The Girthquake's AW11 MR2 Restoration - SNAP OVERSTEER CITY

Howdy GRM, welcome to another "scope creep" thread- where we inevitably claim "while I was in there..." knowing we will regret the decision months later. This car is my 1987 AW11 MR2-  and her name is "Kenzie".

A little backstory first. I pulled "Kenzie" out of an apartment complex in Lincoln Nebraska from a traveling nurse who sold it to me for $1200. It was not running, had 3 different sets of tires, and had been described in the Crigslist ad as "has had some kind of animal living inside". As I had just gotten into cars thanks to Mad Max: FURY ROAD and knew next to nothing outside of basic maintenance, I knew it would be prudent to buy something cheap and fun that I could rebuild and enjoy. So I did what I actually thought was smart- I looked for cars I thought looked cool and could be rebuilt cheaply, and compiled a list including other factors like upgrades and the like. After some deliberation I decided that because I had seen some CRX's before and knew their theft rates, and because of the slim pickings here in the midwest, I decided to jump on the first MR2 I found that had easily repairable rust.

After a $90 tow home with an "interesting" driver and my EMT partner riding sidecar, it took myself and my stepfather less than a week to restart the car and learn why it was parked. My stepdad held my hand the entire process- we replaced nearly everything rubber without ripping into the 4A and it's C52 trans, yanking the old radiator and fixing obvious issues from 2 prior owners. We rebuilt brakes, replaced the fuel pump and ancillary parts, rebuilt the steering rack and swapped busted tie rods like wives at a swinger's party. This car is a running and driving project- I daily-drove it for several weeks in 2016 even, to get a "feel" for what to do next.

And OH BOY, what ideas I had! Firstly, I was well-ventilated on the interstate- not by my berkeleyawesome T-tops, but because I had rust in the floor under the drivers seat. I had two speakers working out of 4, and the butt-thumper sub underneath me was AWOL with evidence of Leaky T-tops being the culprit. My interior had an animal living inside it and smelled the part, and new insulation was desperately needed to quiet the (now throaty due to new exhaust) 4A-GE, an engine which keeps daring you to rev to 7,000 RPM just because you can damnit. Other details involved the obvious 30 year old suspension... doing something, and difficulty starting when cold. So I decided in March of 2017 I would tackle both issues- fix the suspension with new poly bushings, begin replacing and refreshing the interior, and look more into the 4A for it's 10-15 second morning crank.

REMEMBER THAT PROBLEM WITH SCOPE CREEP?

One of the first problems arose from the glacial pace I was able to work. Needing an hour of your day just to go to the thing means whole days would have to be set aside, and since I wanted to be as little of a bugbear as possible what days I would spend taking up garage space would be limited- meaning anything I did would have to be planned out days in advance, with bad weather stalling days worth of progress. Oh, and I'm a paramedic- a job that could be summed up as that quote "all plans only survive first contact."

Still, I soldiered on. I steadily added rubberized Dynamat-like backing to bare steel from Tokiko after removing the entire dash and interior, contorting my body in ways even us 20-somethings would ache from. I would do this either driving the car up into the garage, or if the weather was too cold to start using a lot of goddamned extension cords for the heat gun.

(Still in progress)

During this I also fixed a lot of other issues, including my floor rust in the worst way. I had learned that a body shop had opened in my hometown 5 miles from me, and talks with the local fire chief/mechanic and hot rod shop had them telling me that he was the way to go. After seeing some of his work present including an old Packard, I pulled the trigger to have him weld and make a replacement floor for the car- I asked him to make something that worked, and since I would be under carpet it didn't need to look nice.

Guess who's a chump, to the tune of $225?

When it was home, I pulled it into the garage in the dark and shone a light underneath it- revealing many tiny pinprick holes. Jacking the car up showed that it was booger-welded, to the point where the rod actually got stuck to the body- I know this, because a length of the rod was still attached to a weld and had never been snipped off(!). The floor was stable and POR15'd, but I was rightfully angry and had to seal all the holes with black silicone and added multiple layers of spray undercoating before I felt like it was usable. This wasn't the end tho!

If you live in the USA, you know that thanks to Climate Change the Midwest suffered from one of the worst cold snaps known. We routinely saw temps drop to -20 on some overnights, and and my house was soon afflicted by a burst pipe. On the cars side, something in the master cylinder gave up the ghost a leaked brake fluid down the vacuum booster, a problem that made itself known when I began driving it into my garage only to find my pedal was useless. Further days spent replacing this had me teaching a friend of mine how to act when you can't stop your car, which due to her accidentally spraying Brakeclean into her eye that day might not have stuck. This event prewarned me to the next problem- despite our previous rebuild less than 2 years prior, I had two bleeder screws break off in the calipers and needed to get new ones.

For a 30 year old Toyota.

It took me a week.

So here's the first post of actually showing and doing stuff. This piece of carpet is one that I thought I could salvage from the car- it's the backing that goes up against the firewall, and typically has a 1/4-1/2 inch of mass backing to insulate and deaden sounds. Obviously, you can guess how well it did.

See those odd marks on the driver's side? Those aren't stains- they are chewed holes, made by mice who found an odd hole that was punched into the firewall for more cabling from a prior owner. After I sealed it and began cleaning this for salvage I found those marks and chew holes, which thankfully are the only ones.

How do we clean this carpet piece? Firstly, I had this airing out in my garage for weeks even after ripping the old fabric off the back, and had used the shop vacuum on it repeatedly. The smell had improved from "animal" to "dusty oil", so I knew that it was time to hit it with some true cleaners before any backing could be used.

First, I found some baking soda and shook a good amount into the carpet to deodorize it, working it in with my hands as I went. It's not necessary to go nuts, but it is needed to get rid of the worst smells and to help the vacuum to "grab" the first amounts of dirt. Once this was done and vacuumed again, the carpet only had lingering smells- so I prepared for step 2.

Have a handheld carpet cleaner? You should. We got a bissel machine for 20 bucks, and your own cleaners can be concocted easily with little risk of damaging internals. Seriously, for this we won't use any "typical" cleaner or the overpriced E36 M3- instead, I mixed one part of hot vinegar to one part hot water (I did about a pint's worth) followed by a sludgy dollop of fabric softener and a few squirts of dish soap. Yeah yeah, I hear your keys clacking at your battlestation, telling me about "making chlorine gas" and "being dangerous" and "having little respect for my mother's basement floor and appliances" but chill. I tested this crap and it didn't make any odd bubbling, and I used dish soap instead of fabric detergent because the latter typically is a base, so we all good. Anyway...

My Bissel machine has a sprayer, and I used it to liberally coat and soak the carpet in the concoction. After a soak down, I left it sitting for several minutes to let the soaps (softener is a soap, just not a powerful one) do their thing. After 5-10 minutes, I used the carpet spot cleaner's combination of vacuum and brush head to begin cleaning- I started with regular brushing movements in a back-and-forth, followed by a steady pull to suck up the liquids. The first pass had obvious results.

Black. Typical.

I did this again, soaking the carpet down and waiting before sucking- but this time, I scrubbed in circles before the vacuum- which produced (what else?) more black muck. This is the real trick to cleaning carpets- multiple passes with multiple styles of scrubbing and sucking, and several soaps and cleaning agents followed by rinses of clean water. In the case of this mix, the first vacuum and deodorizer worked up particulate and forced stuff to clump in the beginning. The cleaner isn't powerful on it's own- hot vinegar and water won't kill a lot of bacteria no matter how much patchouli oil sales swamp people tell you- but mixing it with mild detergents and softeners suddenly amplifies everything. For the record, hot vinegar and soap kills bacteria, soap surfactants and vinegar attack oils, and the softeners... soften.

So now we have done this twice and we prep for rinsing. We use hot water again- cause we aren't chumps- and clean out the sucker and it's parts to make sure we leave nothing lingering. This time, we spray it down with hot water and vacuum right after saturating it, again making different passes each time with different motions. After washing it like this several times, we make a final pass using slow, deliberate strokes after it has been scrubbed.

Despite my potato phone camera-quality, I think you can see improvements and oh god did the smell improve. Namely, there isn't much of one. You have a little bite of vinegar, but the softener really covers the smell properly. I also noticed that the black in the carpets really has become deeper. FYI, the water I pulled from it was still black and it was left to sit and dry- it will need another pass and cleaning job before I call it good, simply because it's prior life as a house for wayward stray cats means I won't be satisfied until the only living thing inside it is me. But seriously, try it out for yourself sometime- I promise it will do a good job for you too.

Next up- a catalogue of growing suspension parts, a review of carpets from Stockinteriors/ACC and a soon-to-be reveal of the true star of this thread.

lol one month later

Despite being daily-ied at one point, the AW11 pulled some excellent BS with me and it's master cylinder. When I began to regularly drive it, I noticed that the master had begun to leak into the frunk, dribbling down the booster and pooling into the spare tire well. "Okay," I thought, "Winter is coming, and this will merely 'add' to the list. Get a reman part on order, stow it and replace it when you can." But then we hit -20 at times, which hit the cylinder something foul- I moved the car in one day only to discover while driving that I had no brakes.

So in the car goes. Master cylinder gets pulled, scunge gets the wire wheel and POR15'ed, considerations to replace clutch parts are made but not followed because I am currently becoming the patron saint of "while I'm in here". After it's installed and fluid is properly re-added, we kindly request the Tai-Sho of Toyota corp. to open it's year-old bleeder valves to bleed- but our prayers are met with merely a scowl.

"No." The figure replies. Two fresh bleeder screws snap, one of which takes a reverse-threaded bit with it in an awesome display of defiance. The delay costs two weeks of finding remanufactured calipers to replace those lost, and includes a $100 dollar price on buying new stainless brake lines to replace 30 year old rubber.

An interesting note for anyone following who would like to experience the odd nature of the MR2- it's brakes are awesomely simple. Do you see the upper part where the hose meets the hard, metal lines before disappearing into the body? I had difficulties re-attaching the line to the threads, because it turned out it was re-attached far too hard, causing the flared tip tto expand and be too wide to fit the hole. Typically a bad deal- but thankfully the line barely runs 4 inches into the body until it bolts into another line using a female-female connection to mount to the body. In 30 minutes I was able to remove the stretch of line, file the offending part down, and re-attach without further issue. Score!

For the record, the lines are Techna-Fit, and are provided by MatrixGarage here for a hundred bucks, and while I have not driven this car to give a good recommendation I doubt I will be displeased. They legitimately are a bolt-on operation, but you WILL need to save the original clips. If your not doing it for the supposed performance gains, do it for the peace of mind at least.

Note in the picture above- the rack has been cleaned and refreshed, with new boot seals and new tie rod ends. If you have a "clunk" in your steering its a $3 plastic bushing that needs replaced, a simple operation that can be done in a few hours.

GIRTHQUAKE said:If you have a "clunk" in your steering its a $3 plastic bushing that needs replaced, a simple operation that can be done in a few hours.

Could elaborate on this? I have this problem, and I keep seeing other AW11 owners say similar things. But no one explains where this magical bushing actually is or how to change it. I have the green factory manual and can't identify what is being referred to.

Thanks

JamesMcD said:

GIRTHQUAKE said:If you have a "clunk" in your steering its a $3 plastic bushing that needs replaced, a simple operation that can be done in a few hours.

 

Could elaborate on this? I have this problem, and I keep seeing other AW11 owners say similar things. But no one explains where this magical bushing actually is or how to change it. I have the green factory manual and can't identify what is being referred to.

 

Thanks

I believe it's referring to the rack and pinion bushings, see this article 

http://mr2wiki.com/MKI/RackAndPinionBushing

OK, thanks. I think I found a thread about it on MR2.com.

JamesMcD said:

OK, thanks. I think I found a thread about it on MR2.com.

Yep, that's it! It's the white piece in this picture in the middle:

From what I understand, it serves two functions- keeping the inner toothed rack from metal-on-metal contact with the housing, acting as another grease seal to keep dirt out of the pinion gear AND making the steering smoother.

To replace it, you need to just expose the bushing by removing the tie rod from the wheel, screwing the outer rod off the rack, then use some picks- like pencils or chopsticks or whatever- to push in those "holes" you see in the rack on the left. There are 3 of them, and with at least 2 depressed you will be able to remove the bushing steadily. That guide will give you the source for the part yourself- slather it in molly grease, and before you pop it back in make sure your steering doesn't have any other odd feelings. After that all you'll need to do is replace the claw washer and likely a dust seal boot. If you aren't a car novice like me it will likely take you only 30 minutes, maybe an hour.

Been quite awhile since I updates, but since my work schedule regularly changes and a whole day has to be set aside for work to make it worthwhile I hope it's a little understandable.

Since my last post I have been fighting a combination of the heater core, coolant lines, and the IACV- or 'Idle Air Control Valve'. When Toyota made the 4A and its attendant emissions equipment, they created an odd secondary system for when the engine warms to temperature without messing heavily with air/fuel mixtures.

Notice on the Throttle body that one "hot" line goes in, but one "cold" line leaves. In that space in the throttle is a wax bead set inside of a chamber which acts as a stopgap for more air while also acting as a proto "secondary" thermostat. When the bead is solid- because the coolant is not up to ~180 degrees- it doesn't flow, keeping more air from entering the engine or triggering temperature sensors. This forces the primitive ECU to richen the mixture and to run the Idle speed higher in response- typically over 1500RPM when cold.

The problem with this is when you need to replace your coolant after a complete flush. With no coolant in the space the idle keeps running high, which is good! But with all those dips and turns air pockets are the norm, and while they WILL get worked out eventually the only true success I have ever had bleeding the system was through multiple heat cycles and allowing it to pull from the expansion tank under vacuum. You'll know when this happens- in my case, the car refused to run higher than 2500 RPM,and stalled out regularly during the procedure. After pulling the entire expansion tank's worth of coolant overnight, it never had any difficulties again.

With that, I continued to work at the interior installing sound deadening and insulation under new carpets. It's been a great learning experience so far- I will NEVER install carpets again, but I sure as heck don't regret it.

"We're Top Corporation".

At the advice of MR2 AW11 Guru Yoshimitsuspeed of the Matrix Garage, I decided to take a risk on the new WAT coilovers instead of the typical Koni Shocks with Ground Control Coilovers.

I've never messed with coils before- this is my first project car afterall- but they do have plenty of heft and multipule areas of adjustment. Better still, these have an additional +20mm of piston length added specifically for rough Nebraska roads- while I am sure that Michigan GRM-ers would find ours pleasing, Nebraskans use the roads as a constant topic to collectively complain about and adding even just a *little* length to these tubes should help. I am also installing the new bushings during this, so the next month will hopefully be very productive.

If you’re interested,   I do have some stock trim pieces from the rear trunk,  and various original bits and pieces that you’re welcome to if you ever pass through Sioux Falls. Mine is going a different direction so I am accumulating take-off parts as it goes.