6G Celicas Forums

i took off the front wheels to inspect the brakes since they're making intermittent squealing noises when braking at low speeds. i suspected the brake pads to be thin.

after removing the front wheels, i was greeted with a nice green color on the struts.



TRD coilovers!

how many other surprises will i find on this car!? there were no details from the exporter about any aftermarket parts installed but it seems i've found a real gem. i was wondering why the wheel gap seemed to be a little narrow and the ride to be a little harsh but i just thought that it was on some sort of lowering springs. maybe the exporter had no idea what they had?

it's currently lowered to about 60% should i go lower? seems pretty low already.






does anyone know if the 1 means soft and 4 means hard? or is it the other way around?


based on this pic, do the brake pads need replacing? the creaking/squealing noise that i'm hearing is either coming from the pads or the caliper pistons. i really hope it's the pads..





i also have a green front drive axle! wtf?





and a drive joy oil filter.. meh



This post has been edited by azian_advanced: May 24, 2012 - 12:29 AM

pads look like they have life... but squealing can come from the contact point between the metal part of the pad and the piston itself... may invest in some anti-squealers for the backs of those pads to quiet them up.

maybe tein started making fwd axles! lol

At first, seeing the faded hood and turbo timer and now discovering all the hidden goodies.... I think someone is beginning to love his new car.

Couldn't have been given to a better guy either... he'll take good care of it.

Maybe it just needs to be cleaned. Sometimes just a small bit of metal could've gone somewhere in the caliper or around the pads somewhere which makes this noise. Take the pads out and clean everything off and put them back on making sure everything is fine.
I would like to know if 1 is the softest and 4 the stiffest too. I've always wondered, maybe I'd change mine to a softer level for an everyday ride.

This post has been edited by dudeofchaos: May 24, 2012 - 5:19 PM

nice score on the coilovers, just go for a drive on 1, then switch it over to 4. my guess that 1 would be the softest

I'm curious to know about the coilover settings as well, and find out how you feel about them. Are you still feeling any bogging like you mentioned on page 1?

ok i did some searching on gt4oc and they mention that 1=softest & 4=hardest. when i got my car they were all set to 2 but then i changed them to 1 now and there is a difference but barely even noticeable. i was glad that the coilover damper settings can be changed for the rear without having to remove the rear hatch panels.

i also went to a local tuning shop and ordered an HKS replacement foam air filter. unfortunately they were out of the 200mm-diameter ones and only had 150mm in stock. since it would take a week to order and i didn't want to risk not having a filter, i bought the 150-mm filter insert and put an order in for a gray 200mm filter.




i think the bogging issue i'm having is spark related since it's intermittent. since it's been raining a lot it hasn't been happening much lately. it must be the cold because it happens more frequently on warmer/drier days. i did a search and someone had exactly the same symptoms as i (ie. intermittent bogging on high engine load during boost) and turned out to be spark plug wires. so i will be putting in an order for oem wires, cap, and rotor soon but will have to hold for a couple of weeks once i move out. since i'll be changing the wires, i went ahead and pre-ordered a set of IK22 spark plugs from the same tuning shop as i was told they were the best out there and aren't even available in regular stores. i know the stock st205 uses bkr6e plugs or whatever which can be found anywhere but i took the guy's word for it since they do performance tuning in-house. it also turns out that IK22's are the same as the TRD plugs.


since all cars in Canada are required to have daytime running lights (drl) i went and picked up a DRL kit. it cost $40 and wiring was pretty straight forward. but instead of having the headlamps as my DRLs, i wired them up to my foglamps.



i installed the drl module right where the abs was supposed to be.

today, i had a day off and rewind a couple of days back, i found where my old car was. it was sitting in a wrecker yard for the past few months. so today, i went there first thing in the morning. it was a sad sight to see the car just sitting on the side skirts and ss-iii rear splitters.. wheels, suspension, hubs, all gone.





the interior was pretty much completely intact except for the door panels. the driver side door panel was completely ripped off. i'm guessing somebody saw the JL 8" subs and didn't want to waste time figuring out how the door panel comes off. so yea the subs are gone but i was able to pull out the mids and tweeters as well as the speaker grills for all the speakers. the passenger-side panel was removed properly and was just sitting outside, just my luck since my driver-side (rhd) panel is a little loose and shakes when i shut the door.

the car was basically sitting in the middle of a puddle since it had rained a lot for the past few days. in order to remove the speakers without having to sit on broken glass all over the interior of the car, i used what was left of the driver-side door panel and the rear parcel tray as a platform to avoid getting wet. it hurt having to use interior panels as stepping stones to get around the car.

in addition to the speakers and grills, i also took the heated seat kit, my interior 110V heater wires, my alarm/starter module with temperature sensor and shock sensor (i forgot to get the friggin antenna!!), a window regulator/motor, and my bluetooth input stereo adapter that was neatly tucked away behind the oem stereo.




when i got home i immediately got to work and started doing the 8-speaker conversion. i'll let the pics speak for themselves.















this last picture is with the original (cloth) door panel but i just pulled off the cloth and made it match the driver-side leather panel.
what's nice about the 4-speaker system is that all the wires are already there for the tweeters.. just plug n play!
once i get 8" subs again, i will also be running proper cross-overs and amplifiers for the sound system. but for now, all 3 speakers are wired together which sounds better than just the 4 speakers but still sounds pretty bad. those 6.5" stock speakers are just about to crack.


next on the list was to wire up the heated seats. to do this i basically did the same thing as i did before. remove the chair, insert heating elements, run wire from under chair through the centre console and up to the window vent where i installed the heated seat switch then wired it up to a good power source and ground.







the heated seats work great. even better in the recaros since the cloth material is a lot thinner than the leather (padded) covers. oh it's gonna be a good winter

but that's not all i also wired up my two interior heaters. i had this set up in my old car and it rocked. sure it uses a ****load of electricity and ended up getting wasted for the most part, but when you're paying $500+ for parking for 2 terms, i'm gonna take advantage of it. i know they're a bit overkill but it's nice to walk into your car in the winter and it's already warmed up. i just need to put a timer in. the wires for the heaters run under the passenger side carpet and towards & through the firewall. at the front, there's a 110V plug ready to plug in. btw, this is only phase 1 of my winter-prep, i have an in-line water heater/pump that i've been wanting to put in as well as an inline lower rad hose heater.





and here is something i put in the car. it's an actual flare that came off an old minivan that we used to own.



This post has been edited by azian_advanced: May 29, 2012 - 2:15 AM

noice. Welcome to the club. theres some good parts on that car. Good stuff. and congrats. Question.. didnt your car come with a jdm flare? they all usually do. Annnd were teh sideskirts on your old car still intact or smashed cause its been sitting on it?

About the brakes, it can be some non standard "high performance" pads, they usally make a lot of squealing sounds.. the yellowish dust looks like they are not standard anyway.

What kind of DRL kit did u use ? ..Here in sweden we also need to use lights daytime, but it doesnt need to be automatic, however its very easy to forget about it when you are used to cars with automatic DRL (as most cars sold in sweden have)

I really like that flare, I dig the utilitarian way that you mounted it in the foot well. Anyway, sad to see your car like that - I'd cry and punch something in the face in that situation. Why did you not remove all the parts at time of parting with the car? Sweet GT-4 still too, looks like she's in good hands...

Gerald; what shape is the driverside projector housing in on your old red one??

did yours come with it? i always thought the jdm flares were removed as they are hazardous materials.. anyway i remember playing with one of the flares when i went camping as a kit. it makes a nice 2ft flame just need to make sure you don't wear expensive clothing when you light one up
the skirts and splitters are bent but are probably repairable. the problem is getting under the car to undo the locking tabs & screws. you'd need to jack up the car to get to it but i didn't want to take any chances since there have been many deaths with cars falling on people at junk yards.



i figured that the pads were high performance type pads since they were yellow. i'm gonna switch back to regular supra TT on the next set.
this is the kit that i went with. it cost $40 + tax.



you have to wire up to a constant 12V (battery), ignition, ground, then your headlight of choice (for me it's the fogs), and optional parking lights, and optional high beams if you want the DRLs to shut off when the high beams are triggered.




jdm cars have their flares in that location. since it has everything but the flare, i decided to put one in.
i was not able to remove the parts because after the accident, the car wasn't driveable. the insurance company allows you to come back for the car to retrieve any loose items but anything secured to the vehicle cannot be removed but instead holds value in the insurance write-off amount. unfortunately i wasn't able to bid on it at the salvage auctions to buy it back as a parts car and sell the parts.




i checked the lamps and they're all damaged. but the driver side high and low beam lenses are still good. the internals of the projector is also in good shape.

The biggest thing for me is the tabs of the projector. I don't want/need anything else, just the outer shell that holds everything. Unless the driverside is in really good shape, then I might snag the entire thing off you.

Are you going back to get the command start antenna? Would you mind grabbing the DS projector for me at the same time? (just need the driverside low, provided all tabs are in usable condition)

Thanks man! I appreciate it!

This post has been edited by KAOS: May 29, 2012 - 1:53 PM

They also lifted up the car with the lift directly on the skirts.
I was there the day they took out the motor and rest of the suspension to try and get a couple of parts, and saw that they had lifted it up directly on the sirts, so they're probably pretty damaged, and as Gerald said, dangerous to get off.

Gerald: They took off all the suspension parts in the shop, if you ask the guys working there (Im sure you have) they may still have some of it sitting around inside.

all the lamps have at least one broken tab. i know the driverside high beam still has at least one good tab but i was not able to see the condition bottom tabs of the driver-side because the bumper was still on. the projector might have its two bottom tabs intact but wasn't able to check to confirm.

i wanted to get the ST205 TEIN springs back but didn't know i'm already rolling on TRD coilovers so i have no need for them. but to whoever wants them, it has new KYB GR2 struts all around too. the racingbeat end links are still on the car and waould've been an easy grab but they're really rusted. also, the rear leather seats are in mint condition, the passenger was mint before the accident but now has a 2-inch scratch on the bottom, center hood grill, hood vents, hood spoiler, one HID module, center stereo surround panel, shift boot, gauge cluster, dash, premium stereo and both amplifiers, leather 4-spoke steering wheel (no center), ABS front and rear hubs (with poly trailing arm bushigs for the rears), and many more... for any locals who are interested.

i wanted to take the cruise control but there is no place to put the actuator since the hks intake pipe is in the way.

there are still a lot of parts available. i told the owner if he is willing let go of the parts for less than his asking price, that i will recommend some of my friends to come get some parts off of it themselves.

This post has been edited by azian_advanced: May 29, 2012 - 2:46 PM

Yeah all the ones i know that are here came with it, although i think denley's was expired. I thought yours came with it and replaced it with that one. and thanks for telling me about the skirts. Been looking for TRD deals but a little hard to come by.

How much does the yard want for end links?

Did he say he had all the parts in the shop? Or wherever they store them?