Curse of the Cressida

[battleaxe 0]

cressida is functioning, still needs some stuff, like the fans put on a thermo switch and not being on all the time. has beats, its aligned and has the same wheels and tires all around now.  it was flat when i measured it before alignment, but now that it has the same wheels and tires, and ironically the same camber front and rear, i need to re measure and adjust.  this photo was taken on a hill so its a bit loaded to the back.

 

this car is a paradox.  has re71r's in 215/45 all around, and runs -5 camber all around lol, wheel sizing is limited.  thats 17x9 +17 all around and it barely fits. gotta be weary of tire and wheel sizing on this thing as the fitment is spot on and only has so much clearance in the back being a 4 door even after heavy mods to cut weld and move everything in the back. 

 

[battleaxe 0]

put a new fuel pump relay in the supra. now the pump turns on when put to ign.  i think because the car had a cold start injector that i had eliminated 6yrs ago the fuel pump only ever turned on when cranking so it always felt semi carburated.  then after chasing the fueling issues over the past couple years, it led us to the fuel pump relay up front, this thing got very hot and then started to not work resulting in sputtering or not running at all.  Finally put a relay in, used the oem wiring and now i have a direct to battery relay with an inline fuse and goes to my main fuse block incase something bad happens.  went back to the 82 lights and put the spare wheels on for winter.

 

 

finished up the cressida a little while ago and went drifting after driving it around town a bit. still has starting issues so im going to throw a bunch of grounds at it.  the starter was rebuild and i had it checked. 100/100 starts he showed me without any hiccups. so i think my ground from my trans to chassis is poor...i really hope its something dumb like that.

car ran great other than the power steering leaking out of the resevoir..still unsure if it was too hot, too pressurized or a leaky cap...but it was fine by the end of the day.  needs an actual sway bar, the oem one is pathetic, you can bend it by hand lol.  drifting non stop the peak values were all chill. 85c water temp, oil temp got to 100c and hits the 1bar of boost with no spikes.

 

 

put the spares on for winter

 

and now the s13. runs on 4cyl again after disconnecting the ecu, the ecu had some corrosion on the ecu terminal pins, so cleaned that up and now it runs on 4cyl instead of 2cyl lol. even on 2cyl it moved the car with ease, so strange. lots of tidy up and body work ahead.

 

[Gordo 0]

I've always liked eyeing your herd..,.

You should send a couple to Texas for the winter. 😏

[battleaxe 0]

damn man, i appreciate that.

i person ally would love to see more of your fleet and the things you do. I'm not a big fan of bolt this on and bolt that on, but half of what I do is just that. Or engineering something I have to work with what I have. Mcgyver syndrome

[Gordo 0]

Wish I had time to do something on my stuff....

Damn 12 hour shift at a job 35 miles away is keeping everything in limbo.
After the psycho woman tried to kill me, and totaled my beloved '73 Datsun, what time I do have is taken up by keeping the el cheapo daily driver junk running.

I should just fucking retire, so I can get back to my numerous projects.

[battleaxe 0]

Got damn. A partner trying to kill you is another kind of life problem. If I was in a position to retire I'd take time off to catch up on projects and then maybe go back to work..or sleep for a bit. I'm just trying to empty all my bins and spend only on things to complete my projects..or sell em.

[battleaxe 0]

not toyota related but...
 

been taking some time off from cars outside of washing them and checking fluids and tire pressures.  after this black friday, ive got a number of tasks to do. got a link storm x on order for the supra and cressida (shared same ecu, 2 harnesses), oil filter sandwich plate and koyo for the civic, now i can add my large oil cooler to the civic to get that oil nice and luke warm.  so the plan is to collect the last bit of parts for the na 2j swap and then get cracking on the s13 and the misc tasks.

first up was the max camber in the back so i can clear the arches. sadly at max camber the stance rucas foul the coils, i even flipped them around. this led to a lot of yelling and then i said eff it and moved on to the toe part.

 

 

plan is to get the alignment where it needs to be and deal with the arches after the fact.

after that irritation i went to the front..to where i found more of it.  i was unhappy with the gktech sphericals and that they used a aluminum shaft (as many do now a days) so i grabbed some v1 spl spherical outers and used the gk tech shank (i broke both of mine years ago) so now i have a hybrid front spherical and i matched it to the lca incline so they arent on 2 separate plains.

 

 

next up was modding the brake holders..all because i had a broken bolt in one and then tried to drill and tap it out and its still wrong...so i lopped that side off..odd idea/conclusion to come to? you bet.

 

 

check for clearances for the new outer, brake holder actually being there and max angle at full droop

18x10-12 with a 225/35 s drive (looks bigger than it is)

the end links are oem? i cut them shorter as a test as one was bent so i cut it in half and shortened it, feels good still?

thats firewall clearance as there is no more harness going there and i smashed it back

 

 

put it back down, rolled it around, noticed the rear toe adjusted is far in the other direction now, so more on that later.

went in my bin of misc oem washer bottles, found a hole down low and this honda crv coolant overflow "works", whether it actually works, time will tell.

got a generic one off amazon for $12, shortened the bottom port and capped it. drolled a hole in the side and pushed the grommet and washer pump in, ran the line through the fender rail and comes out by the motor. this time yesterday i found a gremlin traced back to the wipers.  thats a whole other story and well its rather funny but i cant tell stories.

the bracket was an oem bracket from something i kept in a bin. i cut it to size, knocked some holes in it and then welded some old m6's on there as i have no clearance.  looks alright and will be nice to have washer fluid again, the little things, you know?

 

 

idea is to do stuff then do other stuff, then do other stuff and so on

[Donedreamin 0]

Looking forward to more updates! keep up the good work

[battleaxe 0]

couple more tasks sorted. finally made a bracket to hold the fuse boxes under the dash and have a functioning glove box.  i had to source an issue with my wipers/headlights constantly popping up. couldnt find why it was doing that and so traced it to a wire at the wiper motor and depinned it, and now it works, but i only have one function of wipers..win for now..will go back to it when i rewire the car when im 50yrs old. i need to move on from this and get the supra in here and do weekend jobs on the s13 instead of being a statue.

 

 

put the passenger seat in finally, last job in the interior is to take the back two bride seat holders on the driver seat and mod them so the rear can go down one more peg.

then back to the engine bay to shorten the wiper motor and windshield sprayer wires, loom them.

then trans wiring and proper holder for the clutch line on the bottom, and adjust the iacv i put back in and see if i can adjust even though the plastic screw is .. screwed.

 

 

finally got a sandwich plate for the civic so i could put the oil cooler in.  i got the cooler with fittings from a friend and built the system around it. luckily all the hard stuff was tight, but the 1/2inch npt aluminum cooler to npt/-10 fitting leaked and then when trying to remove it, it galled, so warren at bcworks bailed me out again and tig'd it up to become one.  i modified the oem air guide to still sort of guide the air..sort of. its a long travel of line i know but theres a lot of spinning things on that side..should be fine..lots of added capacity is how i think of it. oh and a new koyo rad, new hose clamps and a rad cap.  the oem oil filter doesnt fit no more, luckily i have so many cars and the sr20 oil filter just fits, sadly its a bit smaller. oh well.

 

 

while im at it, heres a picture of my garage currently.  i got more lights at the work bench.

 

 

and lastly for black friday i bought a bunch of stuff, including this link storm x with connectors and a loom for the cressida so both JZs will use this same ecu. supra is the next project.  should start early in the new year perhaps? spring? iunno

 

[Gordo 0]

You could adapt the open vent hole on the passenger side dash to hold vomit bags in case a passenger is not up to entering a corner at 100 kph, sideways ☺️

[Gordo 0]

By the way, my son walked into the room as I'm drooling over shots of your interior, and was liking it, then was amazed when I told him it is an actual drift car.
He is so used to seeing clapped out S-chassis...

[battleaxe 0]

i appreciate that Gordo.  Its coming along...slowly. might upload some of the old photos of it actually driving and not sitting in my garage.

S chassis seem to come in 3 varieties, abused to shit with things falling/hanging off them, show cars with "drift style", usually decently maintained, and then the unicorns, painted one colour, with fitted wheels and time and care put into all the bits. im somewhere between the 3 of them.

i hope to have this thing looking decent (for once) and then go drifting again in it, i miss it a lot actually.  i have a few more tasks before i can put it outside and get started on the supra and swap in that 2j finally.  got a few more parts to collect then ill put the harness on the motor and start to put the wiring loom together, then pull the 5m and start mocking up the motor .

[battleaxe 0]

as the s13 moves and drives.."functions" I wanted to get going on the 2jz so I can get that job done.  We will be doing a big house reno shortly and I wanted to buy the remaining pieces I need for the swap so that I can  be done and I can get rid of all my M motor stuff and continue to clean the garage.

 

pushed the s13 back and moved the motor out, reorganized the shop so i can start to run the harness and take out the auto box plugs and whatever else had no home.

 

 

Got the clutch and flywheel from rock auto, cleaned up the back, put the pilot bearing in, flywheel worked with the auto flywheel bolts, oddly these are 36ftlbs..i went to 50ft lbs as the auto bolts to the flex plate show as 6xftlbs, so i split the difference.  red loctite as per usual.  checked the starter would engage, everything seems to line up so, fingers crossed.

 

 

cleaned the spark plug galley and going to check all the plugs and gap them.  At this time i wanted to paint the covers as they were raw aluminum for some reason.

 

 

I kinda messed all this up as i was going for a oem+ look with all the stock piping and plastic bits...so ill likely source another front cover.  I really wanted to do this and liked the results. i did mess up and forgot to do the lines, but oh well.

 

[Urrik 0]

Goddamn those covers came out awesome.  I appreciate being able to lay out the metallic flake evenly, I've seen resprays with some blotchy ass shit

Man I love VS-XX, makes me want some in silver for my car.  Also reminds me of Tbones car which I miss seeing

Also props for having an organized garage.  I need some top shelving like that, my basement is getting too full of shit

[battleaxe 0]

thanks man.  my garage started out as no sheet, an extension cord ran through the attic and some rickety stairs and table when i bought the house. my dad helped me to wire all the plugs in, insulate and toss boards up, paint it white then started to put shelves in.  i kept tripping on everything as i had no storage, so i went up.

laying flake is easy, you just have to stir it in the pot and giver a wiggle every now and then.  its easy on small parts cause you put it as a wide fan and do medium quick passes.  i could imagine troubles shooting it on a car, but most guys who do are insanely good at it as they're high quality paint jobs...or your garden variety skid mark who gets hte craft store junk in a can and makes a mess.  look into buying the vsxx new to compare it to what used sets go for..if you can find them

[battleaxe 0]

Nothing too exciting, just all basic things most ppl do off camera.

took the plugs out and cleaned them all, gapped them the same and put them back in, same with the coil on plug, cleaned and put back.  Popped the cover on and found the plug wire guides so i could the plug wires tidy.

 

 

Took about a week to find the m10 x 1.00mm tap so i could drill and tap my returnless fuel rail into a return style.

 

 

I buy scrap pieces of off cuts when i go to metal places as you never know when you may use them, welp, used some and cut to size for the lower power steering bracket as this is where the AC compressor usually sits.

 

 

Also modified the throttle wheel by just taking out the slot for the through stud and clocked it different due to the semi electric throttle these things have (very common issue if you want a fully mechanical throttle.  I'm aware this may slip due to the slot being removed, but at this time i have red loctite and a uggadugga on the nut itself.  I have a random throttle bracket i can cut the slotted bit from and weld to the OE one if it does fail.  Its easy to get to and this took me looking at it for a lil bit to figure it out.  I know driftmotion makes that piece but $20US turns into $60cdn real quick with duty, exchange, taxes, customs, shipping.  I figure me looking at it for 20min and understanding whats going on is more beneficial.

 

 

Now i need to get a serpentine belt, cap or modify all the water inlet outlets that are open (water cooled throttle) and the vacuum ports now not needed.  Thats pretty much it then it can go in.  I have some cusco s13 engine mounts i want to use so i have some ideas for how to make that work as the a6 shares a very similar design to the s13 for the subframe.

 

 

went for a drive today with some friends, a friend took pics of the truck.  going to run out of insurance soon so i will be going back to the civic for a bit until the weather gets better, then insure the supra before the swap so i can drive it around and test the fuel pump relay update.

 

[battleaxe 0]

update time:

been busy with home renos of our laundry room, pantry and closet, lots to do and have baby on the way so trying to get all this done before she comes end of July.

 

Cressida. I added a power steering cooler and s14 resevoir. currently the pump still sounds louder than it should be even after a lot of bleeding. not keen on this but its functioning. 

 

Civic.  Put summer wheels on, lowered it 10mm in the back and 5mm in the front, this photo is not great but overall looks a ton better.  The bum was a little high after removing weight hence the difference in heights.

 

D21.  Swapped tires front to back and changed its oil, putting insurance on it shortly and may put a bed in the back to sleep in it instead of camping during May long.

 

S13. I put it outside so i can work on the Supra.  garage has been full of house stuff for a bit and the jobs i need to do on this are lengthy ones and weld grind paint ones and id ratehr get the supra to a state before baby.

 

Supra. put it in the shed yesterday and got the M ready to be pulled minus the exhaust manifold and mounts. leaving it like this for a little bit while we do the floors in the house as i need the storage for house stuff.  should be a good long weekend to take the M out, prep the jz and slot it in..then all the futzing about and detail work.

[battleaxe 0]

been busy with life to care about cars at all.  we had a little girl and we were doing renos since February of this year so the house has been a mess since then.  Also lack of motivation while house and pregnant wife take up most my time.  My wife had a hell of a pregnancy so now that its over we can focus on baby.  Im on parental leave right now so figured nows a good time to swap the 2jz in.  Found i need to get the fork and pivot and maybe the slave cylinder for a jz so i can use my trans...as all those depend on what motor you run lol...ffs toyota. anyways.  motor is out and ready to be picked up by its new owner.  JZ is ready but i have a little more research/mock up to do to make sure I dont need a plate between the motor and trans like most motors do as the auto 2J didn't have one and the w58/M stuff may not work? iunno. might mod the M stuff so i have that "shim."  I modded the rad support like the s13 and d21 cause man it makes it way easier to pull a motor.  took me an hour by myself with the cherry picker and 2 flat boards outside so i can swing and move the parts.

 

 

now to clean all the parts and put the jz bellhousing on the W and then sell the W to M housing

get those oem parts for the trans and then pop the trans on the motor, clean the engine bay then plop it in

[battleaxe 0]

found some time today to do a bunch of small jobs.

found i needed a 2jz fork and pivot for the bellhousing so that came the other day, plopped them in today to make sure they all fit and functioned, success.

 

 

took a video and lots of photos for all the sensors under the intake manifold.

plopped the trans on the motor and torqued all the bolts up.

 

 

swapped back to a power rack as i depowered the rack in 2014 and ever since doing short knuckles and long lca's it has been unpleasant to drive/drift/park.  these are the bcworks rack spacers on top of the angle stuff, had these on there since before angle mods because the oem lock to lock you might as well austin powers the car anywhere.

 

 

while i had that all there, figured i would put it in as my shop is quite the mess and i could do with lots of small jobs over this big job.

using a lot of various tools, by myself i put it in with my minimal space, bad back and wood..lots of wood.

after a head scratch moment with the driftmotion mounts i bought used and looking online to find no answers for what side goes where, i swapped them side to side and knowing they used the "wrong" mounting holes, tapped those before so popping them around was no problem.

once the car is running and driving I will do a parts list and things i came in contact with if anyone is interested/future me needs the help.

 

 

decent firewall clearance

 

[battleaxe 0]

dropped the oil pan today to inspect a rather large dent in the pan.  all good, toyota gives lots of space from pickup to pan and uses very thick gauge metal, so i hammered it out and put it back in and then lined everything up and bolted everything in.  dropped the car back down and started to put the parts back in and start mock up of exhaust, oil cooler/relocate, and intake.  originally wanted to run all oem plastics to go for oem+ (get another front cover so its not flashy) or pop my big filter on and weld up a pipe. iunno which way i'll go just yet.

 

[battleaxe 0]

as im back to work after parental leave next week, figured i would keep on keeping on.

did a bunch of plumbing this week.  fuel lines run, PS lines run, just waiting on a fitting for the rack  so i can connect the -8 line. 

 

 

started to plop the oem hoses back on and figured out the small stuff ... still have to run vacuum lines ... the few that there are.  also did a little project i wanted to do since getting the Gita parts, make the gas pedal and dead pedal work.  With a mix match of parts after a lot of in and outs to see what worked, got it to work with some mods.  The gita pedal with supra mount (different spacing) had a weird arch to it and the arm itself hit the firewall/floor before the pedal can get to full sweep.

 

 

What I ended up with was Gita pedal, spring, throttle cable...supra pedal arm, stopper, mount, pedal pin.  The throttle cable is a lil longer than I want it to be, but a little more helped to mock up the holder where it needs to go...which is the next task.  After that, fab for the rad support and oil cooler mount and then run the -10 lines to where they need to go.  once this is all sorted ill run the harness and get that connected to the link then prep and spray the front half of the bay in single stage black.

 

[battleaxe 0]

minor update, been busy with baby.

supra has a removable rad support now, going to try and Tig this this week, working throttle cable and bracket.

 

lexus has tiny studded snows and i gave a lick of spray paint to the wheels that have never ever been cleaned.

 

 

civic got some brake and clutch fluid bled, swapped to regas with 3mm spacers in the front and changed the eye brow lights to black housings for a change of pace. further work on supra this weekend ahead

 

[battleaxe 0]

no LEV content, just more Supra, and brackets.

 

repurposed an old custom battery tie down from the cressida and chopped it down and made it the oil filter holder.  Cut back most of the battery tray to allow mounting and free up some space.  ran the oil lines, check and re check everything can fit. 

 

 

repurposed a crv? overflow bottle and modified the oem bracket for that to work with the supra.

 

 

found a perfect size cut off in my aluminum bin for the filter.  I wanted to re use the Gita air box but it was massive and did not fit in the engine bay good at all, as well it has the air flow sensor cast into the plastic.  I am debating if modifying the air box to act as a cover would work, or look tacky.  The other option as the filter looks stupid by itself, would be to make a heat shield air box for it by modifying that cut off and welding the shield to that so it acts as a cool box and makes that area not so baron.

Last task before paint is to weld the holes up on the rad support and then paint the lot of it.

 

[battleaxe 0]

After work this week I worked on getting this thing painted so I could assemble this weekend.  I shaved all the unneeded holes on the rad support and then welded them closed and seam sealed the backs.  Tapped all the holes after final sand so the bolts would be in real easy.  Buzzed that all back and prepped the bay for quick spray on the rad support and the one half tower as there was some scratches and the colour was a graphite? I think the bay has been resprayed at some point. 

 

 

Went through all my bolts, went through my Altezza/Gita bolts and went through my stash of zinc plated bolts and found a lot of OEM toyota bolts zinc plated so I used those to tidy up the work I did.  I'm not even a fan of the gold bolts but they are clean and OEM so thats nice.  Took more time finding bolts than it did to assemble the front end.  Painted all the brackets a semi gloss black as well so it wasnt so much raw aluminum everywhere.  I'm still not keen on the air filter, but might use it until I build a ARC type box, or find an ARC box...lets be real, its just the ARC logo on the red filter that people buy it.  The Gita box was took big and I dont think ill attempt cutting it up to make a cover.  I'll keep my eyes out for an OE box too to keep it looking sort of factory..maybe even a honda intake tube.

 

 

I also moved the cars around as the S13 needs a few things..a lot of things and I wanted to move it cause next to the deck is a spot spot for mice/rats.  They don't usually show up but I found a whole apple ( I have an apple tree) eaten on the valve cover that started to rot, so that was nice. cleaned that up, checked fluids and saw the clutch master cylinder seal at the push rod must leak cause it leaked on both sides of the firewall, so the paint it fucked on both sides and I need a new one.  Got it over to the other side of the house so I can do a couple small things on it.  Fired right up too, unlike the cressida.

 

 

I'm not surprised with all the neglect I show my cars that any of this happens to me.  Maker of my own demise.

[battleaxe 0]

 

Supra has a bumper and the harness has been started.

 

 

LS400 is insured and will be a daily .. until it breaks.

Cressida has a water leak.  Found a lake in the passenger carpet.  Sucked that up now to try and find where its coming from.  doesnt look like heater core, i just blew out the sunroof drains so hoping thats what it was.  Swapped the tires from the advans to the SSRs so i could confirm the low disc doesnt work with Z32 brakes, so i have 25mm of spacer in the front.  I need some more room for the other wheels and tires as it is so ill flare these a little when i put the gx81 front end on..some day.

 

S13 also has a sunroof leak and that head liner is damp.  Also fixed the leaking drain on these shitty koyos and found it has no heat either.  Car gets to 80c and stays there but the heater hoses arent warm..so i may have fucked up the order of the heater hoses or theres a heater core issue, which looked fine when i cleaned up...so maybe i broke it then? iunno.  non stop problems as of late.  but i mean, why wouldnt there be when you have this many cars that dont get used and it rains half the year.

 

 

 

civic has winter wheels on it so its even more boring to look at.