out driving the 4spd 240D. He drove it to school and work for 2 years, school round trip was 36 highway miles daily. I would never allow a fast or sporty car to be a kid's first. If you think he won't hotrod it, you're fooling yourself.

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You're a daisy if you do.
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84 Euro 240D 4spd. 220.5k sold
04 Honda Element AWD
1985 F150 XLT 4x4, 351W with 270k miles, hay hauler
1997 Suzuki Sidekick 4x4
1993 Toyota 4wd Pickup 226K and counting

I like this, if you have a disposable 240D. Unfortunately there are few, if any, larger , safeish cars WITH manuals. So all the early learning is going to be on imports or sports cars. Wasn't really like that when I was young....

Yeah, the hot rod thing. I was wanting to hot rod my dinky slushbox '69 Austin American and had the good sense at an early age to realize I would break the silly thing...so I bought the MGB.

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80 300SD (129k mi) 82 240D stick (193k mi)77 240D auto - stick to be (153k mi) 85 380SL (145k mi) 89 BMW 535i 82 Diesel Rabbit Pickup (374k mi) 91 Jetta IDI Diesel (155k mi) 81 VW Rabbit Convertible Diesel 70 Triumph Spitfire Mk III (63kmi)66 Triumph TR4a IRS (90k mi)67 Ford F-100 (??)

My peers subscribed to the "mass is more" theory for first cars for their children - nothing under 4,000 lbs. Maybe you should move up a size or two.

P.S.: While the BMW in question is a relatively mild version of the 3, your son's buddies will line up to race against a BMW.

The first car should be Sacrificial; sacrifice the car to save the kid.
You had better kiss that first car goodbye; can you do that?
A new driver doesn't have the years of experience and subtleties of driving in traffic that you learned through years on the road.
Just Figure your teenager will act just you and your friends acted as teenagers. That ought to temper your thinking.
As example; A Crown Victoria will get him were he is going, and his friends won't want to be seen in 'Das Boot'.

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"Our Lady of Blessed Acceleration...
don't Fail Us Now"

If you are going to compare working the BMW with working on a W123 you are kidding yourself. The BMW is much more complex and much smaller. When I had my 300SD and a 528 I found the BMW much harder to work on. They cram a lot of stuff into a very small space. The W126 was a great engine bay to work in by comparison.

That being said, nothing holds the road or drives like a BMW...

Go to Bavarian Auto to look at parts availability and prices.

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"I have no convictions ... I blow with the wind, and the prevailing wind happens to be from Vichy"

Current
Monika '74 450 SL
BrownHilda '79 280SL
FoxyCleopatra '99 Chevy Suburban
Scarlett 2014 Jeep Cherokee
Krystal 2004 Volvo S60
Gone
'74 Jeep CJ5
'97 Jeep ZJ Laredo
Rudolf ‘86 300SDL
Bruno '81 300SD
Fritzi '84 BMW
'92 Subaru
'96 Impala SS
'71 Buick GS conv
'67 GTO conv
'63 Corvair conv
'57 Nomad

oooo, look whats available for the same price-

1986 Ford Ranger Turbo DIESEL Super rare

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This post brought to you by Carl's Jr.

NO. NO. No kid deserves that diesel Ranger.....

JB3...JB3....he's dropped the receiver and is out looking at it I am sure.... oh crap it's in NC..the race is on...

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80 300SD (129k mi) 82 240D stick (193k mi)77 240D auto - stick to be (153k mi) 85 380SL (145k mi) 89 BMW 535i 82 Diesel Rabbit Pickup (374k mi) 91 Jetta IDI Diesel (155k mi) 81 VW Rabbit Convertible Diesel 70 Triumph Spitfire Mk III (63kmi)66 Triumph TR4a IRS (90k mi)67 Ford F-100 (??)

I was thinking he buys it for himself and gives his son the 300D.

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heyyyyy...what are you doing cruising the NC cl ads???

He's in Banner Elk. Snow country. Salty.

If it were the Toyota pickup diesel, I might bite!

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Ben
1987 190d 2.5Turbo

Jeebus Xhrist, it took me about a day to learn. The choice was this:
(a) learn to drive a manual
(b) don't learn to drive, since we didn't have an auto available
(c) buy my own used car

(c) was sort of a trick choice, since I got a decently-paying internship at an engineering firm that required me to drive there the last year of HS. If I couldn't drive, I wouldn't get paid.

"OK, you've had your practice in the (large, nearby lab complex) parking lot. We'll drive to (a town down the shore, which involves driving through much traffic to get to) now."

owwww...i had no idea the receiver was so heavy!

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Ben
1987 190d 2.5Turbo

I would need to look it up, but I think it's a Mazda TD. Nothing wrong with that. Go get it....

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80 300SD (129k mi) 82 240D stick (193k mi)77 240D auto - stick to be (153k mi) 85 380SL (145k mi) 89 BMW 535i 82 Diesel Rabbit Pickup (374k mi) 91 Jetta IDI Diesel (155k mi) 81 VW Rabbit Convertible Diesel 70 Triumph Spitfire Mk III (63kmi)66 Triumph TR4a IRS (90k mi)67 Ford F-100 (??)

I had an 86 ford escort diesel, its definitely a mazda plant. the NA was about 10 less hp than the VW 1.6, and the timing belt change procedure for the transverse mounting was stupid. Step one "remove engine" no joke.

However it was a plucky efficient robust little diesel, and all the transverse issues would be resolved with a RWD setup, and the turbo probably makes for an excellent balance of power.

I remember my escort had as stock twin oil filters with a stock oil bypass.

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