Need to catch up on posting these images up for posterity and reference so I know what parts to buy if I need to replace. First is the transaxle output shaft seals for the FX16 with the C52 transaxle. These are the aftermarket part #’s I used.
Next is the clutch throwout bearing. I don’t foresee these going out of production anytime soon.
Now these will be good to have the part #. I’m running the JDM 4AGE 20v, but with the 16v main pulley, alternator, p/s, and waterpumps. These are the two belt sizes I used.
Received gasket other day from Rockauto.com for the gas level sender. Shipped promptly with no minimum, Amazon had this exact same but would not ship it without a minimum order. There were online review bits saying they did not fit their Toyota, so I was a little doubtful. On the night I received I tried it out. The sender is easily accessed through a panel under the rear seat. The gasket is the proper size, but the bolt holes did not line up. If you try all the positions, there was one orientation where all but one hole lines up. I took a leather hole punch and made a new hole and all is good. If the gauge reading 1/4 tank all the time starts really bugging me, I guess I can order the replacement unit, but $6 vs $200 is good for now!
Oops, old post from November that was hiding in the drafts box!
Here’s the cleaned up top end back from the machine shop. Not sure if I mentioned I took it to Ted’s. From what I can see they did a good job. Once again, not cheap, but I had the full treatment done, and the head work for the valves ended up being pretty extensive. The 20 valve head is not a US market engine, parts are harder to come by, so the shop took the extra shims I had and machined them down to size as needed. And the shim design is under bucket, meaning you have to remove the cam every time you want to replace a shim. Over bucket like the early 4AGE you can just push down the bucket and pry out the shim. But that also means at high RPM, overbucket shims can fly out on their own too. Performance wise, under bucket is they way to go, one step further is shimless, but that’s yet another level of PIA as you replace the entire bucket with one of desired thickness. Continue reading ‘FX Progress’
Received my order from Belmetric.com. Prompt processing, shipping and reasonable rates. They specialize in metric hardware, of which hose was what I wanted. Hard to find metric hose, usually just end up buying the closest sized standard size hose. Hose stretches so you can make it work, but usually if the OEM used spring type clamps, they won’t clamp tight enough. This is for fuel lines, so even more so I wanted the correct size. Thus these lines from German company Flennor. There seems to be some noise about timing belts from Flennor not fitting correctly. I guess we shall see about the quality of these hoses. They look fine.
And I should probably not mix languages, that titled would actually be German Pants.
Haven’t gotten the new hoses yet, but I put back together what I had and replaced the worst condition hose with the closest non-metric last night. Put some gas in and fired it up. Pump is definitely quiet now. Driveability is harder to determine, there does seem to be more power. The standing start freeway merge gets pretty nutty when you bang it all the way to 7500 before shifting, it makes the tires burnout when you drop into second. Unfortunately the dying out when clutching in coming to a stop came back. At first I though it was cured, but alas no joy there. There should be half a tank of gas now, despite what the gauge says. That’s another common problem of Corollas of this vintage, the gas level senders go bad. I tried taking it apart and doing the bend the armature trick, which helped. Oh yeah, another little rant. Finding the fuel sender gasket is proving to be impossible! Found an aftermarket, but it’s dubious that its the correct size. Finally found somewhere to order it from, it’ll be a $6 experiment so no big loss. It’s not available separately from Toyota, you need to order the entire sender, which isn’t cheap. So for now it’s back together with the slightly torn original. It’s not too critical as its not under a lot of pressure and does not seem to be leaking.
Anyway, if I can solve the stalling at occasional stop problem, it’d be pretty nice.
Published on May 6, 2017 in car and Gear by taro. Closed
RI found out Ckucky just got a little 3D printer, and I had the perfect small project for it. Every FX I’ve owned has a problem with the headlight aiming. What it is is there is a ball and socket joint at one corner where the plastic socket piece cracks. Junkyard doesn’t do much good as chances are more than good that they are all cracked, if you can even find it. Haven’t tried Toyota parts, body parts this old generally aren’t available anymore. I’ve just used zip ties till now, it kind of works. Continue reading ‘3D’
Started looking into the driveability issues with the rally FX. First off I learned that the Air Flow Meter for the 20v engine is not the same, even though it plugs in. Supposedly a Camry one works, so I got one and it seems to run a little better. Unfortunately even in this Internet age, I can’t find the specs for the 20v AFM.
Next up was the fuel pump. After the rallycross, it seemed to have gotten noisy, but the other night when I went for test drive it was quiet. Well, I pumped out what gas I could and then worked on dropping the tank to get the pump out. Ordered replacement Denso from Amazon, it’s actually listed for LandCruiser but guys are using it for AE86’s and Corollas, physically it’s identical. When I finally got the pump out, what the heck? The strainer teabag thing looked like this, totally gone! So somewhere along the way it disintegrated and who knows where the bits ended up. I’m sure the pump is not happy about this. I just hope there isn’t pieces stuck in the lines somewhere.
I got the pump changed, with new strainer. I found a source for metric sized hoses and am waiting for those to arrive in to replace the hoses on the gas tank. I’ll post on those and where I got them when they arrive.
Published on April 26, 2017 in car by taro. Closed
The ongoing saga of the rally FX, I was able to put the repaired transmission back in and made the event. Unfortunately had engine driveablity issues, at one point on my last run it stalled out and would not restart. At the end of the day, it did start and I got home under my own power, so that was good. Waiting on a replacement fuel pump ordered from, yes, Amazon. In the meantime, the parts I ordered from Ruffstuffspecialties came in. No, they are not a brand of questionable prophylactics, they sell parts catering to off road vehicle fabrication. I got a bunch of their “bushed DOM sleeves” in custom length of 2″. My plan is to fabricate replacement engine/transaxle mounts with these. The one I welded solid seems to be creating too much stress. In fact when I crawled under after the event, the bracket had come loose from the bellhousing again. No damage to the threads, but this just wasn’t going to work. The bracket was also deformed and not sitting flush.
Published on April 13, 2017 in car by taro. Closed
Told Ted’s that I have event on Saturday so they came through and repaired the bellhousing. They actually had it done yesterday. I picked it up today and spent the night installing. I tried something a little different in my arrangement of jacks, hoist, and straps, it didn’t seem to make it go that much better. And then I ran into a snag getting the CV shaft to go back in, the spring clip on one side was a bit too open. FInally ended up grabbing a clip from another shaft. It got really late so I didn’t quite get everything together, but all the difficult stuff is done.
Been driving the FX to try and get it to 1000 miles break in to switch to synthetic oil. Almost there, but I noticed some clunking and roughness in acceleration. Got under yesterday to take a look, the rear transmission mount was loose. Dropped the transaxle tonight and here a better look. This is the mount that I welded solid, looks like its too much stress. Case is cracked and stripped out on one hole, bolt snapped off in other. Will be taking this to Ted’s to see if they can repair this. Also been looking into fabricating custom mounts to use polyurethane bushings.
it seems like chainring spacers are some kind of mystical vintage part. I've asked at almost every shop in whistler with a service department. Quite a few didn't even know what it was and couldn't comprehend what I wanted to do. Finally found some at Fanatyk Co but only ancient crusty mechanics know about these and they have poor eyesight or something. I asked for 3mm and he even used a ruler, he scrounged up 4mms.
Need to catch up on posting these images up for posterity and reference so I know what parts to buy if I need to replace. First is the transaxle output shaft seals for the FX16 with the C52 transaxle. These are the aftermarket part #’s I used.
Next is the clutch throwout bearing. I don’t foresee these going out of production anytime soon.
Now these will be good to have the part #. I’m running the JDM 4AGE 20v, but with the 16v main pulley, alternator, p/s, and waterpumps. These are the two belt sizes I used.
