Lauren's 1985 Kouki Trueno

[assassin10000]

Just an FYI, on stock 4age's it's much easier to pull the engine with harness/cylinder head on and transmission attatched.

If you've done it a few times you can do it yourself... last time I did one it was just about 2.5 hours solo.

Andrew

[Lauren]

Yeah, I know. The reason it came out in bits is that we weren't sure what the problem was. Had it been an issue with a sticking valve, just removing the head would have sufficed. We didn't know what the problem was when we took it apart.

Obviously when this engine comes out, it will come out complete with the gearbox to.

[Lauren]

Had to pull out the gearbox because I realised that I hadn't fitted a spigot bearing what with the bottom end coming out of an AW11.

So on Sunday we thought, take the box out, get bearing on Monday and re-fit. I Finally I bought a decent jack from Halfords, especially so as Mark spent lots on bendy ratchet spanners. It was one of their advanced ones for £90 that is quick lifting and lifts nice and high.

I still need to use the shitty Aldi jack to lift it high enough to get the new jack under, but then it was a breeze.

We got the car nice and high and well, it wasn't anything difficult. As usual with the AE86, nothing was rusty and everything came apart easily enough. We had to drain a bit of gear oil when we pulled the prop out the back of the box, so there was an all pervading smell of gear oil, yeuuck!

The box came out easy and isn't particularly heavy. As Mark said it's easy to handle. None of the flywheel bolts were loose, but we took them out and locktited them anyway.

Should be able to pick up the bearing just about anywhere as the Toyota one I've ordered will arrive a day too late. Still, I'd rather get it sorted by tomorrow, than fret about sorting it the day before the trackday. Hopefully should be an easy couple of hours work. Have to say the AE86 is a nice car to work on, which is just as well really!

Then on Monday and time for refit. It only took 7 hours to put a bearing in, bolt the clutch up and fit the gearbox. I will be buying one of those clutch alignment tools. It obviously doesn't massively matter too much if you are fitting an MR2 type box with no spigot bearing, but alignment is absolutely critical with a spigot bearing.

I did say to Mark this afternoon, do you think I should check the clutch alignment as I did it by eye? He said no, we had another half hour attempt of wiggling around the gearbox. I then decided to drop it again on my own, which resulted in the box landing on top of me, but I couldn't get it off me, so was stuck for 5 minutes till one of Mark's employees found me and gave me a hand.

Mark then re-aligned the clutch and guess what, the box popped fully home nearly straight away. That 6.45pm by then so we put in a couple of the main bolts and called it a night.

Taken loads of pics but CBFA at this point so will post them up tomorrow. Should have just a couple of hours now in the morning to finish bolting everything back together. One observation from spending a couple of days under the car, is how mint the underneath is.

[Lauren]

Okay all done. Pleased to report everything okay, though the clutch pedal seems to have a bit of play in it, as if it needs bleeding. Is biting a bit low, but works okay.

Pics:
Sunday early afteroon:


New jack. The £20 Aldi one really was crap, so had to buy something that could get the car high enough. This works well enough. :+:



Mark about to give the engine a hug, he loves 4AGE's.



Rear end in the air, don't worry that rear foglight turned out to have broke it's mounting. What a shame, now no longer fitted.



View of the rear of the gearbox:



View the other way with prop dangling down:



Gearbox out:



Mark undoing clutch cover plate bolts:



Off it comes:



We locktited the flywheel bolts as we didn't do it last month when we swopped the engine stuff around.

Arty shot through the hole for the gearstick to the driver's seat:


Alright for some eh?


View from the rear. Flywheel can be seen:


Here you can clearly see the flywheel with no spigot bearing in the middle:



Mark drifting in the spigot bearing:


Yay, spigot bearing fitted!


Pic of the gearbox. End of input shaft where it locates in the bearing can be clearly seen:




At last it's done, should all be good for the trackday on Saturday. Also whilst there I tidied up the exhaust wrap and fixed a small coolant leak where it transpired there was a hose that wasn't done up properly from the engine change back in February! It was really easy to fix but only because the gearbox was out, so result really as I had noticed some coolant being used, but wasn't sure where it was going.

[Lauren]

Well, after 27 years it would seem that my PAS feed hose from the reservoir to the pump had started to disintegrate and had a slight fluid weep.

I trundled off to Toyota and £43+VAT later I had a new hose (that's with 15% discount). Expensive I know, but it's one of those things you'll only replace once, so might as well fit the correct part.

Old hose in Situ, seen going behind the sheathed AC pipe:



I had a cunning plan for getting the fluid out of the reservoir. This involved using a syringe and some vacuum hose I had lying around:



A quick delve into the recycling and a suitable vessel for temporary storage of power steering fluid was procured:



Got the hose off without too much of a struggle really. That power steering fluid is really horrible stuff, it's all slippery and slimey and stinks (not as bad as gear oil though!):



There was still a little fluid in the reservoir which I caught with a small pan.

New hose popped on dead easy. This is the beauty of OEM parts over finding an appropriate hose to fit I guess:



Pump end:



Reservoir end:


Then it was just a matter of re-using the power steering fluid and job done.

[Lauren]

We noticed some oil on the drive but was confused as to where it was coming from. Here's the culprit, I think!

[assassin10000]

Looks like the undercoat may have damaged the shock seals. IMO They should have taped off the shock.

Andrew

[Lauren]

Think you're most likely right their, Andrew.

Still CS2 time, I think!







http://www.driftworks.com/shop/driftwork...-ae86.html

Quote:The ultimate in monotube track car coilover technology. As used on competition winning cars across the world.

Including our own 720bhp S15 and 590bhp R32!

Performance valved monotube dampers, with 16 stage adjustment .
Cold wound springs in 8kg front and 6kg rear.
Separate Height and Spring Preload adjustment.
Slimmer dampers and springs for better wheel clearance.
Inverted front dampers for extra strength and improved unsprung weight.
Pillowball top mounts all round - Camber adjustable fronts.
Front RCA's included.
Reinforced bracketry for strength and performance needed in performance applications.

To be fair this was the next thing I was going to do after the dissapointment of the handling at the trackday, but it's all a bit more pressing now as I don't think my left rear damper is doing very much at all.

[Lauren]

Okay done the cam timing as per John's.

Mine was originally set at -3 inlet and -4 exhaust.

Now set it to -5 inlet and -7 exhaust.

Is dead easy to do on my HKS cam wheels.

Results are perhaps somewhat qualitative, but the car undoubtedly goes well revving strongly to the limiter as one might expect with the spec of cams (the power range is to 8300rpm).

All good so far, I shall drive it and see how I go.



They go round too:



A friend of mine made 142bhp with this cam timing and an SAFC.

[Lauren]

Yes, I know this isn't cool but! I finally got round to getting a sub for my car. I use it everyday and considering the amount of noise in car, it needs a stereo with some welly in order to counter the noise of the engine, gearbox, diff and all the other things that rattle! Whilst I've had a four speaker system in for nearly a year, I've always thought it lacked bass. I've been looking at subs and came across this sub by Blaupunkt which mounts in the spare wheel well. You can even use the original bolt to hold the wheel down for the sub, so installation couldn't be easier.

I already had an amp, so wired that to the sub then Mark re-wired the 6x9's straight to the head unit.

Mark did a dedicated power supply to the head unit too which is fused due to the extra draw from the 6x9's.





There was a fair bit of soldering to do, so Mark and Tom got down and dirty:



The sub in situ from above:



What's it like? Absolutely stonking! Cannot believe the difference it makes and I can actually hear vocals from the front. Will report back after actually driving it with it all working. Very happy, would recommend this sub.