RentASpace's ST246 N-Edition Progression Thread

[rentaspace]

So it has been a while since a proper update. I've had quite a bit going on in my personal life lately which has included moving out for the first time and dealing with all the associated stresses that entails lol. I have only just gotten my internet connection up and working so I can now post an in depth update.
But, I haven't forgotten about the Caldina.

If your car is lowered and you put the exhaust on, get ready for it touching almost all driveways lol. You quickly learn how to get up and down xD
Now this next one is going to be picture heavy and details my whole experience with getting my Super Circuit Dump Pipe on.
About a week a go, a mate and I decided to tackle the dump pipe and figured that we'd have it done in about 2 hours tops. Boy were we wrong.....

Everything started off smoothly, got the Intercooler off and found the leakage around my Rocker cover is slightly worse than expected and oil is sitting on top of the plugs, so gotta replace the rocker cover gasket ASAP.
Replaced the plugs and the old ones were white (as expected from a lean running motor).

Next was the heat-shield, and the world of pain started... The bolts were so tight that no amount of WD40, Inox or any other rust penetration was budging them. We almost rounded one attempted heat, cold, sprays, breaker bars and nothing no dice.
After 6 hours of trying to remove the shield we retreated and put the car back together. (I don't have a drill at this point). The only one bolt that budged was the lower bolt, which we though was going to be the hardest... lol
After that days struggles we started discussing what we could do. A few days later and his Volvo was off the road after a control arm snapped and the front windscreen cracked from nowhere (not a good week).
Since he was stuck at his house for the day I said why don't we get the maintenance done on my car and I headed over. At his house we had a a lot better tools and space available (The garage shown below is a common area for the two townhouses and it fits 3 cars snugly, or two with room to work. Behind is his actual garage which fits another two cars). As we were setting up I said, you know what lets try this dump pipe again, I'm sure the extra tools will get them off. After trying more sprays and stuff the bolt still wouldn't budge so we got the drill out and went through both of the bolts. One was actually fused to the Heat-shield. We breathed a premature sigh of relief.
After these came off, we came across the next challenge. Stuck just as much as the Heat shield bolts but with about 1/2 the room to work with. These are the bolts on the left side, there are another two on the right side which are under the turbo itself and even harder to reach. (Amount of room from above shown in pic two)
We used more Innox, more WD40 and more hot cold and we couldn't get them off. We tried to get the from above and below and still no luck. At this point we were a 4 hours in and determined to get the pipe on. My mate wasn't letting me leave until it came off, so we focused attention onto the bottom bolts holding the bottom of the stock dump to the rest of the exhaust system, and surprise, surprise they wouldn't budge. Luckily, the dump pipe I purchased also came with the bolts needed already attached so We whipped out the angle grinder and cut the bastards off:


AT this point we retired for some food, we had begun at around 10am and it was now 4pm in the arvo. We had to get the bolts off. My mates dad got home from work (Army) and he started assisting us. He got his largest breaker bar out and got under the car, he had his whole body-weight on the bar, doing literal pull ups and pulling the motor down and all but one bolt broke. The final bolt resulted in a further hour of sprays, mallets, breaker bars and finally it broke. It was the loudest bolt break I have ever heard. After they were all off, we still couldnt move the dump pipe. We removed the oil return line and finally the pipe came out.


Putting it all back together was easy, none of the messed up bolts needed to be put back, so they all got binned.

Edited July 9, 2017 by rentaspace

[nz pom]

Might b a simple no brainer but if ya worried bout turbo get a turbo timer

[rentaspace]

Might b a simple no brainer but if ya worried bout turbo get a turbo timer

Its on my 'to-do' list lol

[nz pom]

Might b a simple no brainer but if ya worried bout turbo get a turbo timer

Its on my 'to-do' list lol

iv sused out how to wire a switch in to disable the vcs and traction control if ya keen to no i did so much research and came up with nothing i found someone who sused it wid a gt turbo from that i worked out how to do it to a gt4

[nz pom]

Havnt done too much to the car lately, My Girlfriend and I are moving out on the 30th and are saving as much as we can.

That said, the car itself is more fuel efficient then my celica was and hasnt missed a beat so far.

A member on Ozcaldina gave me a Climate Control Unit to test out to try and isolate my AC issues which were:

- LCD Flashed for a second and then powered off, plus all the lights constantly on.

First test of the 'New' unit resulted in a blown fuse, (I think this was my fault). Second test, and BAM:

The AC fired up right away and went cold in about 15seconds. I then put the temp up and warm air came out; Unit was working properly!

The front Fascia of my unit was in a lot better condition than the Second Working unit, so I started stripping the two units down to which I realised internally they are completly different:

Behind my fascia was one single circuit board, connected by a single Ribbon cable to the Fascia:

Behind the Second Unit, was myriad of Radio components, and a double-story circuit board:

It appears that the 'top' board is for AC, and the bottom is for a Stock CD stacker radio system. (CD stacker front is ugly IMO).

I started stripping out the LCD Circuit Board (Green Board in the above photo) to realise that both boards are differenty shapes, so we got out the dremel and cut down the new board to fit into my Fascia. The internal Cage in my car that holds all of the seperate systems in place could not fit the New AC/Radio board and I had to resort to cutting and drilling the One that was given to me.

I managed to fit the Radio/AC/Storage Pocket into the Cage (which was never designed for anything more than The CD stacker and the AC. Along with fitting the Double-Din headunit that came with the car.

I got the all fitted into the dash:

And finally, After getting that all sorted in a day, I decided to spend some money and got a new Pioneer Double-Din Headunit so that I could

A) Understand what exactly was happening lol and B) to get bluetooth (And Radio) back into the car.

lol i replaced mine aswell couldt b bothered spending money on a decent 12v rear view camera as the originals a 6v

[rentaspace]

Might b a simple no brainer but if ya worried bout turbo get a turbo timer

Its on my 'to-do' list lol

iv sused out how to wire a switch in to disable the vcs and traction control if ya keen to no i did so much research and came up with nothing i found someone who sused it wid a gt turbo from that i worked out how to do it to a gt4

Might be something worth doing down the track lol :P

And for the reverse cam, mines not a stock one, its some random aftermarket.

[nz pom]

Might b a simple no brainer but if ya worried bout turbo get a turbo timer

Its on my 'to-do' list lol

iv sused out how to wire a switch in to disable the vcs and traction control if ya keen to no i did so much research and came up with nothing i found someone who sused it wid a gt turbo from that i worked out how to do it to a gt4

Might be something worth doing down the track lol :P

And for the reverse cam, mines not a stock one, its some random aftermarket.

defnetly somthing worth looking at as it will end up sending u nuts if u like sliding ya ***** end round and for the sake of bout $15 and bugger all time its a well worth while mod

[rentaspace]

Again, it has been a while! But I now have a larger update!
I have replaced the Standard 17" GT4 Wheels (Which I am sure we are all familiar with being on JFX, Josh's and my old Celica).
This happened a few weeks ago, but I didn't have access to a decent camera to take some snaps of the car
I recently bought myself a Canon 6D, so now I do not have that issue

So some info, I decided to replace the wheels as the tyres that came on the car from Japan were starting to camber-wear. I decided that instead of wasting money on the daggy looking sanded back caldina alloys that I would look around for a new set of wheels. After getting numerous conflicting opinions on what would and wouldn't work and measuring many sets of specs, I decided to trust my gut and with some reassurance from Alex on OzCaldina I purchased a set of wheels from Autotechnik Tuning.
The wheels I bought are Rays Gram Lights 57DR (17x9 +38).
In order to fit them I required the inner rear guard to be cut and the front splash lining cut with the front slightly rolled.


After getting that done, it was time to find some tyres that would fit. I decided on using 235 width as this would allow a slight stretch to minimize any guard issues if they were to come up. After that was decided, I checked local tyre shops to find some deals. Bridgestone had a deal which was buy 3 get one free. So I went for a set of Bridgestone Potenza Adrenalin RE003 which set me back $520 total including disposal of the old tyres. Once I got back home, it was time to install the wheels as everything was ready. Well, wasn't as smooth as I thought. The wheel nuts were put back on so tight that neither I or my dad could crack them and we did this to our wheel brace:


Ended up having to go up to the local tyre shop which used their heavy duty air impact gun and got them loose. While I was there I asked if they could throw the wheels on for me, which they did.
Also a shout out to Tyre Plus Menai as they did everything for me without charge!
Anyway, on to fitment,
Rear:


Front:

Edited July 9, 2017 by rentaspace

[trentmeyer23]

Nice, they RE003s are some good tread too.

[rentaspace]

Nice, they RE003s are some good tread too.

Yep they are very very grippy.

[rentaspace]

Well, Nothing much done on the cali... yet.
But, recently I landed myself a new job which requires a daily 74km round trip, so I got myself a new daily simply for to and from work and runabouts.
A 1996 EP91 Starlet. 125k kms on the clock, 3 speed auto (GG). It's slow but good on fuel

 

 

This leaves me with the cali free, so watch this space cause the build is just beginning!

 

Edited July 9, 2017 by rentaspace

[trentmeyer23]

Starlets are very under rated cars. They are cheap to run and very reliable.

[rentaspace]

Well the starlet was short lived, already sold her haha. Was just too underpowered and was usuing just as much petrol as my Caldina for whatever reason.
Sold it for more than I paid so ended up with $90 profit after taxes and the service I did on it xD



Caldina progress is coming within the month. Stay tuned.

[rentaspace]

So a big update is here,
The car was sent to Just Engine Management for an e85 conversion and I got it back last week
Car is running a Haltech Sprint 500 ECU, Up-rated fuel pump, Metal Suction Pipe to Turbo, Drilled Airbox and now has a full 3" Exhaust from the turbo to the Blitz muffler (The Blitz piping was removed). I also got the Rocker Cover Gasket installed and a new fuel filter put in.
The car feels like a completely different car now, it picks up a lot lower in the rev range and pulls right through to the redline. It also screams with the exhaust silencer removed xD
I also installed an Ultra Racing Front Strut Bar replacing the stock N-Edition one.
This is the Dyno run on Low Boost (14psi):
https://www.facebook.com/JustEngineManagement/videos/826127784197665/?__mref=message

The high boost (19psi) actually makes less power as the TMIC is heat-soaking and causing the boost to drop off.

[KAA]

Looks Great glad it all went well for you

KAA

[rentaspace]

So finally sat down and read the dyno sheet properly,
Low boost (14psi):
Power:    171.9kw @ 110km/h
Torque:    684nm @ 66km/h

High boost (19psi):

Power:    166.7kw @ 116km/h
Torque:    777nm @ 66km/h


You can see on the sheet that up until about 88km/h (5400rpm) the High Boost is well above the Low Boost, but it drops off right at 90km/h (5430rpm) and from there levels out (heat soaking intercooler, injectors at max duty cycle etc). 

[trentmeyer23]

That should be very usuable power, with a solid ECU behind it.

Do they run the turbofold? Turbine housing cast into the exhaust manifold?

[rentaspace]

On 14/04/2016 at 8:57 PM, trentmeyer23 said:

That should be very usuable power, with a solid ECU behind it.

Do they run the turbofold? Turbine housing cast into the exhaust manifold?

Epic long wait to reply:
Yes they do :L

[rentaspace]

Just a few photos of a recent trip my Fiance and I took to the Hunter valley, in other news I am now going to sell my Camry daily as work is offering me the Cube to drive home

 

 

 

 

Over all was a good trip, used just under 1/2 tank to get from Gymea to Cessnock. The cold weather and being parked outside took its toll, couldn't get the car started without spraying start ya ***** into the intake haha.

 

Edited July 9, 2017 by rentaspace

[trentmeyer23]

Need to get your cold start side of the tune sorted by the sounds of it.

[rentaspace]

13 hours ago, trentmeyer23 said:

Need to get your cold start side of the tune sorted by the sounds of it.

Yeah just really hard to get the car back to the tuners when I work everyday haha.
I think I may just hold out until the FMIC is put on and adress it at the retune. (Tuner is aware of the issue so no issues in that regard).

[rentaspace]

Cars now back at the tuners, NRMA got it started again. He doesn't believe it to be fueling as start ya ***** wouldn't get it going. He disconnected one of the sensors at the rear (not sure which one as I don't have the car with me now), tested it as I cranked and said there was no pulsing. He then re-plugged it back in and car fired up. GG. Hopefully it is just something simple like a loose wire or bad plug.


In other news a mate gave me a FMIC to install, nothing fancy and around the same suze as the stock TMIC but should solve the heat-soak problem. Will have to rotate my compressor housing to neatly install it. But will deal with that later on once car is running properly.

Edited July 23, 2016 by rentaspace

[rentaspace]

Update: Car was diagnosed with an electrical fault causing Voltage drop to both the starter motor and ECU during crank. ECU PSU has been rewired, new relay and fuse also installed. A new battery cable was run to the starter also. The BOV was also incorrectly installed so that was fixed up and the battery and starter motor have been diagnosed as damaged.
Car hesitated to start this morning on initial crank, but then started second crank. I am putting this down to damaged starter and battery for now until I get both replaced.
Boost is coming on better now and holding better

[rentaspace]

Well it has been almost a year since I updated here lol.
Car is sitting like this:


I haven't done much to the car itself in the last year, but I have been collecting a few parts including a TRD front bumper which should be getting installed in the next month or so. My partner and I also have had twins (not the turbo variety) and are moving from the Sutherland Shire to Macquarie Fields next week lol.
Once the TRD bumper is installed I have some more plans to make the front end look a but more aggressive but that will be a surprise until it is done :)

Edited July 6, 2017 by rentaspace

[trentmeyer23]

Photobucket has destroyed this thread...