car shaking when idle

[euan]

In November 2003 i purchased my first bmw, a 1996 318is which is also my first own personal car after stealing my da's for 5 years. As i have found out this was just before the face lift of later in that year but still benefits from the 1.9 16v. Which is nice! Its in good condition for its year an has 53000 on it.
Most things seem sound but when the car is stationary and in neutral the car wobbles from side to side??
also i wouldnt say it purrrs when idle. more of the occasional chug purrrr chug purrrr if you know what i mean. Has anyone ever experienced anything like this or any one with a tech head know what to do about it.

While im at it. Does anyone have any tips on how to keep my car in good nick. I have little knowledge but want to find out.
eg What engine oil
What and how to clean
Anything i can do to the engine to keep it smooth etc


Any help to my multitude of questions is greatley appreciated and more questions will follow.

Cheers

[Dave at Pelican Parts]

On the shaking: Check the motor mounts.

On the chugging: Sounds like a misfire of some sort. Often the result of a fault of some sort in the ignition system. Start checking the ignition pieces.

On keeping the car in "good nick", the best thing to do is to follow the maintenance schedule in the owner's manual or the workshop manual. If you have neither one of those, look into getting them! Bentley publishes a workshop manual that is pretty good, as is typical for Bentley.

I will defer the discussion about what and how to clean to those who are better at it--that is, everyone else in the universe...

As for engine oils, that is a "religious topic". Meaning, everyone has a very strongly-held opinion, and almost nobody is willing to change theirs, despite very vocal argument. My own opinion is that any decent brand of oil, changed frequently, is as good as you can do for your car. Some of the proponents of synthetic oils claim you can leave the oil in for a very very long time since synthetic is so good (see the earlier discussion about Amsoil)--but I will have to respectfully disagree. I say change it often, and prefer every 3,000 miles.

--DD