My AE101 - 4AFE LIFE / BLUE SMOKE

[Swampy]

I thought I’d make a thread for my AE101 as that’s what I’ve been working on mainly and to stop posting about it in my SW thread. It is a facelift AE101, with a late gen 4AFE and a C52 transmission. It’s nearly done 300,000km and the plan is to make it a nice, clean example that I can do all my testing/development on in terms of getting more power out of it, and also design a body kit for it.

I understand squeezing power out of an old high km engine is a recipe for disaster, and it does make a bit of blue smoke, so there will be a rebuild of the engine sometime along the way. I will do all testing using the road dyno perfexpert app, on the same stretch of road, and more or less same weather conditions, temperature, humidity, wind etc. the 4AFE has a following lol in many countries where a 4AGE is unobtainium and or labour is cheap, South Africa, Malaysia, to name a few, and there are a few resources on the interwebs about making power out of the oft-overlooked FE heads.

I will do a full exhaust, make adjustments to my intake, head port and polish, cam regrind, along with maintenance. If I make 200hp I will be stoked, if I make = to what a 20v 4age makes, that’s awesome too. Or am I just wasting my time? Follow me down the FE rabbit hole!

[Swampy]

This is the colour it will be, KA4. The oem is a far lighter shade, with no paint code other than “electric blue” but my old paint supplier said he’d match the colour by photo. That’s why I no longer purchase from him, along with the many packages sent to the wrong address.


I had a go at painting it in my old workspace, but being 350km~ away and me having to stay at a campgrounds, plus not having an adequate work area, meant I didn’t do a good enough job and I am re-doing it properly in my new workspace. Hence why some panels are painted and others are scuffed.


I used a Carpro orange peel denim pad, with menzerna super cut compound followed by a wool pad with the same compound. The orange peel was quite bad, so I wet sanded first with 2000grit and a block, but for better finishes the pad alone is designed to cut out the wet sanding stage.




Though it is a nice colour I am not 100% sold on it and this is a closed door job.

[Swampy]

Bumpers done.
The procedure is:
1. DA sand with 240 grit, 180 grit optional for badly damaged areas. Body filler for any large damage/that which primer won’t fill
2. Scuff hard to reach areas with red scuff pad
3. Hose off, clean edges and underside of any dust/dirt
4. Wipe prepsol and blow off, final checks, masking if needed

I use an ANI F1 primer gun with a 2.0 tip, and 2k bodyian epoxy primer from autocolourbank. I find the gun to be good, but I need a 1.8 tip as it’s easy to make runs. Also when mixing by volume add 10% thinners max for primer filler.




It’s important to give the primer time to flash off between coats. If you don’t, you’ll cut through super easy when sanding it, and have to re-do it all over again.



Once primed and cured - overnight works, but be careful in winter time in really cold areas - apply guide coat and sand with 320 or 400 grit



My guide coat is orange, I highly advise using quality guide coat, the cheap stuff doesn’t work here, along with abrasives. I use crappy cheap (trade me) and fair (Bunnings, SCA) but only because I have a 125mm sander. Upgrading to a 150mm and using 3m is high on my list.

Black is the best guide coat, I thought orange was cool, because I used it once in industry when black was out of stock. An elder gent who had been doing this job since the 70s told me he had never seen anything like it. All the panel guys thought it was ridiculous.

Anywho, I have been doing a lot of practice dialing in my gun, getting gun time under my belt, to basically use as much primer as needed til I get to the point where I don’t get runs and I get a good finish that is easily sandable.

I did a crappy job of priming the front bumper in my old shed, so had to re-do it.


It’s crappy because a metallic blue doesn’t cover very well, so will require a lot of coats to hide the different colours beneath it. It’s much easier to just get a solid primer coat beneath it.


I digress - once guide coated, and sanded with 320 or 400, inspect for any pinholes, flaws you may have missed, fill them with a fine 1k filler and sand smooth with a 400g block or foam backed paper.


Wet sand with 400, foam backed or block, too much hand sanding may cause finger sanding marks that’ll show in the final finish

[Swampy]

My bonnet had a spot where the masking film had touched it while drying, and it had caused some solvent pop and runs


It couldn’t be saved, so I blocked it with 400


Filled then sanded any holes




As well as sanded out any dust. There was lots of it


Admittedly my old shed wasn’t the cleanest when I painted, hence why when I paint again I will spend the time to thoroughly clean and remove any dust, as well as wet the floor when painting.

The rest of the bonnet was sanded with 800 grit and wet sanded with a grey scuff pad. This is because it just needs clear, except for the front section


Which was then surface primed using PPG G6 - a good spot primer that comes in lighter g5 or darker g7 colours.

[Swampy]

Unfortunately, my paint, along with the oem, was super thin, and I cut through with fine grits.




I share my mistakes so hopefully others learn from them too. I knew better than this, being my 2nd respray, and knowing the paint amount requirements for each panel. But I took the wrong advice from a panel beater mate, who’d been in industry far longer than I, by about 20 years, he said he could paint a whole car with a litre of paint. If anyone tells you this, don’t listen, buy 4 litres.

The coverage wasn’t good enough, I want paint that will hold up to the sun, polishing, and other sources of damage.

So I sanded the LH side, boot and RH rear quarter where coverage was terrible (old supplier sent me two cans of primer, one dark one light) and masked it up for primer






Note the c-pillar, the masking tape there is folded over itself to give a soft edge and it’s primed close to but not to the tape on the first coat, then further away on following coats. Hard lines aren’t fun to sand and could show in your final finish.



More orangey stuff, time to sand



I had a few pinholes on the boot where I put it on thick, and a few small runs but nothing major

Jacked up to save my old back



Looks good, but in the foreground it needs a bit more sanding and there’s a pinhole


Hose off all that dust, final checks

[Swampy]

Pin holes on the boot, unfortunately was a bit heavy on the glazing putty as my thin filler knife went missing as they do.



Roof gets 800 and then scuffed with grey scotch and scuff paste


Hosed off

[Swampy]

Lower sill scuffed, just the outside will be painted, as it shows. Not much of a big deal as it will be covered by side skirt eventually.


Scuff stuff:


Got bored, so fitted the front bumper just to get an idea of what it looks like:

[Swampy]

My Subaru daily had an exhaust leak, so I had a go at repairing it. I use flux core and a cheap repco welder, it was good practice and time with the welder as my experience is limited to a few patch repairs and a few days course on welding.

[Swampy]

While I save for paint, I’ll tackle a few other jobs. Beginning with my ugly scratched to hell drivers glass





Nothing could have saved it, I tried aggressive compound, wet sanding, I’ll have to buy a replacement, and a replacement weatherstrip next time I visit pickapart.

On a recent drive round the yard the oil light kept flickering. I quickly pulled it into the shed and realised that when I did the timing belt and water pump it had broke, so I left the connector unplugged.

A quick temporary fix:


Later got a replacement from AliExpress, I’ll get an oem one next
Time at pickapart

[Swampy]

Toyota built a reputation for being reliable partly by keeping it simple and using quality parts. How to ruin that? By adding complexity and Chinese parts!

I tidied up my horn wiring:


They’re knock off hella super tones. The looks are polarising, I don’t mind them; but they are really loud and effective at letting morons know they didn’t give way.

Barely visible and protected


I didn’t wire them in properly before, so made sure to do it correctly.

Removing the wheel well cover revealed the firewall grommet. Sending the wire through is a challenge due to the insulation there on the other side but
Manages to get it through with a long pick up tool



Fitted some conduit and cable tied it to the oem harness all the way under the front radiator support.



I then had a cheap keyless entry kit I had laying about, and the remote looks quite “period correct” so went about installing it.

But first, what’s this?




It was super straightforward to install


Installed the led light and a switch to override the horns when they aren’t needed


Unfortunately it’s all a bit useless for security. I thought about installing a relay that when the coil is energised by the alarm finding ground and being armed, it’ll sound the horns when someone tries to start the vehicle. But I found that my module only momentarily grounds when armed, so therefore isn’t suitable. I’ll just have to install a quality mongoose alarm later.



Sorting this out is next on my list. A lot of it just needs shortening , it mainly is dash cam/rca’s/radar detector


Also when I tried to remove my fake momo steering wheel to remove the makeshift spacer and take measurements, it bent and I realised I need a steering wheel puller. So I fitted my genuine one from the SW


So therefore I recommend not buying a fake momo steering wheel!