2.2 st128 strange problem

[samst128]

Hi Everyone,

I am the recent and proud owner of a celica st128 2.2 auto.

i have had it for two weeks and today i have encoundered my first problem.

I was driving along this morning and a felt my car lacked power a little bit but it was just a passing thought and assumed i was wrong.

I carried on about my day and i was was driving down the highway and at low revs i could hear a bit of a fast bearing type sound coming from the lower engine bay ( the same level as the accelerator pedal.) as i put my foot down a bit and picked the the revs the noise would go. (I also noticed the yellow engine light come on)

I then needed to overtake on the highway and as i put my foot down power was weak so i put my foot down harder and the auto dropped a gear down and it picked up but soon after the performance dropped even more.

I exited onto a slip road and as i did the car began to idle weak and so i went into the emergency lane and as i stopped it cut out and with that the brakes failed so did power steering.

I came to a stop and sat there and noticed the temp guage was on max! a failure on my part not to notice in the first place.

so at this point i had began to investigate.

• Lifted the bonnet and a little greyish smoke was coming off the engine (overheated)
  
• power windows and sunroof were weak for power (battery)
  
• car would not start
  
• Cooling system has very rusty water and it has leaked a bit of its orange juice from the rad cap
  

I left it for 20 mins to cool and and tried to start it and it would almost start. i left it another 15 mins and it then fired up so i moved it off the slip road and parked it on a main street. I got a a friend to pick me up and went ot the servo to get some coolant. i topped up the rad but not too much but enough to ease concern nd none came out of the botttom on to the road.

I let it cool to almost cold on the guage started it up and it sounded and idled perfectly and all the electrics windows etc worked normally . i then drove it and no longer than two mins later the heat was soaring again.

Im not a complete mechanical novice but all my experience is on BMW E30's and to be totally honest im at a loss to understand what the problem is with this.

Any help would be really appreciated.

Thank you

[samst128]

if there is no such thing as an st128 i guess its a st184. its a 2.2 1992 celica

[95celica]

the sound you heard was probably the engine pinging from being too hot.When its too hot the engine will loose power. I would suspect you could have a faulty themostat of possibly a blocked radiator, hopefully it hasnt blown the headgasket. A easy check to do is when the engine is at operating temp check the top and bottom hoses, If 1 is hot and 1 is cold you have a thermosat/ radiator issue. Dont drive it until you get it sorted or you will do more damage