Project Pearl

deecee

New member
Thank you for the compliment. Nick and I have been put in some decent hours to get to this stage. Still a lot more to do to get her to something I am happy with, but pretty happy knowing she is going to be a rather decent car once finished :) And it's some really basic things to get the car nice. Full interior clean, fixing minor electrical things, changing the odd hose here and there. Gotta strip the seats to wash the covers = more fun

The next big challenges will be when I weld in the support panel and get the radiators straightened out. Hopefully they don't leak. By that time, I should have a RC bonnet and bumper to replace the damaged ones as I got reproductions made from the Elephant's bonnet and bumper :) Panel beater may scratch his head at the paint mix as it looks like a custom white pearl
 

underscore

Well-known member
You guys move fast, nice work! Sad to hear about the A at the wreckers though, not enough love for these cars it seems.
 

deecee

New member
Yep - never planned to move this fast on the car, but circumstances demanded it. I have been pretty focused on the rectangle and was just finishing up the exhaust muffler mounts and the crank angle sensor mount when I decided to work on the RC. Effort has been worth it though :)

Interesting short shifter modification in the car. Will take some photos while the centre console is out. Gearbox is really notchy, and I have trouble putting the car into gear. Can't tell if it is clutch fluid, syncros or the shifter modification. Will figure it out later I guess.
 

deecee

New member
So I have been using Pearl as a mule for me to do my fibreglass moulding for Elephant and it has taken a very very long time to get done. Move Pearl back to Nick's place about a month ago and left it there not doing much. Decided to weld the radiator support panel on today as it is Queen's birthday long weekend here in NZ.

Bit of a back log on the photos but you all love photos

Nov-14 - Car looks half respectable now that it is clean. Had to roll it out of the garage to move to Nish's where I was doing the fibreglass work
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Drove it for the first time. CT20B goes nicely. And in it's new residence to be a mule for the guards
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Started stripping down the front end so I can mount the guards and cover the body to protect it for FG resin
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The high stop light on the rear spoiler was broken, so removed the spoiler. Bolt that holds it on was rusted and broken off much to my annoyance.
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And here is the broken and replacement stop light
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Time to remove bolt with an angle grinder
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Replaced a broken vacuum valve from a Ceres. Toyot generic part so easy enough to find a replacement at the scrapyard
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Slowly fettling the ground down bolt out of the boot
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Was wondering why the spoiler side parts were not sitting right. Took the plastics off to find the mounts were the wrong way around.. idiots
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And mounted correctly
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deecee

New member
January 2015 - I got my RC bonnet and bumper moulded, so I thought I'd try them on the RC. Also, my guards finally came back from the panel beater so I thought I'd try them on as well
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It had been a long while since I had seen my handy work, they look pretty good
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And there is definitely some room for larger wheels
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February 2015 - This is Elephant work, but may as well show it off since it is on Pearl. Guards are prepped and then corflute/plastic signboard is hot glued on to some masking tape at the edges of the panel. Car covered up as well
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Then gel coat is applied. I used tooling gel goat which ends up harder.
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Both sides are done at the same time.
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March - 2015 Fibreglass done. Pearl gets out of the garage to see some sunlight
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And here are the main parts of the guard moulds
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Since I was over at the fibreglass place, I took some photos of my moulds
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And now back to my bodgy job haha. The guards are a multi piece mould. More fun stickling plastic to the guards, prepping, applying gel coat and fibreglass
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deecee

New member
April 2015 - Car got put back together. I left the battery connected and had to jump start it with my deep cycle sitting in Nish's garage
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This is the panel that was mashed up from the accident. Car sat at Nick's for a good month before I looked at it today
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1-June-2015 - Decided to get it back on the road. First things first, weld in the top radiator support. Had to load up the car with my welding gear and tools and setup at Nick's. While at Nick's he straighten the water to air radiator which had gotten a bit bent in the crash.
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And welded in. The welds are pretty ugly TBH, but the support is in solid so I'm happy. Nick gave the panel a spray with some black caliper paint I had brought over
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deecee

New member
Thanks, and I try to do stuff as time allows with Pearl. Main focus is the other car and getting that finished up :)
 

deecee

New member
Got some more work done on Pearl this weekend. Nick had started reassembling the front end, mounting in the various radiators and brackets.

I popped over after laying down the PVA on the moulds to tackle the exhaust system which I thought was just cut at the rear after the previous owner removed the tip. Low and behold, the idiots tried to remove the pipe work just after the muffler with a sabre saw, basically leaving the whole rear section an absolute mess to clean up !@#$

Easiest thing to do will be to source a whole rear muffler section as there is too much work to fix it all up grrr. Luckily I know where a whole muffler system is and the owner has kindly said I can take the lot :) Will get some pics of the mess later.

Anyway, back to the front end. Firstly I used some polyurethane to cover the weld holes and a horizontal gap that toyota normally urethanes. Got to get it back to what it was.

Then we looked at the other brackets at the front of the car. There is a vertical support for the horizontal plastic trim that was crumpled in the crash. I had a replacement one from a standard GT Four but the support is different on the RC. The vertical portion allows for mounting the water to air heat exchanger so we decided to take the good horizontal portion and put it on the RC vertical support.

Nick drilled out the spots welds for the brackets and I welded the non crumbled piece back to the RC vertical support. Had to use Nick's saw horse as a temp welding station lol.
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Got a couple of spots on with with the tig and that was that :) Gave it a brush down and painted it black to protect the exposed metal.
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The drivers side guard also had a crumbled bracket and some slight panel work to remedy. Nick got on with bending the vertical lip which was pushed back and I got on with prepping the bracket and guard for welding.

I had previously removed these brackets from some NA guards so I could make moulds for the wide wide body guards for the Elephant. The plan was to fix the crumbled bracket, so as I had my moulds, time to repair the guard.
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Original bracket on the left, replacement on the right.
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Hmm.. a lovely twisted mess
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But this is better
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And a bunch of clamps to hold it all into place while I weld. Of note, while I have a Mig, I use the Tig as I don't have gas for the Mig yet. Panel steel isn't easy to Tig as the steel just burns up any time I put some current in, and in this case, I managed to get some spots down to hold it together.
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And the front end starting to look like a car again.
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Pearl's front end is pretty much fixed up now. I had some fibreglass copies of the RC bonnet and bumper made for Pearl so it can pretty much go all back together.

Things to do:
- install RC bumper support properly (that bolt is somewhere..)
- fix the wiring loom which goes to the alternator
- install headlights, plastic trim, etc
- reinstall various brackets, components, airbox, overflow bottle (need to remove the rad it seems - not much room around that area) around the engine bay which we disassembled to do the repair
- cut various holes into the bonnet and bumper for mounting accessories, trim etc.
- buy some mesh and poly into the various vents/holes
- install some replacement under body panels under the front end
- maybe fix the saggy front and rear engine mounts
- scavenge the exhaust to fix the rear section of the muffler system
- re- install the interior
- fix the drivers seat foam and a leather patch to cover the hole

Not sure if I want to spend money on painting the front end to be perfectly honest. I just want to get rid of the car and push it off. I may paint it if I bother to keep it as a run around, but we'll see.

I'll calculate the total cost thus far and see if it is worth keeping. The notchy gear engagement is a bit annoying, but I'll try some fixes before I remove the short shifter kit and replace it with something smoother.
For a moment I was thinking of breaking the car as the exhaust system issue was looking to cost far too much to repair.
 

deecee

New member
4 July 2015

Have bothered to dedicate some time to Pearl while my fibrglass guards dry. I have a list of things to do and so time to tick them off and get Pearl back on the road.

Main mission is to fix up the exhaust system due to the issues previously mentioned, and while I was under the car, Nick worked on the front end. I got him to move the sugar cube around due to some clutch change issues. Here is the wear on the cube.
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Nick also started drilling the various holes in the bumper for mounting.
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I finally got the exhaust out.
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As you can see, the previous owner removed the resonator and left a big mess.
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And here is the aborted attempt at cutting through the pipe just after the muffler.
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I was rounding the nuts-bolts which held the muffler sections together. They were well and truly rust solide. I had to take an angle grinder and cut sections out to get the nuts and bolts out.
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Removed the rear brace under the diff yoke. Took a while and a lot of torque due the bolts being corroded. With the muffler out of the way, I managed to get some lube on to the bolt threads from the reverse and worked the bolts in and out to clear the rust debris between the threads. Cleaned up the bolts and the threads in the subframe once the bolts were out.
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Time to fix the wiring over the head. Originally the wiring loom was just wrapped up in electrical tape. I removed the tape and cleaned up the wiring a bit using some wax and grease remover.
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Then I positioned the wiring into the spare loom plastic I pulled from an NA at the scrap yard.
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And now the wiring is neatly routed
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During the day we did some minor checks for the warrent of fitness (WOF).
 

deecee

New member
5 July 2015

Today was spent cleaning up the interior and doing minor stuff.
- Tightened down the spoiler and the boot trim on. Was missing some clips for the plastic nearest the hinges as they had rusted out, so I'll need to find some extra clips.
- Put a rubber washer (again scavanged from the scrapyard) under the rear washer nozzle as that was the cause of a leak into the boot.
- Started reassembling the interior at the rear of the car.
- Vacuumed the seats of the dog hair which was embedded into the fabric. Undecided if I will bother steam cleaning, may do as Nick has a steam cleaner.

Nick kept reassembling the front end, doing minor spray and touch ups. He connected up the horns, they didn't work. Relay was clicking so he made a new loom and beep beep, they work. He painted the welded guard panels for some protection with some 040 white spray paint. Looks a bit naff next to the pearl white, but at least it is protected. He fitted the guard and liner on the passenger side.

Front end is looking a lot better though
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Interior is also coming together.
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Nick noticed a broken wire on the AFM plug. I disassembled the plug so I could do a solder repair, but the copper is too corroded so I'll have to find a new plug *sigh. More and more minor issues.
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bmt

New member
Jeez Dave didn't realize you had ANOTHER project Celica! Glutton! For punishment anyway.

Next time you are getting welding supplies get 10 sticks of Silicon bronze either 1.6mm diameter or 2.4mm diameter. It melts at a low melting point and makes tig tacks/welds super easy on thinner mild steel and is of a good enough strength for a filling a few spotwelds. It's more expensive so it's kind of a back up plan kind of thing. It's excellent for galvanised material. Ordinarily I'd mig them but if it isn't an available option and the material is bit too crappy or thin for mild steel wire then give it a go. Oh one more thing you can't weld over it with mild steel wire after it's in!
 

deecee

New member
Haha - yes Bruce, I have had an RC since last year. Thanks for the tips on the silicon bronze. I do have a mig, but I don't have a bottle or reg - on the 'to purchase' list if I bother to keep the mig around. Tig does me fine, but I should have done the repairs using a mig as I wouldn't have introduced so much heat and blown a couple of holes. Oh well, I'm just trying to save an RC, so I'm not super worried about a top end job with the prices of RCs nowadays.
 

deecee

New member
It's been nearly a year since I've done an update.

Been pretty busy with work and while I do work on the cars on occasion, sometimes it's pretty hard to get to writing out updates to my normal level of detail as they can be quite time consuming.

Had some very good progress recently, so I thought I'd better provide some updates.

6 July 2015

So a quick attempt at a solder job left me with less copper than I started with. Rather disappointing really.
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Taking some Project Elephant wiring, I found a plug wire connector which was the same as the AFM plug wire with the same wire colour and trimmed back the AFM wire.
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Then after measuring the wire lengths, I crimped the wires together. The crimp was then covered with heatshrink, wire connector inserted back in to the plug and loom wrapped back up.
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As I posted in Project Elephant, I got the GT4A back from the panel beaters on the 10th July. Understandably, it meant Pearl needed to be stored outside.

19 July 2015

Spent some more time on Pearl testing electrics.
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deecee

New member
August 2015

Sometimes I have to head up to get parts for Pearl. Found this monstrosity. I wasn't able to get many parts this time around.
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Being under the car, I found that the engine was sitting lower than it should be, allowing the gearbox transfer case to sit on the front cross member. Got some new engine mounts to fix that.
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Decided to sort out the exhaust system. I did consider getting an ebay special, but after some research and learning about fitment issues, I decided to fab up my own exhaust system.

A friend of mine had a parts car which I was able to get a free custom 2.5" fabricated exhaust system from. I had bought a RPS muffler for $70 for this project, but with the cut up exhaust system, I had the opportunity to make up something a little more special.

I ended up having to get under this GT Four and cut the exhaust system out as the exhaust shop had welded it in, without flanges. Annoying to say the least, but hey, when it's a free exhaust system, you can't be too fussy in some work to get it.
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23 August 2015

Time to get some new engine mounts in. Stock replacements only, couldn't justify Toyota new or solid urethane bushes.
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As you can see, the old mounts look pretty worn out.
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Pulled the engine subframe and cross member out and gave them a scrub and clean
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Look much better
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Old mounts vs new
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deecee

New member
25/26 August 2015

Exhaust clean up time. As I had to cut that exhaust system out of the parts car, I had to clean up and start planning how to get it in installed in Pearl
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As you can see, it was weathered and they had mig welded everything together
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And I had to make my own little mess of the piping which needed to be cut off
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Interesting that they had crushed the pipe, press fitted, then done a lap weld vs a butt weld.
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More mig welding to clean up / remove
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Taking a stripping disc, I started cleaning up the exhaust system. I was pleasantly surprised to find the pipe still in good condition. Nice thickwall pipe was used.
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Side by side comparison of the mid pipe
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So I'm the Vice President of the New Zealand GT-Four Owners Club. The Club president came down for a weekend and I got him around to Nick's place to visit Pearl and Elephant. He was loving the fibreglass parts! Couldn't believe how light the bonnet was!
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deecee

New member
September 2015

More exhaust stripping and clean up.
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For ease of installation of the exhaust back in to Pearl, I decided to add flanges to the exhaust. I took the time to measure the location of the flanges relative to the original exhaust.
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Tig time..
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Not too bad a job
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Took me quite a while to get the angles of the exhaust correct.
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Had to cut sections and weld the length and angle back in.
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deecee

New member
October 2015

As Pearl is at Nick's, I had to load up the wagon and get my tools over. Lots of crawling underneath the car on cold and rough concrete, moving exhaust pipe and flanges around to get the correct fitment.
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As you can see, getting the rear exhaust big bore in the right position meant a S bend.
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And some manipulation on the axle stands
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Spacing the custom mid pipe was a bit of a pain, especially as it wasn't exactly the same shape as the original.
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Slowly but surely, the exhaust system came together. And yes, all done outside. Spot weld bits in, disassemble, run some beads and reinstall. This happened A LOT!
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Some times I got a fine day, so was able to progress. Sometimes I was working late in to the night, wearing thermals and trying to push through. This was a half decent day. Too many parts..
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More tig work
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And finally finished. A spray of heat temp paint and all ready to go back in after a month of work.
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Exhaust tree.. everyone should get one haha. Back section getting some more welding done. Finish the flange to the centre muffler and weld on the support rods on the back big bore
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