well, I did a compression test on my car the other day and cylinders 2 and 3 had low compression. Then I did a wet compression test and the numbers went up... so, that means worn piston rings. the next day, as I was drving my car fairly aggressively, the car sputtered and died as I was driving it. I pulled into a parking lot and tried to start it. it cranked, but wouldn't turn over. The cranking noises it made were not consistent either, indicating low compression in one or more cylinders... meaning, I more than likely fried my piston rings. so, I'm planning on selling all the aftermarket stuff off my car, using the money to buy a new car, then buying a new engine or rebuilding my engine for the celica, and then selling it too. I want a car that comes from the factory witha turbo, so it'll be a little more reliable! I'm thinking about MKIII supra turbos, MKII mr2 turbo's (a little out of my price range though), ST185 alltracs (again, a little too expensive, but more-so just hard to find), 95-99 mitsubishi eclipse GSX, and also looking at some miatas, and S14 240sx's. I might be able to get a 7th gen if i take out a loan, but I don't know if I'm willing to do that. anyway, there's the low-down and what-not... I'm gonna miss this car.

This post has been edited by 6strngs: May 17, 2008 - 3:08 AM

Damn, that really sucks. Good luck getting rebuilt.

Now, me and the mad scientist got to rip apart the block and replace the piston rings you fried.

Sorry i had too.

keep the car, do an engine swap.

>

yea... id keep it and just swap it.

anyone can buy a car turbo, but to build your own setup gets mad props.

think 5 years from now how nice you could have your car, even just by puttin $100 a month into for parts how good it would look.

take out loan $7k

swap in 2nd gen 3s

bigger turbo & supporting

new paint

new suspension

then work on it slowly as you pay that off. shouldnt be more than 1-200 a month for payments.

I think you should keep it and swap in a different engine.

since hes in cali its almost impossible to get a 2's swap into it unless he can source a usdm 3's motor but good luck and i wish you the best

>



what?

if you sell the aftermarket parts i call dibs on some stuff. if not good luck on whatever you plan do to.

dude nate that sucks man! i was looking forward on seeing you at the next meet!!!!!

ok, well, I did a compression check on it the day before the engine blew, and this is what lead me to believe that the piston rings were going out. here were the results:

178, 150, 155, 176

then a wet test showed these numbers:

200, 190, 185, 202

so, it indicated that the piston rings were going out. so, today I finally did a compression test again and here were the results:

90, 10, 50, 45

and a wet test was something like:

130, 50, 80, 90

so, it seems to point towards blown piston rings, however, it seems strange to me that all the cylinders would go at the same time so I'm not really sure what's up. I don't know what could affect them all. the only things I could really think of were the timing belt snapping and bending a lot of valves, but since this is a non-interference engine, that's not possible. anybody have any ideas? or is it definately the piston rings?


anyway, yes, since I live in california, it's not so easy as to just drop a 3s in. What I was planning on doing to smog my 5s was remove all the stuff and throw stock stuff back on when smog rolled around. it's not so easy to do that with a 3sgte... And the only way to have a smog legal 3s is to have a same year or newer engine and all the same smog equipment. So, that means getting one from a 94 or 95 MR2. I don't know if JDM ones will be legal. However, I don't know how a smog referree could tell the difference between an engine from a JDM 93 alltrac or a USDM 94 mr2. do they have a VIN or serial number on them or something? plus, all 94+ JDM 3sgtes are 3rd gens, which, apart from being too expensive for me, would probably be even harder to pass. If I did get a 2nd gen 3s, I would probably need to use a USDM ECU, and I would definately need to get a USDM intake manifold and all the EGR equipment just to pass smog. So, yeah. I'm also not sure if I would need to also find a california spec engine too. If I did, then that rules out all JDM engines, and it would be next to impossible to find an engine from a 94 or 95 cali-spec MR2!


anyway, right now I'm trying to decide between buying a 2002 celica GTS 6-speed for $9000 and having to make payments on it for a couple years while having to pay way increased insurance bills. Or, buying my dad's 94 honda civic 4-door 5-speed for $750. having to pay almost no money for insurance, and getting about 34 mpg in the city and 42 on the freeway while I save my money up for a year or whatever to buy a really uber nice car, like an ST185, or a WRX, or a 7th gen, or whatever.

As for parts, they will almost definately go for sale in the next couple of days. I will be selling mostly my celica-specific or 5sfte-specific parts at first and holding onto some of the universal parts for a little bit until I make up my mind. Please don't call dibs on stuff yet though. I don't know how motivated I'm gonna be to pull all the stuff off and I don't want you to be waiting on me for too long and all.

oh yeah... to top it all off, my T3/T4 turbo came in the mail today finally

This post has been edited by 6strngs: Apr 21, 2008 - 11:00 PM

Hey how do you like the kyb gr2 shocks on your car?
I was thinking of getting those instead of the nex kit

Also why dont you just swap in the same motor? You have a 5sfe right and those motor cost less than the 7afe you should be able to find one for 5 or $600. I have seen 5s engines with 250 hp and huge torque numbers and if you just received your turbo why not finish it?

Regardless if you know how to do some of this work yourself you should have the car running for around the $750 or more it is going to cost you to get the civic on the road.

This is just me [I don't give up on cars - especially not over an engine] but why don't you get the sh*tvic for now and save money and buy yourself a good 98+ Camry/Celica motor and build it right?

i am looking at a rebuilt engine for 700 bucks on ebay.

I would not give up on the celi, but of course it also depends on how much money is available. I have alternate means of transoportation.

Before you do sell, just think about if you are going to be happy without it. follow your dreams. If they dont include a celi, well then you know...

my dreams include something RWD or AWD, with a turbo, fast, but isn't getting close to 20 years old, and something that I can still afford. oh, and reliable too... lol. As Manny and others have told me so many times: "Cheap, Fast, Reliable... Pick two." I've been looking for engines but I haven't seen any for anywhere near $700. I saw a rebuilt long block for $2200 on ebay. and I found a rebuilt complete engine for $1500 and short block for $750. But one of my co-workers today was telling me that we have an account with this engine place and we get about a 20-30% discount from them and I could probably find a rebuilt or even new engine for $500-800, so I'm gonna look into that.

I'm not 100% sure what's gonna happen yet, I'm gonna talk to my teacher tonight at school about the legality of a 3sgte swap since he's a smog referee.

1000 rebuilt

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewI...A:IT&ih=011

400 used.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/92-93-94-95...sspagenameZWDVW

745 used

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/92-95-Toyot...sspagenameZWDVW

rebuilt cylinder head 400

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/TOYOTA-CAMR...sspagenameZWDVW

another cylinder

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/TOYOTA-CAMR...sspagenameZWDVW

there, stop waisting time and rbuild that baby.....

Yea I got my 99 long block for $900...they are out there...If it was me I would end up regretting giving up on the celica but maybe for you this is the last straw either way good luck with what ever path you may chose.

hmm, so I called the engine place my coworker was talking about. it's $750 for an engine (don't know if it's new or rebuilt, probably rebuilt) and $550 for a transmission. for $1300, I could have a car practically with 0 miles... I'm gonna ask them if they can get a 94-95 MR2 turbo engine and an E-153 w/ LSD. if not, I'll ask about a 98+ engine. I'm considering keeping it, but I just don't know yet. I'm gonna pull the old engine out, save up some money, and go from there.

>
RWD is still calling isnt it?




































I cant shut it up here

well, this engine isn't so hard to remove... I've got about 75% of it all done already. the motor might even come out tomorrow!

im assuming you are keepin.

No pics, it aint happening!!!

so its not hard at all? I want to do this some day!

>
well, I say it's not hard because I've done it all before. it's too dark to take pics right now, but it's happening. lol. I didn't end up doing any work on it today, maybe monday it'll come out...

I'm soo confused as to whether or not to keep it. because I want to, I really do, but it's sooooooo much money to get it how I want it that I just don't see it being worth it because in the end, it's still going to be slower than a ton of other cars that I could've just bought instead. sure, it's got that original "wow" factor, but I just don't know if it's worth it.

the options I have now:

1: 3sgte swap. can be street legal if I spend a TON of money, otherwise is illegal but I might be able to get away with it and have it become legal if the smog referree isn't the brightest. soo expensive though

2: build up a 5sfe with forged internals and all. probably won't pass smog, and will cost pretty close to the same as the 3s, with less horsepower to show for it.

3: get a 5sfe and put only a thicker head gasket for a lower compression ration, and ARP head bolts. Also have the head ported and polished and possibly have the intake manifold bored out a little. This is by far the most cost effective, but I really don't know if it'll be reliable enough. After seeing the problems Calijeff, bccentaur, and now me have had, I really don't think the 5s is as durable as everyone says they are. except the 98+'s since everyone with one of those hasn't had any problems...

4: new car!

Go 3s bro. Thats what I'm about to do. I really cant say that the 5sfe is NOT durable, because I didn't care about the outcome of the motor. I did it as a learning process. I mean who here would have the balls to boost a motor with a little over 208,000 miles? I got it tuned over and over, but I knew it was going to go sometime, but didn't think it would happen so fast.

Don't get a new car. You and I are both still young, so just do what you do. Working on my celica is my hobby. Without it I wouldn't be able to sit still. Just spend the money and drop in the 3s and work from there. When you get older and make more money, you can finally buy what ever car you want. But if you are in the same position as I am, stick with the celica and work on her.

>


X 2, except the young part.

5: move out of california. get away from arnold's dictatorship.

>
ha ha. maybe one day. but I like the governator. lol. then again, I don't really follow politics... at all. but anyway, I have to finish up college first, and I'll go from there.

I still don't know on the celica. I could almost buy a nice ST185 for the price it's gonna cost for a legal 3s, and then I'd have AWD!

has anyone used flashoptions.com? they have an ST185 clip for $1200! but they only accept bank transfers and western union and money orders, whcih seems extremely fishy to me.

flashoptions= junk
dont bother.

>

Do that or buy an mr2.

>
I just wish I could find one worth buying within 100 miles of me. I wouldn't mind driving to so-cal or nevada or even oregon for one, but it's hard to tell the condition of a car you see on the internet. I'd hate to drive up there and spend $150+ on gas, let alone food and possibly a hotel room for one night, only to find out the car is junk. I'm keeping my eyes out for a good one.

I wouldn't mind an MR2. same engine, but is soo much lighter and therefore gonna be faster. but, I just can't imagine working on one. everytime I see the engine bay of one, I just cringe at the thought of ever having to work on one... and I thought my car was a pain to work on. lol

This post has been edited by 6strngs: Apr 26, 2008 - 5:07 PM

i used to think the same thing until i actually worked on one. Its not bad at all.