Squalled

UPDATE: Found a few people have used an F55 turbocharger on their 1KD builds. Anyone had any personal experience using this turbo on their 1KD?

G'Day TOCA, I've been searching around online recently to help a mate in regards to going for a larger turbo for his 2012 Hilux. He's currently running a front mount intercooler, stainless steel snorkel, intake airbox upgrade and a 3" exhaust system performance wise along with a tune to suit the mods. He is also running a heavy duty clutch to handle the extra power and torque. He's chasing more power but, after a few hours of searching around I can only seem to find what appear to be OEM style replacement turbos and higher flowed stock turbos. I have found maybe one of two forum posts on other sites with larger turbos installed but they don't seem to show any specs on the turbo they used referring to them as "stages". Just wondering if anyone able to shed some light on larger turbo upgrades, where to source the turbo and what power you got afterwards? Cheers!

No worries mate! Always enjoy watching him on RaceCam with his hilarious commentary of other rivals like the old Group C Camaro and Volvo at Bathurst.

So finally after 3 long months of horrible conditions and water restrictions, I've finally been able to give the car it's first decent wash. Thankfully NSW has had a massive down pour earlier this year which lifted the water restrictions allowing cars to be washed with a trigger nozzle once again. Thankfully the investment in detailing last year paid off as it was honestly a lot easier to clean than I first thought and the rain in between probably helped a little as well. It's the first time in ages I have actually seen the real colour of my rims which are definitely a lot more difficult to was than my old Advan's but I think I'll have a good technique set soon. I also managed to take the car for it's first relatively spirited drive through the twisties not too long ago and decided to test out the RS4's. Well I found they certainly have a lot more grip than any tyre I've ever experience before and I felt I could push the car a bit harder than I ever have before with confidence that I would make it around the corner. So this year I'll likely just be doing the finishing touches to the exterior and keeping up with servicing and maintaining the car as best as possible. Knowing me, I will likely find something else to add to the ever growing list of things to do but hopefully once I put my head down and get into the swing of things, I'll be able to share it here in the future. My main to do list items at the moment are: - Re-do black housing headlights with original lights - Install BRD engine mounts (need to find a rough 2nd hand front and rear since the original rubber bushings need to go anyways) - Possibly replace the endlinks as I feel they may be on their way out - Steam clean and stain remove the Recaros It doesn't seem like too much but with work and other personal things I'm finding it a bit harder to fit the time in to get things done. Stay tuned!

Hey TOCA, Towards the middle and late last year, The Bathurst Motor Racing Museum had a showcase of the late great Peter Williamson's Toyota's with his contribution to 7 Sports RaceCam technology which was developed in the 70's, introduced at the 1979 Bathurst 1000 and lead the way for the future of in car camera's that we now have in various forms of Motorsport. I visited the museum for the first time in October last year not long after the exhibit had been introduced to the museum. I managed to get some quick photo's of the showcase as I follow historic motor racing quite closely these days, especially the periods between the 70's, 80's and 90's. It was great to see some of the cars he drove throughout his long career with Toyota.

I believe Toyota MAY need to program it, I got a new key cut for mine and they mentioned in terms of programming that it needed to be done by them but the cutting can be done elsewhere. Not sure if this helps at all.

Does it sound like an engine sound of something else like an exhaust related issue? Any sound recordings or videos could help.

Nothing to update really this month. Car has been sadly neglected since it was last washed in early Decemeber with the unpredictable weather (rain and dust storms), heat, water restrictions and also just running out of time. Car does really need some good loving and will hopefully get a nice wash in the next few days. Everything has been going super well with car, I've been getting better fuel economy then ever lately, ranging from around 640-680 kms a tank depending how I drive which has been nice to the bank account. There have been no dramas with the gearbox since 6th was replaced at the end of 2019. The gearbox has felt better than ever with the Royal Purple fluid which I definitely recommend again for street use. I have managed once to give the car a quick once over with quick detailer and glass cleaner but ironically it rained and basically turned my cars paint into patina a few hours later because of all the dirt. In other news, I've recently transferred the ownership of the car into my name along with insurance as it was previously listed under my Dad's name and I was listed as a driver on insurance. Since I've owned it for quite a while, I thought it was worth while to move it into my name for ownership and insurance. The insurance has since doubled but my mods are now covered and I've also managed to get the agreed value to a more suitable range seeing as NRMA wasn't doing much more when increasing it. Other than that, hopefully next months update will have some photo's and more to update on. Stay tuned.

Had a quick look at mine, it seems to link them to specific posts. Just a suggestion, edit the post and remove and replace the photo that way.

Final update for 2019! To begin, something not mentioned in the last update as it's now been fixed is that I had lost 6th gear again as I had sometime ago when the gearbox was rebuilt. This time, it was determined that the 6th gear and selector hub were the likely culprits causing the issue. After leaving it with the mechanic to do some checks he indeed found that 6th gear and the selector hub required replacement. Since the wait time to receive the parts was between 3-4 weeks, I was able to drive around but drive it as a 5 speed seeing as there were no other issues with any other parts. After a 3 week wait, driving on highways sitting at almost 4500 RPM in 5th doing 100, the parts finally arrived and the car was booked in to get the job done. Thankfully it was a quick job as the gearbox could stay in and the gear and hub could be removed without removing the gearbox. I had also collected some new gearbox oil sometime ago as I was planning to change the gearbox oil before the end of the year seeing as it had been almost 2 years since the last change. After hearing some great stories from multiple people and mates, I ordered some Royal Purple Synchromax. After driving with it for almost a month now, I can definitely say it's well worth the extra coin over Penrite. The gears are so much smoother to engage both up and down shifting and the cold shifts are a breeze now, not that there were any issues but the main difference is how much smoother and less notchy it is when cold. I'd highly recommend it to any Sportivo owners looking for some quality oil for their gearbox. Moving on, the 6th gear felt a little notchy at first but after a 1000kms or so it felt as it was before it was replaced. From what we found, the teeth on both the 6th gear and selector hub were worn down causing the selector to not fully engage the gear and slip off once some load was given. There is roughly 3mm of movement for the selector hub to engage 6th gear and over time like most things, it's worn down although nowhere near as bad as my synchro's for instance. I was able to keep the gear and hub to add to sadly and slowly growing gearbox part collection... A little hard to get the photo's of the gear and hub to show the wear but hopefully they'll give a good idea. I've also found the new 6th gear selector teeth are now even, where as the old 6th gear point on the teeth is not centered so I guess Toyota have redesigned it since 2005. Since NSW is going through one the worst droughts in history, and with the raging bush fires continuing around the state it's been quite hard to keep the car looking clean. I last washed it at the start of the month before using some quick detail and other Bowdens cleaners a few weeks ago to remove most of the dirt and grime. Hopefully in the next few days it will get some much needed love. Here's when it was last cleaned properly at the car wash. Stay tuned for my updates in the New Year. There's still a whole heap more to go proving that this definitely is a never ending project.

A good and somewhat dated option is a Camcon piggyback option, doesn't break the bank and yields nice gains for the 1ZZ. If not, you'd likely need to look into a full standalone option.

You can find the clutch on eBay, since I got mine over 3 years ago the price of them has gone up I believe, well for the heavy duty that is.

Are you referring to the complete lense cover itself to remove it from the tail light? I mean it should be, they should be not much different from headlights which plenty of people have pulled apart to paint and modify before, someone correct me if I'm wrong though.

Hey mate, Let us know how the Sahara is with your non gains Power FC tune that is slower than a stock tune Sportivo. Thank you for you kind comments, I will be sure to crawl over your head some day soon. Cheers

Update time. So not long after my last update, a couple of my mates and I made the drive to Mount Panorama in Bathurst. We were up bright and early and made the trip in around 3 hours with some stops before beginning the day at the Motor Racing Museum and followed by a heaps of laps around the track. What an experience, definitely a must do for anyone even if you don't like cars or motor racing for that matter, it's still a beautiful place to be. We did a heap of laps I lost count, even doing some backwards which was really unusual to say the least. I also had the chance to drive my mates Evo around so he could get some rolling shots and boy wasn't that an experience. Within 10 minutes I was pulled over by a HWP on Conrod straight for "a random breath test" before going on my way again. Can definitely say driving an Evo with a heavy duty clutch, no air-con, no rear seats and a half cage around Bathurst is quite fun, once you learn how to take off without stalling. Got some great pics for the day we were there before heading home. For the last year and a half or so, I've been really contemplating whether to get my current wheels repaired and resprayed or, get a completely new set. I was more or less split 50/50 between the two options since I've really loved the look of the RG2's and seeing as not many people around the globe run them, it's quite unique. I've also been pretty indecisive about wanting to get news wheels as a whole heap had come up in the last year that I was looking at and by the time I decided they were usually sold. So after such a long wait, I finally found a set that I was considering since I was having a bit of trouble finding some other wheels I had in mind in my preferred spec and colour. So, farewell to the Advan RG2's which served me well, and now on to... Yeap, Enkei RPF1's. They are obviously one of the most common wheels in the world but, not in this factory colour I managed to find them in. They're factory Matte Gunmetallic which the first Australian owner was lucky enough to find on Yahoo Auctions just over a year ago with minimal mileage covered while in Japan. The owner was kind enough to accept a small deposit after I inspected them before I picked them up on the Friday which was super kind seeing as I wasn't too sure if I actually was going to get them. They're 15x8 +28 which is 1" smaller in diameter compared to my RG2's and also 1" wider too. I also managed to get them with Hankook RS4's in practically new condition which I will run until they wear down and I plan to go for a sports road tyre like an RE003 since I don't plan to do any circuit work anytime soon. So a week later it was off the tyre shop after work to get the wheels fitted and to save me a huge chunk of time having to jack it up at home. Massive thank you to my mate Kyle and his team for fitting me in so fast and getting the wheels fitted. The following morning I was up early to get the rear guards rolled. I don't plan to go too low anytime soon but I'd rather try and reduce unnecessary scrub if I can. Super happy with the result and have had minimal issues with rubbing so far. Once the guards were rolled I headed over to Alec's work and he got it up the hoist for an alignment. It was the first time since I got my pilot sports over 2 years ago, which is pretty bad of me. Alec was able to get -1.5 degrees of camber on the front and get everything else aligned correctly including my steering wheel which had been off center since I've owned the car. Once it was all done, left the work shop with a straight steering wheel and excellent alignment. The BC's can run roughly -3.0 degrees of camber on the front but we were only able to get -1.5 which turned out to be good enough seeing as I drive it on the daily and -3.0 degrees would wear down the tyres pretty badly too. Massive thanks to Alec for getting it all aligned. And this is how it sits now! Definitely loving the new look. It looks somewhat like a go-kart seeing as the wheels are smaller and wide as well. Seeing as the wheels stick out quite far I will need to be fairly cautious when and where I drive in the future. I haven't had the chance to test the handling side of things just yet but will be hopefully in the coming weeks before the end of the year. Later on the same day, I headed over to my mate Adam's place so he could have a look further into the Greddy V-Manage setup. In the last few months, he's really worked some wonders with his setup in his own Sportivo and it was now time to get mine running up to standard. So as I've mentioned previously, with the low lift enabled my car would tend to jolt around 7500 RPM at random points, it went from a rare occurrence to basically every time I would engage lift. Adam managed to find a way to get it working by using a relay which works by using the stock VVTL-i signal to emulate the stock oil pressure switch. After many hours of checking, wiring and re-checking again along with a slight hiccup with the car rev cutting at 7000 RPM in the first test run which turned out to be on wire connected incorrectly to the relay, we were in business. Lift is now set to 5500, and it's honestly awesome to drive. It's much easier to keep the car in power band between gear changes without having to shift as fast as lightning. I will be doing some fine tuning in the future to improve the power curve once Lift engages to reduce any sort of bogging or flat spots but so far, so good. Also managed to get another shot of the front fitment while the V-Manage wiring was getting fixed up. That's all for this month. I've still got plenty ahead for the car so stay tuned until next month.