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From what I can tell it's binding at the inner joint. I already have the replacement on hand so it's just a matter of switching them out. I really hope I don't have to struggle with the c-clip anywhere near as much as I did this past weekend. I was using an 8lb slide hammer and a CV axle attachment, and it still took forever to break loose.

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hmmm, the butt dyno says the red cover puts this 5S into 1MZ territory lol

yeah I'm thinking SS as well cause its a factory toyota LSD in the beams, but I can't isolate the variables. Good news is that you should be able to.

with my car, I just bought a house like Daniel, am in the PROCESS of getting the garage, because there isn't one. Have been trying to get everything done and the car has remained at my fathers. Need to get my wheels straightened out and rubber on them and i'll move the car to the house. It needs fender work, toms lip installed, side skirts painted and installed, rear lip painted and installed, rear visor installed, rear spoiler figured out and maybe painted and installed, and the worst of it is that I need to change the timing belt and a bearing on the BEAMS. Pretty rough "grind" coming from over there. Don't really want to pull the motor, but because i can't screw up the timing, I might as well (again I reference the garage need).

But I do miss driving it and sitting in the recaros and getting crazy ass looks from the Rhd.


But this looks good. I enjoyed the last 10 pages

Well I hope you get the house situation figured out soon because that car needs to be on the road! And thank you, I'm glad people enjoy the thread. It's certainly a pain taking pics in the middle of a job haha.

Update:

The driver side axle has been replaced with another new part and my driveability issue is solved. No more vibration at speeds over 25mph
In other news, I spent the hours after work this week installing the front/rear gt4 suspension and brakes:


The GT4 rotors and calipers look even more massive when they're mounted on the car! Could not be happier with how this turned out.


I will be running stock GT brake lines until I can have a set of SS lines made. I do not see any issues just running the GT lines permanently though.


I had to use 7 cotter pins per side haha. Here you can see the infamous figure 8.


I am using the stock GT4 sway bar up front together with the Mazda 5 links I detailed earlier in the thread. I will be replacing the rear bar with a suspension techniques part to take care of whatever understeer the helical and SS can't handle.


I will be adding bellows to the struts in the near future. The stock parts were torn by me unfortunately


I also purchased a set of Monroe GT rear struts and swapped the GT4 springs onto them. The stock GT4 rear struts do not mate up with a USDM rear spindle unfortunately. However this actually works out in my favor because I still get the benefit of stiffer rear springs with dampers that match a lighter ST204 rear end. The GT4 rear calipers then just require a 5mm spacer to line up properly. Nothing a trip to Ace Hardware couldn't fix

Can't comment on the details of the handling just yet because I haven't put any real miles on these, but initial impressions are very good. Turning circle is tight, there is no binding at full lock with a usdm rack, turns feel confident and planted, less nose dive under braking, less squat under accleration, and overall ride quality is slightly better than stock GT. Oh yea, GT4 brakes bite HARD

This suspension still needs an alignment, and I have to get the front rotors cut about a mm further towards the top hats so the pads bite better. Other than that things feel tight with no clunking anywhere.

I would rate this conversion as easy to do. Just replace the inner tie rods with shorter ones and you will have no issues (There's even an off-the-shelf tie rod available, so no custom machining is required). The USDM rack, GT brake lines, GT axles, and subframe all work just fine. Your experience may vary and your particular application might be different, so dont treat this thread as a guide; I can't accept responsibility for harm caused by attempts to follow my work!

anyway, I will be the guinea pig and let everyone know how this holds up over time.

Next update should be paint!

This post has been edited by enderswift: Aug 15, 2014 - 10:57 PM

Looks fantastic Luke

Wow amazing. Real gt4 front end... Props

Baller. I need to refresh my whole superstrut suspension like this. Really give the car the fine tooth comb.

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Thank you as always Dustin

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Thank you, it's about as close to the real thing as I can manage.

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it's worth it in my opinion, especially if the goal is to be factory-like in terms of reliability. The only downside is that after a certain point it becomes a game of diminishing returns. You end up exerting enormous amounts of effort for only a little gain. I consider the paint and powder coating I did to the suspension to be a perfect example of this haha.

As for my thoughts on the helical and susperstrut:

Helical with mcpherson suspension:

The only way I could tell the helical was there was during sharp high speed turns. I would coast into a 90 degree turn in at ~25mph and step on it mid-corner. With an open diff this always caused the car to understeer like craaaazy. With the helical the car pulls right through. The tricky thing now is the fact that I have to actively countersteer at the end of a corner because the car wants to keep cornering and the powersteering cant keep up haha. (edit) I forgot to mention how the car acts when flooring it from a standstill. Torque steer is GREATLY diminished. I used keep one hand on the wheel when punching it to keep it from turning left, but now I can control the car with literally one finger. Another benefit is the fact that jumping into traffic is now a possibility in many more situations. making a right turn out of a parking lot onto a busy street is no longer a matter of waiting for a big gap in the flow of traffic. I can now floor it and the car will simply accererate into the turn without any wheel hop/spin.

TL;DR: buy a helical.

Helical and superstrut

Superstrut is awesome. I like it. And the biggest reason is because it removes the pucker factor from a lot of the things I'd try to do in the past. For instance I'm a big fan of merging onto a highway at speed. That means taking the clover-leaf on-ramps with your foot on the gas. With mcpherson I would feel nervous going past half throttle and I would usually max out at 45mph. Superstrut takes that nervous feeling away. The car feels planted and I give it more gas, finding myself taking those ramps about 5-10mph faster without being worried. Trace, I haven't noticed the car diving in half way through the on ramp yet, but keep in mind my tires are pretty worn and the alignment wasn't set when I went about testing this. Plus I'm still running a stock rear sway bar so there was a decent amount of roll


Update time:

The car is in for paint!





At the moment I've asked the shop to:

-Straighten Hood and repair crushed area near latch
-Remove front windshield and repair any existing rust/ rustproof
-Repair fender dents
-Paint and Blend all front panels
-Repair Passenger rocker panel
-Repair bumper cover cracks and tears and reinforce weak areas.

I'm excited to see the results

Before all of this I took the car to have the 3in exhaust pipe welded back together, this time with a set of flanges to allow the inevitable future disassembly. My god was it nice to drive the white car without choking on exhaust fumes, or making an insane amount of noise, or having a temporary flex pipe rattle on the cross member.

I also went in for an alignment. Wow this ended up turning into a cluster. Long story short, I asked the alignment guys to be careful with the suspension because I just painted/coated everything. Well they used vise grips on everything and ruined the finish on a number of parts


I have no idea how this could have happened. All I asked them to do was adjust the toe. Nothing else.


Ruined the threads on the inner rods too, even though the flat spot for a 12mm wrench is right there....

Sigh. I touched most of the areas up and I'm on the lookout for some off-the-shelf inner tie rods that will work with superstrut.

Anyway,

I just ordered a set of st202 stainles brake lines and a new FX300 clutch kit from clutchmasters. The car should be painted within two weeks and when it gets back I'll immediately work towards dropping in the 3S

I've also been looking into a devils own WI kit, a symtech map clamp, a turbo timer, and an HKS EVC-S boost controller. It's time to get some power out of this setup

This post has been edited by enderswift: Sep 1, 2014 - 8:34 PM

that sucks, bunch of incompetents. sorry to hear that..

go yell at them! that angers me just looking at it!

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I appreciate the sentiment, and I was annoyed for sure, but there would be no point to yell. In the end its just paint. I should have taken the car to the local alignment specialist instead of a good year center. The guys in goodyear/firestone/wherever are just there to get a job done. They don't look at cars the same way people on this site do

The silver lining to all this is that it motivated me to find an off-the-shelf solution for the inner tie rods!

If you are trying to convert your car to superstrut, you only need to buy inner tie rods from a MKIV Supra! They are the perfect length to fit superstrut outer tie rods to a USDM steering rack

Observe:


Stock st205 inner tie rod on the left, 1994 Supra rod on the right. The ST205 joints are a little too short to work on a USDM steering rack, but the Supra part makes up for this difference perfectly. No need to custom machine anything, no need to weld anything, just buy the supra parts and bolt all of the superstrut parts right on



As always, this is a custom application for my specific car. Your experience may vary and I cannot be liable for damages resulting from attempts to copy my work

This post has been edited by enderswift: Sep 1, 2014 - 8:39 PM

great job finding a replacement and easy plug in inner tie rod. thanks for updating the mcpherson to superstrut thread with the pics.

by the way i see you don't have abs stock on your celica gt. did you happen to see how the abs line was connected to the st205 knuckle on the clip you bought long ago??

I knew there was bound to be a direct fit part out there somewhere. I would have just never guessed it would end up being a 4th gen supra. And I was more than happy to update the conversion thread. I feel these suspensions have a lot to offer so its good to put together a one stop shop for information.

As for the abs sensor line, it actually ran on the underside of the banana arm to the knuckle. It was protected by a plastic cover which I have unfortunately thrown away (you can still see the two 10mm bolts that used to secure the cover on the arm on one of my previous photos). After coming up from the banana arm it simply runs to the the axle just like in the mcpherson setup.

This post has been edited by enderswift: Sep 1, 2014 - 8:26 PM

good job!

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Thanks Berto

Quick update:

Stainless brake lines and new clutch have arrived


Gave the resurfaced flywheel a rinse with brake cleaner before checking to see if they sent me the correct kit


Looks like they sent me a 5s disk instead of a 3s disk with a 5s spline. Whatever, I have no doubt it will hold power just fine


It was interesting to see that they have changed their pressure plate design in the last two years. It is has more cutouts compared to the previous one, which looked like every stock pressure plate ever.



I am very impressed with the quality of these lines. They are produced by a company called HEL, and this particular set is for an ST202 celica, which comes superstrut. So they should be the correct length for my car. The GT lines work, but they are too short to be secured at the stock strut location. At the moment they slide past the strut during every turn, which I feel will ultimately lead to a failure.

where u get the clutch?

Purchased another fx300 directly from clutchmasters

Hey 6gc,

I have another small update. The majority of the body work has been done on the car and it's going to be getting a fresh coat of paint very soon. Therefore I've been busy fixing up a few small things on the 3s so that it's ready to be dropped in as soon as the car returns.

observe:



Nearly all of the nuts and bolts securing the turbo system began to loosen shortly after the first swap and I developed tiny but annoying leaks. Therefore I took everything apart, replaced all of the exhaust studs, replaced all of the gaskets, and reassembled the system with Nord-lock washers. I should have zero issues no matter how much the engine vibrates or how many heat cycles it goes through


Unfortunately I didn't layer enough coats on the block when I painted it, so the finish was starting to break down from the turbo heat Next time I'll make sure to put on more than two coats.


The turbo parts painted with VHT extreme paint held up beautifully. I'm nothing short of amazed by this stuff, it's approaching powder/ceramic-coat levels of durability! Easy to paint with too


...which is why I coated the downpipe with it as well. The original ceramic was beginning to look a little beat up from my non-stop tinkering.


After lots and lots of masking I touched up the block with multiple coats of engine enamel. I'm curious to see how it holds up this time.


And done

I cant wait to revive the monster

This post has been edited by enderswift: Sep 15, 2014 - 9:51 AM

Very nice!

So pretty.

Amazing builds man

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Thank guys!

Paint is done!


Aluminum is apparently a god-awful material to try and repair. But they did a fantastic job anyway


All together it took a ton of work to restore the panels to something presentable. I'm very happy with the attention to detail so far. This bodywork is head and shoulders above everything else I've had done in the past. Just goes to show that its always best to take your car to another enthusiast. In my case this body shop owner is part of a miata club





Everything is done

The windshield frame has been acid etched to remove any traces of rust. A brand new windshield was installed with a new seal, the fenders were straightened and sealed, the hood was completely reworked, the front bumper had all cracks fixed, the rocker panel was pulled out and smoothed over, and finally all panels were painted and blended with the rest of the body. Quality work everywhere. I'm terrified to drive this thing now.


So recap:

SuperStrut Suspension = done
GT4 brakes = done
Interior = done
GT4 body panels = done
Helical LSD S54 conversion = done

Next: 3SGTE swap

This post has been edited by enderswift: Oct 12, 2014 - 9:19 PM

oh wow, now im jelly. beautiful color...

absolutely beautiful!

Got her looking clean man
not to add the powa!!

Looking awesome, Luke! I can't wait to see this car at the Spring meet, if not a mini winter meet before then!

Looks great Luke! Worth the wrench time for sure!

you can't hide from me! the tie rod combo for plug and play superstrut suspension! wheres the effort.

Looks great brotha! I don't know how you have the patience with that 3S staring at you haha

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Thank you! But I think the poor camera on my HTC makes it look like some fancy silvery white when it's really just good old Toyota 040 white. For once the camera worked in my favor haha


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Thank you, it's been a long road to get to this point. Still a long way to go..

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Hopefully soon!

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A winter meet would be awesome!


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It always is

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Don't worry, I haven't forgotten. I have all the parts in my garage, it's just a matter of taking the car apart to do it. So I think all that is going to have to wait until the swap.


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At first it really bothered me lol. But after a while I forgot what boost feels like and it wasn't so bad any more. Plus I had a bunch of fun side projects to keep me busy