Alaska Celica ST revival, Stuck on what I should do to bring my 6th gen back from the dead Options

[Livewire]

So not sure what happened to my first post, but it lacked pictures anyways...

How’s it going, new here, and I inherited a 96 Celica ST hatch from my parents. Basically there was a pop as my dad was driving it up a nearby hill, and it started spewing white smoke out the tail pipe. It then sat in their yard for what I can recall is about 13 years. That’s 13 years of Alaskan winters without moving. Needless to say this car is pretty rough. But, my parents were pretty easy to convince to get rid of the car for the low low cost of a tow dolly ��. Back in October I did a compression test and if I remember right there was two cylinders with 0 compression... now I’m considering doing a full rebuild or a swap, don’t know if I’m super keen on keeping the 7A when there’s so much more fun to be had with this car but stuck on if I should swap it, and if I do what I should swap with, or just rebuild and call it a day. I’m a delivery driver so gas mileage is somewhat of a concern here . What do you guys think? Mind the mess but whatever I decide to do I’m happy to have a new car to join a forum that’s not for another ford








This post has been edited by Livewire: Jul 16, 2020 - 12:20 AM

[cheela]

7A is definitely a good engine for daily driving and MPG but it gets boring fast so just a heads up. but if you put $$ into the suspension/tires etc then it can still be fun to throw around in the twisties. $4k is a good budget for either a rebuild or a swap. I'm close to $3k into my swap from 7A to 3sge BEAMS so it's definitely doable.

I'd give it a real long nice power wash first to see what you have to work with. and check the hatch area. I see that the spoiler is off and the holes for it were left uncovered so I hope water and whatnot didn't seep into it and into the hatch area. other than that, good luck with the build, it'll be nice to see it restored once you're finished.