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Well the outside is all done and I couldn’t be happier. I spent a total of 200 bucks to transform this thing on the outside. It’s not perfect by any means but it’s a repair that will last for many years plus it looks amazing from 5 feet away. All the rust is gone and any areas that had no clear coat left have been painted with good quality 2k urethane paint. The trim was sanded and brought back to life and everything is protected with either wax or uv coating. (Wax for the paint, uv for the trim)
Something else I forgot to add. Before i drove it to denver i threw that weber on it. It ran great all the way but once i got into denver the car barely wanted to run at all. I checked compression on all cylinders before i left and heres where it was #1, 130 #2&3, 145 #4, 150. after i got to to denver the compression was #1, 105 #2&3, 135 #4, 140. The tired rings in the 3ac didn't appreciate the added power from the weber and my foot to the floor for a thousand miles.
Someone recommended I try changing the oil and adding a can of Engine Restore so I did and restore It did. After driving a few hundred miles to let the product work the motor was running great and compression on all cylinders was up to + or - 3psi of 150psi and it stopped burning oil. I highly recommend the stuff to any one with an older engine thats beginning to burn oil or loose compression. Unlike the stp crap it doesn't make the oil thicker. It has little specks of aluminum, brass, and copper among other things suspended in a 30wt oil and those specks are supposed to fill in worn down areas of the cylinder, rings, and bearings and bring them back close to oem tolerance. I never would've believed it but i did the research and it checks out. I think its one of the only oil additives thats not total bs. Except marvel mystery oil (Quite honestly I don't care if marvel works or not it just smells great )
Something else I forgot to add. Before i drove it to denver i threw that weber on it. It ran great all the way but once i got into denver the car barely wanted to run at all. I checked compression on all cylinders before i left and heres where it was #1, 130 #2&3, 145 #4, 150. after i got to to denver the compression was #1, 105 #2&3, 135 #4, 140. The tired rings in the 3ac didn't appreciate the added power from the weber and my foot to the floor for a thousand miles.
Someone recommended I try changing the oil and adding a can of Engine Restore so I did and restore It did. After driving a few hundred miles to let the product work the motor was running great and compression on all cylinders was up to + or - 3psi of 150psi and it stopped burning oil. I highly recommend the stuff to any one with an older engine thats beginning to burn oil or loose compression. Unlike the stp crap it doesn't make the oil thicker. It has little specks of aluminum, brass, and copper among other things suspended in a 30wt oil and those specks are supposed to fill in worn down areas of the cylinder, rings, and bearings and bring them back close to oem tolerance. I never would've believed it but i did the research and it checks out. I think its one of the only oil additives thats not total bs. Except marvel mystery oil (Quite honestly I don't care if marvel works or not it just smells great )
Very interesting. I could try it in my 22re and try to duplicate your results. Don't have time to drive to Denver, though I wish, so will have to use my regular commute.
Very interesting. I could try it in my 22re and try to duplicate your results. Don't have time to drive to Denver, though I wish, so will have to use my regular commute.
just a few hundred miles is all it takes. Change the oil too. The stuff is actually Jesus in a bottle
Now that the outside is done, it’s time to focus on the inside. Most of the interior is pretty good with the exception of a few tears in the driver seat and all the dark brown fabric has faded to a dull purple color up front. The rear is still fresh from having tinted windows all the way to the back so the sun couldn’t damage the fabric.
I got a can of SEM color coat fabric dye (15173 camel), masked off the brown parts and sprayed the seats
The passenger seat looks almost brand new if it wasent dirty. The paint is a perfect match and the fabric actually feels new. It’s a little stiff but I’d imagine in a few weeks with normal use it will soften up. I’m going to get some fabric and do a mediocre patch job on the drivers side and then spray that seat in the next few days. I am very impressed with that SEM spray. Even though it felt so wrong using spray paint on a car seat
Last edited by cars-guy; Apr 19, 2019 at 02:20 PM.
Just finished up the driver seat. It’s seen quite a bit more use then the passenger seat because if you drive one of these cars you tend to not have friends The side bolster is pretty torn up Cut some to foam to somewhat match the other side. Used and upholstery adhesive and simaler fabric as a patch Got everything painted and it looks better then the gaping hole and exposed metal support. Unfortunately the paint ended up metling some of the adhesive forcing me to reglue it after it dried so now you can see some of the dried adhesive 🙃.
Pretty soon I’ll be cleaning my carpets in my apartment so I’ll get one of the hand attachments for the rug doctor thing and shampoo the seats which should help tie everything together better. While it’s not the best looking patch job it did improve the first glance look of the interior and I only spent about 12 bucks on the materials.
Sadly this will be the end to this build up thread and the end of the tercel. Sunday night while I was at work, a drunk driver slammed into the tercel that was parked in front of my house. The guy immediately fled the scene. The neighbors I bought the car from heard the impact and tracked the trail of coolant from his car back to his house just a block away and called the police. He was arrested for a DUI and hit and run. Thank god for them and thank god no one was injured except Dan (the tercel). Police estimate he was going about 50 MPH in a 25 MPH residential street.
Last edited by cars-guy; Sep 24, 2019 at 02:42 PM.
Oh well poo, horrible, just horrible. What kind of vehicle hit it? Damn man this makes me sad, all those years needing some love and then you give it love and it’s all just sitting there all happy......and bam, alcohol
Oh well poo, horrible, just horrible. What kind of vehicle hit it? Damn man this makes me sad, all those years needing some love and then you give it love and it’s all just sitting there all happy......and bam, alcohol
I’m really sorry dude!!!
It was by a 2018 Land Rover discovery that hardly had any damage too it. It was a glancing blow that transferred all the energy of the impact into the tercel. His insurance wants to give me 800 bucks to total out that car. I’m taking him to court.
I have decided to resurrect this car in one form or another. I won’t let this drunk fool wreck the legend that is the tercel. A friend of mine sent me a link to another tercel a few hours away with 116k miles and minor front end crash damage for $250. Since my car was hit from the rear I can take all the front end parts from it and put it on the new car. Plus the old car has brand new suspension and brakes that i Installed a few thousand miles ago. While the original cars damage is just too extensive to even fathom trying to repair, it can be an organ donor to keep the legend alive.
I’ll keep updating this thread as well as starting a new thread with much more detail to follow the new buildup
Saw one of these in town the other day. It was gold like yours, except it was lowered way down. It had wider white style BBS (I think) wheels. It didn't look to bad. I'm guessing it wasn't the 4 wheel drive version.
I don't know how you can feasibly get these much lower and still daily drive them. Mrs. Punjab managed to bump the gas tank on our AllTrac sedan going through one of those crazy low gutter - crazy high center cross - street intersections and put a pinhole leak in the tank. It is proving IMPOSSIBLE to find a suitable replacement.
At first I thought, they only made 800 of these sedans so they must have used a tank from another model, right? Apparently not. It's seemingly specific to this vehicle. I don't even think an AllTrac wagon tank will fit. The shape is the same as older, rear wheel drive corollas like the AE85 and AE86 but most all of them were carbureted instead of my fuel-injected motor so no baffles and the fill neck is in the wrong location.
Forget about using a 2WD tank of which there are a 1,000 in every junk yard in America. Not even close.
Nobody understands when I explain my plight either. "Yeah it's a rare car." "Your Corolla?! ...As in Toyota?" "Well it's a special Corolla."
In the mean-time I silver soldered over the hole and it's holding surprisingly well. Once I get it truly fixed I'm going to build a skid plate for it.
Ok, I just started on swapping the body parts over today and I think I'm done actually. I had to get creative with an engine hoist and a hammer to unbend the sheet metal behind the head light. It doesn't look perfect but all the mounting point are where they need to be and panel gap is acceptable. Next step from here will be paint. Heres what I'm starting with, underneath is what it should look like. Its mostly bent out. Doesn't look great but everything lines up and fits like it should. Done!
Again its not perfect and needs a little more messaging but everything is in the ball park. Next step is body work and paint!
Mar 20, 2019 | 07:40 PM
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