6G Celicas Forums

No it doesn't unfortunately. I bought it for a cheap price though so I may as well get some with the hose connections already installed.

A couple of you may recognize my name from a previous thread about swapping a BEAMS engine into my SS-I, which led to me deciding not to and saving up to just buy a SS-III Celica instead (or if you don't recognize me, you may remember now...or you'll go looking for my thread).

Long story short, I've decided to keep hold of my 3S-FE powered Celica and save up to buy something better in the near future. But for now, I may as well do a couple of mods to my daily driver; starting with a short ram intake.

First off, I am unsure what system my engine uses to test air flow/mass. I haven't been able to find anything removable/cleanable (apart from the air temp sensor in the air box) so I'm hoping that it wont be an issue when installing new piping for the intake.

Secondly, now this is when pictures come into play:



I understand that the hose running from the crank case/valve cover to the intake pipe is something to do with ventilation and positive pressure? Now I've seen cars with small air filters on their valve covers, but after some quick reading I found that some people believe this is bad as it messes with the pressure etc.

So basically, if I'm using aluminium piping for this air intake, what needs to be done with this hose?

That was the other thing which I would have to look into. I wasn't sure if a certification plate was needed for an engine of the same type, but I'm also not sure if the 3S-GE BEAMS counts as an engine which is meant for this car anyway. So the cost of doing all this would almost add up to the price of a nice SS-III anyway haha.

And yeah I noticed that when I first found the auction. The wording is quite hard to follow. I wasn't sure if they were offering an install as part of the auction either, it almost sounds as if they were when I read it the first couple of times.

I'm still undecided about this. BEAMS swaps in the US and Australia make sense because SS-III Celicas weren't sold there (as far as I know), but there are plenty of tidy examples for sale on Trade Me. That may be the path I take in the end.

Thanks for the replies everyone

Your conversion was actually what had me wondering if it was as simple as you made it look! And the way yours has turned out looks perfect. Plus, I can read where you went wrong and avoid doing the same

Hey all

I own a '96 Celica with a 3S-FE engine. As a lot of you may know, its a nice, economical engine with decent power, but after reading so much about other people's Celicas, and having a friend who owns a 1998 Celica with the 3S-GE BEAMS engine, I kind of feel like I have a Nintendo Wii and everyone else has PS3s and Xboxs. They're all very similar, but its just missing that grunt factor. Now apart from his being an Automatic, his Celica is cooler in every way, and after finding an auction for a half-cut with the BEAMS engine on a site called Trade Me (New Zealands version of Ebay), I am extremely interested in doing an engine swap for my car.

Here is the auction for those who are interested: 3S-GE & 5 SPD Beams VVTi

I have read a couple of threads about people doing a BEAMS engine swap, but these were in Australia and I think in the US, and the Celicas there are slightly different.

I have never done an engine swap before, but I am eager to learn and I am reading as much as I can about it. I'm currently 19 years old so I don't have a lot of experience with large jobs such as this, but I know what is what in an engine.

First off, will everything that I need (apart from tools and universal engine parts [battery etc]) be included either with the half cut or interchangeable with my Celica? By this I mean things like wiring, cables, ECU etc?

And how 'plug-and-play' will it be with my Celica? I've sort of gathered that NZ has JDM Spec Celicas, so will that make this job any smoother?

I know what equipment and tools that I will require, and I do have a couple mates who are mechanics so they should be able to help me out, but they wont have nearly as much knowledge about Celicas as you guys do.

I apologise if I sound ignorant by asking these questions, but I just want to get an idea. I may as well summarise (in broad steps) how I think this will go down:

So basically:

• Remove BEAMS engine & transmission from half cut > clean and change fluids
• Remove 3S-FE engine & transmission from Celica > set aside
• Install BEAMS engine into Celica on same engine mounts?
• Unsure what to do with things such as fuel, fuses, power steering etc (Hoping 3S-FE stuff is the same)
• Install BEAMS Wiring Loom (Or use existing 3S-FE Loom)
• Install BEAMS ECU
• Install super strut front & Brake Assembly

Now I am not asking for a full walkthrough on how to swap engines, I am just wanting to see if I have the right idea about this, and for anyone to PLEASE correct me where I am completely wrong.

I know this is not a walk in the park for someone who has never done this, but I'm mainly wondering how compatible the existing components of the 3S-FE engine are with the BEAMS engine.

I appreciate any feedback, cheers.

EDIT: For the price I'm paying, I could probably sell my current Celica and for one or two grand extra, get a very tidy 3S-GE non-Beams. Unless this swap is fairly straight forward, that may be the option I take.

Woah thanks man, that has taught me a lot. I always thought that there would be some sort of difference in measurements between America and Aus/NZ/Japan in terms of octane, since we are different in the way we measure almost everything else.

So for the 3S-FE engine, will I see any change (better or worse) in performance or mileage by using 95 RON?

Sweet as, cheers dude. I get roughly 650Kms to a tank of 91 so I'll see how this goes.

Hey everyone,

So I've been on this forum for a little while now and I've figured solutions to most of my questions from seeing previous threads, however I couldn't get the search to work for this particular question I have.

So for the people with the 3S-FE engine, I was wondering which octane you run. I have been using 91 since I bought the car in November, and my Dad said that he ran our old 5th Gen Celica GT-R (3S-GE I think) on 91 also, however I decided to try 95 today since I was driving on the fuel light. I had a short drive home from the petrol station so I haven't had chance to see any difference yet.

So yeah, let me know which you use and feel free to yell at me if I've done something wrong, cheers.