Toyota Altezza daily

That will be me, I've moved to Sawston There is another white Altezza in the area though so could be either of us

 

Well as the Altezza has become less of a daily it has been time to get a second car. Although I did get some new wheels which I fucking love:



RE-Amemiya AW7s by Desmond

Now I know RX7 purists will tell me to fuck off as they are wheels for RX7s but I don't care, let me be happy.

The thermostat seems to be stuck as it takes about 25minutes to get to temperature, I'm creaking on full lock so probably worn ball joints and these tyres are way too wide for an NA 4 pot so I'll give her some TLC over the coming months.

Now as I was after a second car I was thinking practical, 4 door, plenty of space. Like the Impreza wagon I had, which was NA so low maintenance and plenty of room. But unfortunately I have also been watching way too many Hot Version episodes on the Youtubes and got hooked on the Techno Pro Spirits MR-S... so meet my new car, nicknamed "The Banana Shitbox"



As you can see she isn't a show pony. The most serious concern is steering vibration on bumpy ground. It might be steering rack bushes but I'll jack her up when I have time and see if I can find out for sure. It also came with an engine management light which no one has been able to read as its a Japanese import, but using the bluetooth adapter, Torque pro and a custom string I managed to read the fault code of an O2 sensor.

The car itself is pretty standard, although has a J1 front/rear lip and sideskirts and an Abflug(?) rear wing. Also has a reeealy old HKS sticker above the exhaust, so having a HKS backbox could be cool. Again, need it jacked up to really see what I bought for £900.

I know the Mk3 MR2 is hated but it is like a go cart to drive with amazing handling, and at that price it is a 7/7 from me.

 

Knock knock

Who's there?

MR-S engine

Shit.

 

More woes.

Was swapping out the thermostat on the Altezza, took a bit of time to wiggle it out but got there in the end. Was bleeding coolant, had the engine running with an easy bleed funnel to get it up to temperature and then poof, engine died. EFI fuse has blown like it did on the drift day. Now whenever the ignition switches on the fuse blows instantly.

Electrics are probably my worst skill so learning stuff as I go. I ran out of fuses so waiting for a bunch to arrive and then I can start troubleshooting. The plan of attack is:
- Unplug everything in the engine bay, see if fuse blows. If it doesn't, plug stuff back in one by one until it blows.
- Fuel pump. Test resistance across terminals, turn on ignition with it unplugged.
- Cry
- Highlight everything on a wiring diagram that is remotely connected to the EFI fuse. Learn how to use a multimeter and try to find a short.
- Hire a priest to spray it with holy water

On the MR-S front, there is a aux pulley with a fair bit of play, a slight clunk when pressing the belt (probably tensioner) and the belt itself has split. Also ordered a replacement timing chain tensioner in case that is what is making the clunk (I'm hoping it isn't rod knock).

This week I hate cars and am considering becoming a cyclist and swearing at drivers as I cut them off.

 

Electrical problem on the Altezza solved, was a short from a plug the I had cable tied out the way when ITBs went on:



Knocking on the MRS identified... is indeed rod knock. Pulled the pan off and there's a lot of play on cylinder 4. Need to get a 12 sided socket piece then will get the bearings out and see how bad the crank is. Might try and clean it up and put new bearings in as a short term fix. If the crank is shot will be cheaper and easier to get a new engine in.

After not driving the Altezza for a few weeks, I forgot how great it is to drive. Just need to get the hardrace RCAs installed and correct the ride height

 

Have you driven a 2ZZ MR2? With the bearings needing to be replaced I expect the engine will be a ticking time bomb so it will end up being a simple 1ZZ replacement or going 2ZZ. My "issue" is that the 2ZZ seems more like the 3SGE and needs to be revved to get it going, whereas I like how the 1ZZ had a lot of umph low in the range. But that might be because the chassis is so light so light? I'm new to the ZZ world so probably need to go and experience it.

The techno Pro Spirit MR-S has the 2ZZ and it sounds like it has ITBs on the Hot Version episodes.... I think it needs extra firewall clearance to fit but that would be a lot of fun....

And I bought this as a cheap daily so I could keep the Tez in the garage I have no self control

 

Well it has been a while, not a lot has changed on the car considering how much time I've had.

First up: Tail light covers. They are cheap fiberglass ones so are not the flushest of fit but I quite like the change for now. I tried painting them myself with rattle cans... now have much more appreciation for car painters.



The front right wheel has an air leak from the barrel, bit of a pain as that is tyre off and re-sealing. I don't want to split the rims just yet as I'll get them fully refurbed at some point, and considering their age I don't want to fuck anything up.

Next up i an NRG steering wheel. The DW suede one got trashed pretty quickly as I use it daily and it ended up being gross. I couldn't justify the cost of a Nardi, I don't feel like they are worth it? So wen't semi-budget and got a leather one that will last longer with my sweaty hands



The next learning curve for the Altezza is getting a gauge installed in the dash somewhere. Being on ITBs and Link ECU I want to keep an eye on some parameters, particularly AFR. With a Link lambda controller already in place, the best solution seems to be a CAN bus gauge. Went for AEM as it seems like a decent option for the price compared to plug'n'play gauges for the link ECU. The basic setup is:
- Spliced AEM harness to separate power from the stereo or something, and the CAN+/- to the ECU.
- The CAN wires will be spliced in to a Link plug int he CAN socket on the ECU.
- In the Link ECU, replicate CAN IDs, frequency etc to match AEMNET IDs. Link only use 6 CAN channels and bundle different parameters in to each ID whereas AEMNET seem to use a separate ID for each parameter. So I can get 6 different data channels out of the ECU which is more than what I need.



The pain here will be the wiring, and as the ECU is in the engine bay I need to feed CAN wires through the firewall.

On other news, the MR-S battery drains within days due to the immobiliser, so got a quick disconnect switch for the battery rather than fixing the actual problem. Other than that, it drives great with new shocks, OEM wheels and fresh tyres



And now for the reason why car progress has slowed down... this is Elphie, she still needs to learn how to pass me the 10mm socket

 

It has ben a while with not much progress, but a few bits have been done. First of all, the RE-Amemiya AW7 wheels have been refurbished. They were not too bad before, aesthetically, but they were not sealed properly and were leaking a lot of air. Decided to have the centres powdercoated while they were apart. I'm trying out Falken Azenis FK510s as I wanted a tyre good in the wet.


Next up is trying to figure out the best way to deal with engine bay space problems. I can't seem to get the pod air filter to work. It presses against piping by the firewall, and the baseplate for the filter is touching the clutch master cylinder despite clearancing as much as I can. Also, If I try and use the Cusco strut brace it presses on the filter. The current plan is to try and get a small tray that hugs close to the throttles, then mount a slimmer filter on top of that. Should allow some finer control for spacing the filter. Just need to check there is space towards the firewall.



And finally, I got the AEM CAN gauge installed. This was a bit of a fiddle to get right. I tagged some wires on to the Lambda controller's wiring to extend the bus, threaded them through the firewall and behind the dash. I found a small 3D printed gauge pod that replaces the ash tray on the XE10, which was ideal as I wasn't keen on screwing the gauge up on the dash. All the wiring is using crimped connecters and scotchlocks, so I will need to go back through and make it more resilient.


Trying to replicate the AEMnet was a bit of a pain, as the Link ECU uses different everything to AEM. Things I needed to do:
- Set Link Lambda Controller to 500Kb/s (instead of the default 1Mb/s)
- Set up CAN channels to replicate AEMnet (using hex AEM IDs converted to decimal extended CAN IDs for Link)
- Create frames within the stream for the correct data transfer. This was a pain as AEM have plenty of info on how their CAN network works, but Link doesn't seem to have readily available info.

For example, AEM supply this info for Lambda #1


Whereas Link use 16 bit and their value is out by a factor of 10. So within the CAN settings you need to apply some maths to get the value correct on the gauge:


As it was freezing outside, I only set up a few parameters; lambda, IAT and MAP.

The most annoying part about the ECU settings was being able to connect to the ECU. I hate Windows so don't have a Windows laptop, only Linux. So I needed to fire up a Windows 10 VM within Virtualbox on Debian, get some extra USB extensions for the software and pray that the VM would connect with the ECU. But it did work and wasn't too hard to set up.

Need to get an alignment done now as I've put on Hardrace RCAs and fiddled with the ride height. Then I'll re-book a grip track day (thanks Covid) and see how it all feels when driven in anger.

 

I've had a few people ask about how the ITBs are done, so I'll stick the info here in one place in case anyone else comes across it needing some info.

My setup:
AE111 4AGE Blacktop individual throttle bodies
SQ Engineering adapter plate
SQ Engineering 100mm throttles
SQ Engineering down pull throttle linkage kit
90° PCV valve
Pipercross backing plate
Pipercross PX600 dome filter
Ebay vacuum collector box
Mishimoto catch can
Link Altezza plugin ECU
Link lambda controller
IAT sensor

After searching/waiting for the throttles to come up for sale, I found them here for a cheaper price than any I found in the UK: https://www.smr2u.com/
I think the AE111 Corolla was available in Malaysia so they have a decent supply out there.

The vacuum set up is one pipe from each cylinder to the collector box, taken from the SQ Engineering adapter plate. From the collector box, one pipe goes to the on-board MAP sensor on the ECU, and another pipe goes to the brake booster.
The MAP sensor input isn't always needed as ITBs are generally tuned with alpha n, but it can be useful for fuel table corrections (same with the wideband).




I initially tried having the catch can under vacuum, but that was messing up everything else so I just vent the can now. Ideally the PCV valve should be bored out and use a wider diameter pipe, but I haven't done that yet. I just have both the PCV and breather going straight in to the can with a filter on the third port.


To use the Altezza throttle cable, is spaced out the downpull throttle mount by 30mm (I think). I use the downpull relocation to avoid the damper on the fuel rail, and it also looks tidier.


Trying to fit the air filter was a bit of a hassle. I needed to take off the clutch master reservoir, grind the reservoir support back and user a remote reservoir. A Toyota rav4 has a part that attaches to the master cylinder and angles a pipe away from the engine allowing a remote reservoir to be attached. The clearance between the master cylinder and the adapter plate is very tight, and with my worn engine mounts there is some knocking/rubbing. I have some plans to try and solve this using an extended Jenvey throttle tray.
I attach the IAT sensor to the original throttle cable mount on the brake master


Unfortunately with the 100mm trumpets and pipercross filter, I can't comfortably use the Cusco strut brace.

All in, including tuning and a bit of workshop time at Fensport, it cost me £2,800. This could definitely be done for cheaper as I bought spares and duplicates, plus a lot of excess piping and fittings, but it was still cheaper than buying a ready made ITB setup for the 3SGE beams.

 

I used a Brembo reservoir with a smaller fitting like you found, and just used one of those step down barb connectors halfway between them. I have a bit of seeping around the area so I need to re-do it though

 

Well, I jumped on the bandwagon and found myself some Ganador mirrors. They came in from Russia, in half decent condition.



I had a grip day at Snetterton, which started off wet but dried out nicely in the afternoon. I never found the grip limit in the dry, as my tyres are probably far too wide for the power. It goes around corners so quick and while every other car pulled away on the straights, I could catch most up in the turns.

One big flaw with the car from factory is the final drive. At 4.1:1 for the early models, it can be painful when the time between gears is measured in minutes while accelerating. The answer is the 4.6 final drive kit from TRD, but they are discontinued and quite rare now. I thought I'd pair it with an OS Giken 1.5 way if I could get hold of either. But lo and behold, Yahoo auctioned delivered. 4.6 final drive with OS GIiken 1.5 way. Was it a miracle? Or was I checking the auctions daily for this exact piece? We'll never know.

It took almost a year to get from the auction win to get to my door due to various delays, but it arrived all cleaned up and painted.



And it passed inspection by the newest member of the family. Not sure if she checked the backlash though.

Filled it with some proper oil that came in nice cans, and I have a spare ready. It is expensive but apparently necessary.



Had a busy few weeks so hadn't had a chance to get it in until today. I feel like it was one of the worst jobs I've had to do on this car. A mixture of rounded bolts, awkward angles and copious amounts of underseal made it grim but I got the old one out and the "new" one in.



My original diff, the 4.1 torsen, had been leaking for years and is in a bit of a sorry state, so it should be a noticeable change. The next step is to grab a different 6th gear to bring RPM down while cruising at 70 which SQ Engineering sell.