Monkeymax's White 1987 MR2 SC

[monkeymax]

Yup, that's right! Continuing on from this thread here I decided one MR2 and a Pug wasn't already enough grief. Well actually a member of the owners club who is now a friend of mine contacted me to let me know of an SC that was going cheap... The owner had bought it a couple of months ago, it had then blown the headgasket and he'd had enough of it. "Okay," I said. "Would you like it?" He asked. I had to see it.

But at the time I was in Brazil (for New Year - a present from my parents as I'd treated them to a holiday a couple of years ago, they reciprocated this year knowing I couldn't afford to go anywhere myself) and so seeing it straight away was impossible.

A week passed and I was worried it'd be sold to someone else. It wouldn't be too bad, but I at least wanted to see it.

So I returned and last Saturday I popped over to Enfield to have a look at it. Compared to the red one (Aiko), it's a little (!!!) rusty. As you can see:






At least this is front arch...

The supercharger engine:


Slightly high mileage... 137k miles. Meh.:



So, I was unsure but something in me said that it may be fun (in spite of my serious lack of time at the moment!). It was when he said he was probably just going to break it, I figured I didn't have anything to lose. So I got it cheap (£600).

I really want to save it. I drove an SC on a trackday back in Oct 2006. It really was fantastic, though different from the NA. I don't know how I will finance the cars (it's already difficult enough on the student budget!) but I'm going to take things one step at a time.

It seems the car will be delivered (due to the engine troubles, it can't be driven at the moment) on Thursday. Then I'm going to give it a good going over to determine just how bad the rust is... (When I looked it didn't seem too bad - some bodge jobs going rusty again around the arches, bad drivers side A-piller, the underside seemed okay - but as it was raining I couldn't spend long checking)

The plan is to save it and restore it as best as possible. I'm sure that plan will change though - it all depends how much work is required, etc. I'm not convinced yet that it's headgasket failure so that'll be the next thing I'll check.

I am slightly worried about taking this project on - as well as being excited. On the one hand, if worst does come to worst and I have to break it, I think I'll be able to at least break-even on it (though obviously I'd have lost the time it'd cost me). But this car has been cared for at some point in it's life (whoever decided to paint the roof black also decided to do a few other trick things too!).

But I broke all my own rules when I went to view this car. I viewed it alone (bad). I could've haggled better (bad - but then it wasn't that pricey in the first place). I shouldn't have gone when it was wet (though at least it meant the car was cold, and it had been stored in a garage anyway - still... bad). Also I was in a rush when I viewed it (silly). Oh, and I didn't drive it (well - that's obvious, but still... No).

Well, we'll see what happens. I'll try keep this thread updated as I get it up and running (though it may be a mirror of threads on a couple of other sites - sorry! It seems there's a bit of interest in this car!) just in case any of you guys want to see what in the innards of a 4A-GZE look like...

[Redliner]

I like nice cars...where in Brazil were you?

[monkeymax]

I was in Rio for two weeks. Amazing place! Though we spent as much time at home relaxing as we did out and about (old parents... tut... )

[fbc]

I approve

The torque of the S/C has always appealed to me - I do miss that from the 4AGE, but the way it pulls from 4,500rpm to 7,600rpm makes up for it.

[monkeymax]

FBC, I agree - the torque of the SC is great fun, but if I compare my red NA to the SCs I've driven I still prefer the NA...

Updatage time!

Initial inspection when it arrived last Thursday:






Right, so I got it up on ramps and most of it is superficial - you'll probably see more detail later. Though the rear arches are slightly worse than I initially thought - but there is still metal there for the most part. Still - photos later.

One concern was this:




One of the suspension mounts rear drivers side. It's the forward mount. It's still really quite solid so I think it should be okay still.

Also, I got the engine started briefly. Smoke comes from around exhaust manifold area (couldn't tell exactly where) a few seconds after start up and there's bubbling in the expansion tank area almost straight away (in fact it even bubbles when you're trying to start it but it's not starting).

Also:



And



Oh and underneath the engine there's green drops - e.g. sitting on the bottom of the exhaust.

So it really is headgasket based on the symptoms...


Then I had to stop for the night. Going back again quickly the following night I found the rear jacking points aren't in the best of nick either:

Rear Drivers:


Rear Passenger:





I'll probably remove all signs of paint and rust from here and POR-15 it. But the passenger side just above this last photo (i.e. the front of the rear arch) is definitely gone underneath the skirt and will need some attention at some point soon. Probably just as well I'm learning to make my welds neater, eh?

But yup, most of it is treatable thankfully, so it's not as bad as I've been fearing. And it can be covered up until I can get around to properly replacing the metal.

At this point I was still split - do I make the effort to save the car, or do I just do the cruel (but possibly financially sensible) thing and strip it...?

I looked at it's face again... and decided to save it...

The car definitely needs love. I haven't gotten too attached to it yet (just as well!) but someone in the past clearly really cared for this car and then owners after them have done exactly the opposite. I've never seen such an exhaustive owners history for a car (though not for all it's life - depended on the owner) and the small mods are further evidence of how someone felt for it.
I think it's saveable, and I'm gonna give it a go...!


So... here goes nothing!

[monkeymax]

So.... what did I manage to do this weekend? Well, thanks to doing various service jobs on a Micra, Audi 90 and Fiesta and having to clean up in the workshop a bit to make the chairman happy (so that I can now keep the car in the workshop... woohooo!!!) I lost a lot of time. However, I did manage to do a bit of rust prevention...:

Under the Frunk:









Drivers side Sill & jacking point:





Rear drivers side suspension mount:






That's Silver POR-15 which has some metal filler in it as well and TBH looks pretty awesome underneath now. It took a while to get the old underseal off under the frunk, but I was glad of it - the amount of rust (mostly surface only though) I found underneath the underseal was pretty scary and so I'll probably be doing the same on the red one as soon as I can. As time goes on, I'll be painting under more and more of this car as well to protect it as much as possible.

I was hoping to start stripping the engine down, but with everything else that went on, I didn't get a chance to. However, I've loosened off some of the bolts, and it's all ready now for the oil to be drained when I next go back in (unfortunately not tonight - but possibly tomorrow night).
However, the engine cover and surrounding panels are now off and it's all ready to go.

One of my other concerns now is how dirty the workshop is - I'm going to have to be careful to keep everything nice and clean around the engine!

[Ottobon]

Very cool too see one being saved !

I think the S/Cs have a issue of being under dampened and or undersprung, the mki MR2 is actually rather softly sprung for its weight and handling characteristics.


Anyways, i believe that suspension mount was for the rear caster, know that sounds weird, but the mki mr2 is one of the few cars i know that not only has rear caster, but adjustable rear caster

I kinda miss my car, still i think i want to own a Italian before i make a return to Toyotas.

If you want, i'm still interested in fabricating some headers for the mki mr2, if i ever get around to it are you interested in this?

[monkeymax]

Originally Posted by Ottobon

Very cool too see one being saved !

Glad you think so... The easy route really would've been to start stripping it, but I also like the idea of saving another one... and it's really not that bad once you start poking everything with a screwdriver...

Originally Posted by Ottobon

I think the S/Cs have a issue of being under dampened and or undersprung, the mki MR2 is actually rather softly sprung for its weight and handling characteristics.

Interesting - something I'm going to have to look into. Having not owned one before, I've not bothered looking at the suspension setup of the SCs yet...

Originally Posted by Ottobon

Anyways, i believe that suspension mount was for the rear caster, know that sounds weird, but the mki mr2 is one of the few cars i know that not only has rear caster, but adjustable rear caster

On that point, correct.

Originally Posted by Ottobon

I kinda miss my car, still i think i want to own a Italian before i make a return to Toyotas.

Italian? Mad...! So you're going to go to utterly unreliable, then back to utterly reliable...

Originally Posted by Ottobon

If you want, i'm still interested in fabricating some headers for the mki mr2, if i ever get around to it are you interested in this?

If you ship to the UK, then possibly. And if you've enough details, I'm sure I could find a fair few others who are interested too!

[Redliner]

Thanks for saving this nice little car. I would be a little sad if you decided to strip it. Keep us updated!

[jayhawk]

Originally Posted by Redliner

Thanks for saving this nice little car. I would be a little sad if you decided to strip it. Keep us updated!

Summed up my thoughts. Keep up the good work, Max!

[monkeymax]

Cheers Guys!

So, managed a bit more work over the weekend...

Last Wednesday I had to drop my housemate off at the airport, but he was late so by the time I'd dropped him off then swung by the workshop, I could only drain the oil (mixture of black and cream colour... ewwww) and empty the frunk in preparation to drain the coolant (was hoping to start this off then too, but ended up being asked to do an oil change on someone elses car instead - again - so never got around to it...).




I realised I need a puller to get the various pulleys off the engine... I found a puller in the workshop but it was missing the centre bolt... I tried to fabricate a replacement, but got thoroughly fed up, so I'll have to try again another time.

I can't find the locking nut for the wheels at the moment, which is a huge problem... (gonna make getting to the crank pulley just that little bit harder I think... Grrrrrrr...

I lost much of Saturday to many small but needed jobs in the morning...
...So, in all I was probably only in the workshop for 5 or 6 hours on Saturday.

In that time, I:

1) drained the coolant...


Very little came out the front Radiator. Lots came out from the two pipes under the car (under the front undertray). And I couldn't find the drain plug on the engine itself (as illustrated by the BGB) so gave up on that one. I'm just gonna hope there's nothing left in it.
With the quantity that came out, I'm left wondering what would've caused the HG failure in the first place...? The coolant that came from front & rear, top and bottom, was all the relatively new stuff put in by the previous owner, so it's clearly circulating well enough...
And there was enough of it:




2) Getting back up, work begun on stripping the engine. First off, the intercooler came off. However:


This was easier than it probably should've been. The two bolt holes near the battery had no bolts, or anything to secure bolts to, so I guess the holder for this part of the intercooler has disappeared. Also, the battery had nothing holding it in place; there was no battery bracket. It slid around fairly easy. Looks like I'll need these bits when I come to rebuilding it.
Oh and battery tray was fairly rusty, so I'll probably be attacking that with wire brush on drill and repainting too...


3) Removed a whole load of other pipes. Honestly, this is where I began bricking it. The BGB identifies things but doesn't say where they are or what they look like. This is when it hit me just how little I know about what I'm doing... I've read plenty about the AFM, but had no idea what it looked like until this weekend... There are other parts I'm still puzzled about as well...
Anyway, I've taken some notes along the way with everything I've done. Also put masking tape on stuff to label where it all came from, so hopefully it'll all go back together!

There are a lot more 'work in progress' pics, but as they're quite specific, it's probably not worth me putting them all up... I was going to put up a pic of work so far, but I don't seem to have taken one... Oops.

I was having difficulty following the BGB. I think I have for the most part, but there were a few bits where I just didn't know the parts they were referring to. Unfortunately in the end I just gave up on following it and started just pulling things off/unbolting things. I've been bagging and tagging where possible, and labelling electrical connectors so I know where they go. Plus I've written notes on everything I've done. Hopefully this'll all help on the rebuild side.

The last job I did on Saturday was to set the car to TDC...:

[monkeymax]

First time I've ever done this. And I have to say, doing it by yourself, when there's a sodding wheel in the way, it's freezing bl**dy cold, you've got a huge bruise on the leg you're having to lie on, and you keep going past the marker point is all just a real PITA. It was when I accidentally snapped the black plastic bit of trip running diagonally up behind the window because I was leaning on it bending down (although maybe it was there before and I made it worse - there's dirt in the crack) that I decided this'd be the last job for the night.
It seems easy enough to set the engine to TDC, but I was seriously not in a good mood by this point. I'd realised I probably didn't pick the best car to learn how to do a HG change on... I was also extremely annoyed with myself for not having gotten as far as I'd have liked during the day...


So, some of the issues that I need to investigate (that I can remember!):

While under the engine trying to find the coolant drain plug there, I found two unplugged plugs... (note: both these photos are me looking up)
First one:

By Gearbox

Second:

Just above oil filter.


White Powdery stuff in the intake air system. That really can't be good:


Grounding wire. What you can't really see in this pic is that in a few places there's a few centimeters where the plastic wire cover has disappeared (worn off or something) leaving exposed wire. So that's something to clean and re-cover with PVC tape too...





More confirmation (as though it was needed) that it's HG. Number 4 spark plug was clean, the other three were blackened (though three was fairly clean too). In fact, Number 4 spark plug had coolant dripping off it when I pulled it out (bear in mind it's been over a week since the car was last turned over).


In spite of my anger at myself, I had high hopes for Sunday. But a late night -> late breakfast -> enjoying the Sun, I decided to make the most of the warm(ish) weather and washed the Pug (finally - after 4 months). I don't recognise it anymore, but when you have the following on front and rear of all 4 wheels:

... you know it's a clean that was long overdue. I was shovelling the mud away afterwards, and reckon there was easily more than 10Kgs!


Someone who's restoring a mini at the workshop arrived (while I was washing the Pug) and finally started doing work on the Mini. Great - I'm happy with that. I wasn't happy with the splatter coming off the angle grinder and hitting the rear of the MR2. I decided it'd be best to leave the cover on. So I got nothing done on Sunday - well, I did stuff with the Red MR2s suspension instead, so it wasn't completely lost... but still.... Grrrrrrrr...




It's funny, my non-car-knowledgeable friends were all pretty shocked.
- How do you know how to do all this?
- I don't, I'm following the manual - a bit like a big, expensive Lego kit.
- Well, it's very impressive!
- Actually it's not - I've not achieved anything yet... Grrrr...


And one of my more car-knowledgeable friends suggested that it'd be much easier if I just dropped the engine - that way I could do an assortment of other jobs too and inspect the block better. It was a tempting idea, but feels like it could possibly be too much work... But then again, I could then clean and paint everything... yum!

[monkeymax]

Well, the car is overdue some work, and this forum is well overdue an update...

Unfortunately I've managed to do precisely nothing to the cars over the last week and a bit due to real life getting in the way. However, in the week or two earlier, I managed to wrestle with the engine a bit more. I've been trying to get the supercharger off whilst stripping the engine down further. Unfortunately I've discovered a few other issues, including that the supercharger unit was being run without oil!!!
Others are shown below...


But, it's taken me that long to get the most recent photos online. Here're a few highlights of what I saw on my last journey into the SC's engine:




Nice. So much for Magnex stainless. Will be welding that back up I think. Or fitting the "Longlife" exhaust I was going to put on Aiko (which I now can't for various reasons). Currently undecided.




More crap. In the exhaust manifold. Hmmmm...




The state of the pulley.




Somehow (well, it was cold, I was very very irritated and started to rush things) I managed to drop one of the bolts holding the part that attaches to this down into this hole. So... a bolt fell down here basically. Insert all manner of swear words here...




The SC as it's been sitting for the last week.

Unfortunately I forgot to take an 'over-all' photo of the engine bay, but it is now quite bare!

Having now gotten further down in the engine and finding more 'issues' I'm now leaning more and more to pulling the engine out completely to work on it outside the car... Funtimes...

[monkeymax]

I've just realised... I've not updated either of my car threads in... well, a while...
I've done a bit on this car since the last update.

So, since I last wrote anything, I've had a good peek around the engine, and much discussion with other owners. After wrestling other parts unable to remove them, I made the decision to take the engine out. I bought an engine stand, got the manual printed out, then took a few days off work. Which promptly disappeared to nothing as I had to do so many other things.
Still, in that time I managed to prep the engine to be taken out (which involved disconnect & removing many many things - The AC being one highlight!) and at 11pm on the Sunday night of those days off, I got the engine out...! (with the help of friends of course!)

So... Photos!



I decided to tackle the driveshafts by undoing them at the gearbox end... (The wheels have locking nuts, I don't have the 'key' nut so had to remove the driveshafts this way)





The drivers side separated very easily - there was enough play in the driveshaft to separate the two. I then temporarily cable tied it to the suspension arm.
The passenger side... well that didn't come out all the way. Much umming and ahhing, and I decided there'd be enough clearance when we were dropping the engine to do the separation and covering up then.
As it would turn out, as soon as I undid the two torque mounts, this also dropped out, so I didn't have to wait until the engine was fully separated...



You can see also the AC Pump.



Passenger side driveshaft when I couldn't separate the two.




I also took some time out to clean many of the removed engine bits. They were covered in oil - and I mean to the point where if you picked them up your hands went black. I'd been storing them in the boot and in the drivers footwell. Obviously if we wanted to lift the boot, this wasn't great. Now that I've sandblasted most my bits for the red Mk1, I can now start cleaning these up, so I've degreased them and have brought most home to do a more thorough clean-up...
A mix of washing up liquid and turtle wax...




My other project for the day was showing my housemate how to remove rust with a wire brush attachment on the angle grinder - and paint over the good metal bits. Unfortunately the front of the van has started to sprout holes. I'm not sure if my welding is good enough for structural members so he's going to get quotes to get someone to do it...



A rusty rear torque mount. Photographed because I nearly missed this cable that's been cable-tied to it. Saw it a few minutes before we started dropping the engine...




Bits all good to go now, torque mounts off. At this point, I was (easily) demonstrating to my housemate and the club chairman the usefulness of the torque mounts on these engines!




One last check. At this point, I was very nervous, and bricking it a bit.




It seems the engine was also nervous as feck as it started peeing as we begun lowering it to the ground...
(That's just coolant still left inside)




Going down!



And out. Me next to it, wondering why the heck I decided to do this.

[monkeymax]

The obligatory man-in-engine-bay shot!
My mates were completely laughing their heads off at this!




The beast in all its rusty, oily, mucky glory.




The team.
To the left, my German housemate (whose van that was earlier) striking a silly pose...
To the right, the Estonian club chairman.
I've removed an engine only as far as assisting someone else - and that was a Punto. Neither of these guys have ever removed an engine before - Marc (my housemate) is still learning the basics of engines so he was learning a lot and asking a lot of questions - I enjoyed it!




Describing my plans and/or being asked whether it was worth it...




Heart and body separated.


Overall it went well. I couldn't remove the alternator beforehand (despite trying a lot) but stupidly left no bolts holding it to the engine thinking that it'd be fine given I couldn't remove it - and also that it'd be good being able to move it if necessary while dropping the engine. I was right on that front - being able to swivel it a bit was great. But, the blasted thing dropped to the floor shortly after the engine cleared the bay. Don't know yet if it's done any damage...


Currently the engine is sitting on the floor, propped up by the sump and gearbox with wood. I was hoping to go back in this evening to remove the gearbox and get it on the engine stand, but I've just found I'm needed at Uni this evening, so that's out. Drat.

Can't wait to crack the thing open.



I apologise for the crappiness of the photo. My workshop cam is getting more and more dead... I didn't want my SLR around when we were removing the engine...

And there we have it... engine out. Now it's time for the proper work!

That was two weeks ago... Unfortunately I've not had time since to do anything further... this weekend hopefully!