Logan's rides

[Logan]

After a long time since updating my last rides thread I thought I would start fresh and talk about each of my MR2's.

I'll start off first with my Aquamarine Pearl Turbo. I bought it just over a year ago "Reg/Wof" and drove it home. After driving it home I don't believe it had a genuine WoF as a number of issues started to arise.
The first issue was the gearbox. It crunched badly into and out of 3rd. This wasn't helped by the NA gear cables that had been fitted meaning the shifter was not in the right place.
After a long time searching I managed to find some turbo shift cables to replace these with but unfortunately the damage to the gearbox was done. So at this point I pulled the motor out and replaced the gearbox with a spare I had. This solved that issue.
Later I had the gearbox rebuilt and found that you can no longer buy 3rd-4th gear synchro cones for the E153...So instead the replacement parts were salvaged from a caldina GT-T gearbox.

While it was out I was also able to address numerous other problems. The accelerator cable had been replaced by something that was obviously made up and incorrect for the car. The accelerator was extremely stiff beforehand and felt uneasy to drive. Replaced this with a factory one I had spare from a wrecked car.
One thing that was evident on the drive home was the twitchiness of the rear of the car. After further investigation I found that there was a rear bushing that was completely shot. This should have been picked up on the WoF check...Have now replaced this and it certainly feels a lot nicer to drive at high speed.

When I bought it the paint was quite bad. It had a terrible paintjob, hand prints in the paint on the bonnet and clear peeling on the engine lid. Gave it a cut, polish and wax and it came out much better than I was expecting. Pics following:

Removed the engine lid to touch up the clear coat. Looks much:

Hoping to get a WoF on it this week and then the plan is to sell it on as I need to downsize my fleet.

[chief1eye]

I don't know if I should say this. But I do like the look of some of that American muscle in the background!!!

[Spykerwolf]

Lookin' good

[Logan]

Decided to do a bit of a thread revival as I reminisce a little.
My MR2 ownership has been a long journey of ups and downs and I've owned plenty of what I would call Toyotas least reliable car.

It all started with this gem which I flew down to Wellington and bought sight unseen.

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Quite an adventure given I hadn't driven manual for a few years. After that drive back I was hooked on the MR2 and decided it needed some cosmetic changes to it. I'm sure others here have similar experiences. Does anyone remember their first drive in an MR2?
As with most of the generation 2 3SGE's the engine bay looked pretty tired so I spent a few weekends tidying it up with some personal touches.

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At this point in time the car was still my daily driver for a year or two until one day a bus drove into the side of me, damaging the autopista bodykit and making me question the future of the car.
Luckily the chassis wasn't damaged but the bodykit was beyond repair. After getting paid out for the incident I decided to purchase a full Border style bodykit. (You could still buy them brand new in NZ then!)

The purple paint that I bought the car with proved very difficult to colour match, so in the end it got a slightly more satin sheen of purple.

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I had done bodywork before but this was my first attempt at fitting a bodykit. It was certainly a challenging experience, I learnt a lot and that I didn't want to do it again in a hurry!

I took this car on many runs such as the one in the image below. This was back in 2012: http://mr2.org.nz/phpbb3/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=10276

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It served its purpose and I gave it hell on each run. She lasted about another year until the engine smoke was getting out of control. It was at this point when I decided I'd like to put a v6 in. A mistake I must admit in hindsight.

[Logan]

I always loved the sleek profile that the border front bumper gave the car. it really makes you appreciate the lines of the MR2.

This has to be one of my most photographed cars, as I used to take it everywhere and anywhere.

To continue the story...The engine was starting to get very smokey, it was time to do something with the car. At this point I saw a very cheap Toyota Windom come up for sale with the 3vz 3l v6 and decided this would be the way to go. As I was younger and foolish I decided to drive the dead-registration vehicle home. It lasted about 1km on the motorway before the bonnet decided to fly up and destroy the windscreen. In a rush of adrenaline and not wanting to get caught that was the fastest I may have ever moved as I jumped out to jam it down and drive carefully off the motorway into a hidden away place in the industrial area on Rosebank Rd. I somehow found my way home and got a trailer to go pick it up. The things we do when we aren't thinking eh?

Not long after I had the engine out and ready to strip down for a full rebuild.

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I'd played around with engines before and done plenty of waterpump + cambelt changes and other maintenance items but this was the first time I'd been truly inside an engine. Following the service manual carefully I did a full rebuild, bore + hone and port and polish. A great learning experience.
I then continued to the wiring of it which was very confusing as there was very little online about the Windom which seemed to only be Japanese delivered. I struggled through and managed to get it running on the stock automatic ECU but it never worked completely right seeming to bog down above about 4k RPM. At this point the car was driveable and I managed to take it to work a couple of times across town. (The car wasn't my daily at this stage!) This was all going ok until one day the traffic was particularly bad, the car blew a water hose off right on the harbour bridge of all places. Ending up with me creeping down the other side. At this point I decided to see what I could do to fix the little issues it had.
I ended up at this point buying a megasquirt ECU to try and fix the performance problems I was having with the factory ECU. At the time I found the support for the ECU lack lustre and certainly regret doing this as I never got it to run properly with this setup. Having never tuned an ECU before I assumed it was an issue with me doing it.

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After probably 2 years of getting no where with this swap I ended up purchasing a turbo engine off a fellow member and a whole car which had an engine issue, giving me all the parts for a full turbo conversion.

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And so began the next stage of the purple mr2...

[Logan]

By this time it was early 2016 and I had sold off the v6 and megasquirt in favour of a gen 2 3sgte. I had got the engine in pretty quick but then soon discovered it had an issue with a boost leak.
Unfortunately I did never solve it and the car sat there for a while as I got busier with my job.

By this time I had moved house 4 times and dragged the MR2 around with me each time and made a tough decision to sell it. Life moves on and writing this I'm feeling a bit of regret!

She sure had changed a lot since the first time I drove it.

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In hindsight I learnt how to do an awful lot on this car, and a few things not to do. I'm hoping to see it pop up again eventually down the road...

[Jabeo]

Great car mate, I came to view it that one time and it was an awesome time seeing my first mr2 up close and going for a ride. Since then I learned to drive stick, got my full and got my own mr2 as well! So I have to thank you for giving me the the first experience I had with an mr2 and I have been hooked ever since

[Gleshlich]

That looks an awful lot like the megasquirt I bought a couple years back for my V6

[Spykerwolf]

Welcome back old man

[Logan]

Great car mate, I came to view it that one time and it was an awesome time seeing my first mr2 up close and going for a ride. Since then I learned to drive stick, got my full and got my own mr2 as well! So I have to thank you for giving me the the first experience I had with an mr2 and I have been hooked ever since

I'm glad I passed the bug onto you Jabeo and hope to see you on a run soon when my MR2 finally gets the suspension components I've been waiting for.

That looks an awful lot like the megasquirt I bought a couple years back for my V6

Could be Justin? I sold the complete package, ECU, loom, engine and gearbox to someone local but perhaps he parted it out afterwards? I never heard back from him afterwards unfortunately.

Welcome back old man

Thanks mate Glad to see you back in the MR2 game also.

[Logan]

In my last years of high school and through university I never bothered getting a typical job. Instead opting to be self employed I would buy real cheap cars from the trade and exchange paper, and later trade-me in its early years, to do up and sell on. Having owned around 10-15 ST182 celicas by this point I was fairly competent working on the 3sge and so decided to start looking at other MR2's as they came up for sale.

One of the first ones I bought however was mechanically sound, but just quite out of the way. So I drove down to Tapu on the Corromandel peninsula and ended up with a lightly modified NA manual at a great price.

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Possibly the only MR2 I've seen in NZ with a Bomex bodykit on it? And the red paint wasn't even faded. It was fairly meticulously kept by the older owner and proved to be one of the most reliable MR2's I bought over the years. Unfortunately I don't have the best pictures of it... I hope this car is still out there somewhere.

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At the time the wheels weren't my taste but I think they may have come back in fashion now. Looks better than I remember it.

[mickeyduck]

Run, Sunday...

[Logan]

Run, Sunday...

I would love to come Charlie but my two is on axles stands right now.

Long story short it started smoking quite bad. I bought a leak down tester and identified it was the turbo that was the problem. I pulled this and got Alltech to rebuild it.
While that was out of course I couldn't help but tidy up the engine loom and do a whole pile of other stuff...I'll get to post it all on here eventually.

I have only just finished putting the turbo back in and did it's first start today.
While this was out I ordered some new swaybars and end links as the car didn't have any when I purchased it. I don't like how it handles on the road without them.. Unfortunately their shipping was delayed but am hoping to get them next week or the week after. I don't really want to put the cross-member in and have to take it out again to do that.

So it will be back on the road very soon but not Sunday soon unfortunately!

[mickeyduck]

Well you might get your SW back on its feet before mine mate. Good on you. I'll look forward to a run where we have them both on the road. Cos that would be cool.

[Logan]

I'll look forward to a run where we have them both on the road. Cos that would be cool.

That will definitely be a SWeet run.
Looking forward to that. What needs fixing with your SW now?

Another 2 another story...
I bought this wee NA manual to tidy up and sell. It had the usual faded red paint but came up real nice after a good deep polish.
I used this one as my daily to get to work for a few months while I fixed up another Toyota I was working on. This one being a little more sort after as a hard top was in pretty good overall condition and looked sharp with some aftermarket wheels.

She had an issue with the alternator when I bought her and it seemed to cut out intermittently. Testng tboth the alternator and battery showed no signs of issues. Eventually I found after a lot of searching that the rubber seal had degraded in the alternator plug, causing the plug to not be able to "click" into place. When it was driven it would vibrate in and out of connection. What a pain but an easy fix nonetheless!

I still remember to this day seeing it out driving with the same wheels on years after I sold it on and feeling proud that it was still on the road.