st185 project -need help please!-

don't think i can do it :roll:

mods, delete the whole thread if you like.

just thought i'd add a half decent pic. again you can see the door/rear quarter were a bit messed up. i just found a door that i'm going to buy next monday for $50, it's red and in perfect shape.

also, purchased a turbo and downpipe, which are supposed to arrive friday.

in addition, bought some oil line gaskets, HFH 1&2, and a new oem fuel filter, and should have some new/ish oem ignition wires coming


past that, i'm trying to decide what to focus on after that. i'd like to put on an st185 RC intercooler, but i also feel that money might be better suited being saved for bodywork. i just want to try to get rid of the rust it has before it gets worse. most of it isn't bad, but the passenger rear wheelwell has rusted through on the back section (where the mudflap would be if it had them.)

speaking of which, what is the best way to go about that? should i get someone to get me a cut of a non rusted gt-s, or would a bodyshop not have too much trouble putting in new metal and fitting/forming it? i just wonder because it's not just the outer part, but a little of the underside right there (so dust flies into the hatch) i know...pics are needed.

anyway, that's the current state. the turbo/downpipe will hopefully go in sometime between mon-thursday of next week....so hopefully no more revving at stoplights to keep from smoking up a storm. haha

pic of the worst spot of rust. i believe everything else is surface. there's a little spot on the other side towards the rocker panel where the undercoat wore thin...i think it just needs sanded off, looks to be a thin layer of surface rust. the same goes up front under the door where the paint seems to have worn down even past the primer on part of the rocker. again, surface rust which should just be sandable and paintable.

this is the part that i'll of course spend most of the $$. there is a nice clean gts rear section at the junkyard, if i can get it somehow. they're kind of turds, and doubt they'd feel like cutting it out for me. should any body shop be able to take care of this, or do i need to reeaally search around. because honestly, i have no idea where to take it. my hometown body shops i have a hard time trusting (it's the epitome of a redneck town) and in columbus, i figure most shops are just looking to rip people off.

anyway...i think i'd like to tackle this before it becomes a bigger problem.

if anyone has some suggestions, let me know! and yes, i'm about to start doing lots of searching

Hey let me know when you get the wires. I didnt even notice before but there in the original toyota box and everything.... Sweet box.... 8)

will do, did they happen to give you an estimate on how long it would take?

and i don't remember, did i have you ship it to pataskala or warsaw? i'm hoping warsaw...haha. it's my parents address, and i'll be there sat-thurs to take care of the dog while they go to arizona.

looking forward to getting them! thanks

Pataskala.... :doh:

There probably already there. Should have gotten there yesterday or today. Do you have anyone to check because if your not there they will leave it at your door. :shrug:

actually i'm still here for now.

normally they bring it to the door, but sometimes if the box is small enough they put it in a parcel box at the mailboxes. dunno if my bro has checked the mail lately or not. i think he has the key though, so i can't haha.

i'll check when he gets home.

thanks for the info!

ok, they weren't here, but showed up this morning.

thanks!

WARNING: i'm long winded, and like to talk about nothing...so you can either read my silly story, or just look at pictures. haha.

let me first say that i think transferring doors is probably easier with an extra set of hands. but my parents went to arizona, so i have been staying at their house (the dog needs to eat, and go outside) instead of at the apartment with my brother. so an extra set of hands were not available.

secondly, it is probably less annoying to do in a nice garage. my parents garage only fits one vehicle, and it is my dad's jeep...he never puts the top on, so it stays in the garage.

third, if one needs to do the job outside, with only one pair of hands, one should probably patiently wait until the weather is agreeable.


in this instance, not having 4 hands or a garage, and considering it's been raining for the last 3 days straight, it may have been better not to switch doors today. i decided that it would be fine. after all, the rain became only a drizzly/mist for awhile.

i'm obviously just being an idiot, it really wasn't too bad, and didn't take very long. it was a little difficult at first getting the new door situated close enough to start the bolts, but after some annoyingness, and finally just getting a tire for it to rest on, and then using a jack with a pillow between it and the door, i managed to get the bottom close enough, which allowed me to lift the backside and get the top ones.

enough talk, on to the pictures.


no door, rain still falling...this wasn't a great idea, was it?


the old door...


new door in its transit position


attached!


attached! 2



so anyway, it's on. i haven't swapped out the inside panel, or the door handle, so of course, the lock is different, and no system 10 on that side at the moment...

also, the center brass hinge thing, that the small pin goes through...it seems to be shorter on the new door, which if i install the pin, seems that it will only let the door open a very small amount...is there an actual difference, and is it hard to swap out from the old door if i need to?


at any rate, certainly still plenty to do, but it's a start...right?

well, yesterday i finally got a box from toyota containing the aforementioned gaskets, filters, and hoses.

i'm thinking of naming the car Aviendha. it's from the wheel of time series of books by robert jordan. aviendha is one of the main characters ladies. haha. she's a strong fighter, and has red hair, and is part of a group of people who survive in what is known as the aiel waste...pretty rough landscape, i dunno...seems fitting for a car designed for rally. and red. and besides the girls in these books are nothing but trouble...kinda like alltracs.

anyway, um, nothing else really has happened. i was waiting for these parts to do the turbo...but to be honest, i haven't noticed it smoking at idle anymore.

when it started smoking (after going on runs, it would smoke after sitting for 20-30 secs or so, sometimes bluish, usually white) i did a search, and found most people saying this is 95% of the time turbo seals. so i figured that made sense, since the turbo is probably getting old, and whatnot. then last week sometime i saw someone say a clogged pcv could cause such symptoms. just to be sure i checked the hose from pcv pipe to the intake. well the intake nipple that the hose is on is smaller than the pcv, so it had some tape on it to make it larger to be able to tighten the hose down snug. the tape had started to unravel into the hose a little...possibly clogging it.

anyone think that might've been the issue? i haven't driven it enough again to know for sure that its totally stopped the idle smoking, but i do know i've left it sitting for the normal time, and haven't noticed any (but a few of these times were at night)

don't really want to remove that turbo if i don't have to! haha.

so, i still haven't seen it smoke again, though it is idling a little higher, maybe that is making it behave as if i'm blipping the throttle to keep it from smoking, i don't know. at any rate, it hasn't helped me want to go through removing the turbo. haha.

i'm about to go out and change the fuel filter and change the ignition wires, and considering yanking the charcoal canister for a little extra room.


and again, does anyone have much experience with bodywork to give me an idea of what it might cost to have that rear rust fixed? i know stuff like that varies greatly, but i'm not looking for a beautiful paint job, just want my rust fixed, and then maybe paint the car decently enough that it protects the body and looks respectable until i can afford a better paint job. i'm just mostly concerned about the rust. anyone know about what it'd cost just having that cut out and new metal put in?

thanks

at the moment, i'm going to say i think doing the fuel filter might actually be more annoying than doing the power steering pump and hoses.


i've done them on my 90 celica gt, and my 86 st, both in the same location, without too much more room, and didn't have an issue. but this one i just can't get the bottom line to budge for anything. the others i didn't even use line wrenches, this time i bought a set, since i know people have issues.

but yeah, it's not moving. something started to give, but it wasn't the line loosening, nor was it the line bending or the filter. the line wrenche should be keeping me from rounding it off (and doesn't feel rounded) but something felt mushy for a second.

just venting my annoyance with what SHOULD be a rather simple job.


on another note, i was going to get rid of the charcoal canister. but i'm a little confused. the line from the canister that is "supposed" to go to the vsv....well, it doesn't go to the vsv. there is nothing connected to that port on the vsv...and the hose that had been connected to the canister runs over to the manifold area. i have a hard time following it once it is under the throttle body area. it seems to go to the little regulator type thing that is in there...(whatever it is in the center area behind the valve cover...i'm guessing its connected to the fuel rail) as far as i know, that isn't the proper setup. what should that be connected to? if anyone reads this

siigh...

well, i never got it off. i gave up. it would turn maybe a 1/6 turn, but it wasn't the fitting that was moving, eventually i realized that even though it is a line wrench, completely around the fitting and not slipping, that the ends of the wrench were cutting into part of the fitting, and nothing was giving...so i'm going to assume this line will have to be cut in order to change the filter. ridiculous.

so, then i just hooked the line that goes to the fuel rail back up, and tried again to figure out where the charcoal canister's vacuum line goes...it heads around the back side of the intake manifold, then up around and close to the center section of the manifold, under the throttle body, by the fuel rail. i can't fit any fingers to follow it. i can just pull it and see it move. it doesn't seem to be connected to anything there, but possibly goes down to the lower section of the manifold area. i can't find it.

i did though notice that the little vacuum line that is on the nipple on the valve cover isn't attached to anything. oddly enough, i think i remember having noticed that once before when we were working on the car. there are no open connections for it to go to (so many other things are hooked up, i'm guessing for the vpc, or evc, etc) i think i remember last time hooking it up to vacuum and the car running worse...even after resetting the ecu. i suppose that's why it's still disconnected.

at any rate, i'm starting to think this car might be more of a project than i can afford right now. don't get me wrong, it'll run and drive great...but i wanted to take care of the rust, and that would be killer. i wanted to take care of these minor maintenance things, and it just bothers me that i can have this much trouble with maintenance.

maybe it'll turn out that my brother has decided he wants to keep it anyway

hi again kids.

well, i removed the throttle body so i could get a look at where the vacuum line was going. it's connected to a hard vac. line by the fuel rail. i'm sure there are pics of this with things removed, but i did a search and couldn't find them. does anyone know what i'm talking about? if so, what is the line for? and what is this vacuum normally connected to? (since i know the charcoal canister isn't right...)

also, in the process, i got under the car and removed the brace to try to get a better view of the underside of the engine, and see if the hose went down there (before i found out what it was connected to) i noticed that the nipple on the tvis vsv that is supposed to connect to the vacuum tank is void of its hose...now of course, i know the answer is.....put a hose on to connect those suckers...right? well, my question for this one is...how does one manage to get a hand up there to connect said vacuum hose?

i must say, it surprises me how well the car has been running with these various hoses either missing, connected to nothing, or apparently connected to the wrong things.

pic:



yeah, still hard to see i know. anyway, it tore when i pulled on it...but there it is...hiding behind the incoming fuel line...

haha.

i dunno if anyone reads this, but i'll update anyway...cuz, it's a project log...

um, since i couldn't figure out what that hose *should* have been connected to, and since it was just hooked up to the canister, i figured it couldn't be anything overly important. it now has a cap on it.

also capped off the valve cover one, since it was just open to atmosphere and spitting out oil occassionally...if it runs crappy, i guess i'll just stick another hose on there connected to nothing :?

i stuck a little plastic filter between the vapor line and the fresh air tube and deleted the canister.

i yanked off the driver's side engine hoist bracket thing, since it seems to serve no real purpose if you aren't hoisting an engine. i just moved the breather to the other section of tubing.

put on some oem ignition wires, since the ngk's had some issues.

just bought egr blockoff plates from hotrodhendrix, so, when those come...i'll get that crap taken off.


i still wouldn't mind knowing the purpose of the vacuum line i was speaking of in the above post.

the quote i got today for the rust repair on the rear wheelwell, and a paintjob was......5-6k.

no way i can afford that. i was hoping i could get it done for 2-3 without getting a great paint job.

i may try elsewhere, but it's kind of discouraging. add to it that i've found out my financial situation is in worse shape than i originally thought.

this is why i told myself a year ago that i should not try owning an alltrac again until i was rolling in $$$ how quickly we forget.

I had similar rust on my rear quarter panel, you can check out my project page for some pics.

I got it done for $950, which included that rear quarter panel rust, completely new rocker panels on both sides (cutting them out and rewelding them), fixing a hole in my flood board, and one or two small fender rust spots cut out! (Came out to be $1250, but I know the mechanic so he knocked it down $200.)

All of these were painted to match the current paint job.

I'd take baby steps, and just get the rust done and have a mech blend the paint as best they can to match. Then save up for a really nice paint job at a separate time.

Good luck! I still owe about $3,000 on my Alltrac. :wink:

-Towels