st205 swap Options

[mycelicagt]

I am wanting to do a ST205 3sgte swap but im wondering how reliable the motor actually is, and if you did the swap yourself or had a shop do it all, thanks guys.

[Silver94CelicaOw...]

IMO, the words "3SGTE swap" and " repair shop" should never be combined. When you depend on others to make your swap work properly, theres a lack of readiness on behalf of the owner should a problem arise and could make the entire effort of swapping a failure. At the very least, I would suggest having a very strong knowledge base if you were having the swap done for you....but at that point, you could probably do it yourself!

I'm not trying to be a downer, but not everyone's best move is to swap their Celica. Sometimes having what you want in a stock platform that you can take to a shop to be repaired is better suited for you.

A swap can be just as reliable as the motor would have been in its original form, just so long as all the bugs are worked out and diagnosed properly if they should arise.
If you're looking for a drive-and-forget kind of motor like a 5SFE, then a 3SGTE transplant may not be for you....its going to require alot of time under the hood regardless of how well it runs. If its something that you know you want then the best thing to do is bury yourself in research and get your hands dirty until you're confident you can take on a swap, beyond the shadow of a doubt.


I'm swapping a super-clean ST205 engine right now and I love it so far. The details and refinements that Toyota applied to the 3rd gen 3SGTE make me glad I went this route. So to answer the first question, I would reccomend it.