long time lurker, 1995 Celica ST liftback Options

[ds8]

Hello everyone,

This thread is to document work I do to my celica. It is my second celica, my first was a 1995 GT but somebody rear ended it while it was parked in front of my house.

Some pics of my old one

on the right




I had that celica from late 2009 or early 2010 and I junked it in january of 2016. On new years eve I was driving my 2016 WRX and left the celica parked in the street. I got a call from my brother around 3 or 4 am that somebody hit my car. the cops showed up, took his info, and gave it to my brother. I showed up the next day to find this







The impact pushed the car one house over. It received front end damage as well, it had hit another car parked in in front of the next house.

The kid who hit it was 18 and uninsured driving his moms 98 4runner. I have uninsured motorist coverage so after 3 or 4 weeks I got a check from my insurance for $2,800. They offered $3,000 and they keep the car, or $2,800 and I keep it. So I kept it and started looking for a replacement.

I found another 1995, same color as mine, but it was an ST with the 1.8 7AFE, not the 2.2 5SFE that my GT had. My GT had 230,000 miles on it and this one only had 71,000 miles. It also had decent paint whereas my GT had **** paint that I never got around to getting repainted. Oh and the GT's AC didnt work, and this one worked perfectly. The car was listed for $3,500, I offered $3,000 over the phone, and talked him down another $200 in person so I got the car for $2,800. Exactly what my insurance had given me.

heres a pic from the drive home



and the rest of the car




I pulled all of the useful things from the GT that I could think of, including my front seats, speakers, stereo, wheels/rims, interior trim pieces, etc... The new ST had an ugly tan interior and the front seats were dirty and kinda gross so I put my GT's front seats in. My GT had a black interior. After pulling stuff out I junked it for $150.

So far I have tinted the windows, installed a keyless entry system, a trunk popper, bluetooth stereo, speakers, and seat warmers. The ST has manual locks and windows. The windows I can deal with, but manual locks were really annoying so I purchased a kit with door lock actuators and installed them. I pulled out the entire interior to run wiring for the trunk popper, seat warmers, actuators, and the keyless entry box. While I had everything out I laid down the poor mans dynamat, peel n seal



A friend of mine had recently redone the carpet in his house and had leftover carpet padding he gave me for free. I laid it over my floor over the peel n seal. Then I got a black carpet from the junk yard, washed very well with a pressure washer and installed it. On all of my interior panels I glued quilting foam to the inside of the panels. The interior is nice and quiet now and I have 0 rattles. I still get road noise but overall its a good improvement.

I have also upgraded most of my lights to LED








one last pic of the car


One of my current projects is the rims. I got a second set of factory alloy wheels I'm restoring. I want one set in bright rally white and another in silver. Once I finish the first set I'll swap them and restore the other set.

This post has been edited by ds8: May 11, 2017 - 4:27 PM

[ds8]

I would like to hear your opinions on refinishing this set of factory alloys. I got them stripped and ready for paint. My question is do I powder coat or do regular automotive paint + clearcoat or engine enamel? I wanna do this set in bright white. I'm talking rally white. Once they are done I'll swap them out and redo the set currently on the car in silver.

[narly_charley]

I would like to hear your opinions on refinishing this set of factory alloys. I got them stripped and ready for paint. My question is do I powder coat or do regular automotive paint + clearcoat or engine enamel? I wanna do this set in bright white. I'm talking rally white. Once they are done I'll swap them out and redo the set currently on the car in silver.

Powder Coat all day. I had a set of TRD 18" wheels for my 7th gen that I sent to Wheels America (their Chicago branch before they closed it down). They were bent to hell and back and had DEEP curb rash. They sent them back and they looked better than new, I could not have been happier. If you plan on racing/tracking it with the wheels, I wouldn't recommend refinishing like that because they heat them up pretty hot and CAN make them more brittle. Mine was just driven on the road, so I didn't have any issues.


https://wheelsamerica.com/retail-services/w...epair-services/