Holy crap. Needs "some" love? How are the structural things, like the sills and wheelarches? The trunklid doesn't look too promising .

The structural things like floor pan are really solid!! Boot floor needs a lot of attention but by not means is it unfixable! Passenger arch needs replacing!
Surface rust from bird SH1T but all panels are solid!

Hey guys and greetings from Finland! Thought i could share my "winterbeater" -83 TA60 Carina. It's in pretty rough shape at the moment but there's changes coming for sure.



Just figuring out the front suspension swap and there's gonna be EE90 corolla bumper coming to the front since there's nothing atm. Needs paint too badly but i hope that's going to change in the summer. And im missing a place to work on this so it's really slow progress on winter but in the meantime ill be doing sideways and waiting for summer

Welcome!
I'll be curious how well the EE90 corolla bumper looks. I've only seen it on two JDM Carinas with the double headlights.
Deep dished steelies look awesome on your car!

Thanks! I saw a pic where one was badly fitted over the fenders and got the idea from that. I intend to cut the fenders for a "little" better fit and i hope to find warm garage soon, but everybody seems to have their own little projects blown to bits at their garage Those steelies are widened 14inch rims. 8"wide at front and 9"on the back with 175/60 and 185/60 winter tyres stretched on them. I thought about getting some 15" diamondracing wheels or some wide japchromes for summer, and keep these as winter rims but ill be searching for the right ones

So, i did some measuring and research today.
Last thursday, i picked my KP61 apart, which left me with some AE86 coilover struts. As i am not in possesion of the AE86 brakes, i want to know if i can get the TA60 brakes to work on the AE86 struts.

Here are my conclusions:

Comparing the 2 struts together, i came to the conclusion that they are almost the same, except for the 4 boltholes behind the axlestub. The axlestub however, is identical, which makes it possible to mount the TA60 hub+disc onto the AE86 strut, and vice versa. This should also mean that the front wheelbearings are identical, which has already been stated in this topic.

Now, i didnt have all the correct parts with me, so i did some measuring, to see what i can come up with:


Thickness of the hub, measured from the disc-wheelmounting surface:
AE86: 20mm
TA60: 34mm

Thickness of the disc:
AE86: 38mm (disc ends at 58mm from the wheel)
TA60: 21mm (disc ends at 55mm from the wheel)

AE86 Bracket strut-caliper, 8mm thick, and the 2 mountingfaces are 8mm offset to the inside
TA60 Bracket strut-caliper, 8mm thick (have to double check, didnt measure this, but i assume its the same), and the 2 mountingfaces are 3mm offset to the inside

The holes on both brackets have the same spacing between them, so the caliper should bolt up without a problem.

I have roughly measured the bottom mounting holes, for the steeringarm, and the appear to be the same aswell. I will verify this as soon as i get to mounting the coilovers to the car.

So basicly what all this means, is that if i would mount the TA60 hub+disc onto the AE86 strut, and try to mount the caliper, it would foul by 8mm (5mm difference in the brackets, and 3mm in the hub-disc combination).

So, my plan is, to cut of the 2 mounting ears of the TA60 brackets, place them on the AE86 brackets, and use longer bolts to mount the calipers. This should solve my problems, and i would not have to recreate the coiloversetup on the TA60 struts, and leave them intact.

Why go through all this trouble, and not go for ae86 brakes? I have to stay within budget, and for now i dont need bigger/better brakes, as i still run the stock 2T in the car.

I have also taken a look at the rearsprings of the car. I bought some Craftz springs secondhand, a long time ago. I believe they where made for an AE86, so i decided to try them on the rear. The springs are roughly half the lenght of the stock springs, and i believe they come in 5kg and 6kg (from what i could find on the net). Diameter is also the same, except for the part that is on the springseat. Springs are something like 13,5cm in diameter, and the bottom coil on the stock springs is about 11,5cm. So, this leaves me with a spring that doesnt sit 100% right on the bottom seat, but i will try to modify the springseat so it does sit right.

I have also ordered a set of S13 camberplates, to mount my coilovers with, they should fit, maybe with a little bit of persuasion. My mate has an S13, and i will also measure up the distance between the struts, so maybe its possible to use an S13 strutbar (maybe with a little bending or so ) I will post an update in this topic once i got everything fitted .

My dumbass just realized that i tried the bracket onto the AE86 strut only in one way, so i'm not sure if it might have fit the other way around? I didnt have the AE86 brackets with me, and i've just picked them up. I'm just thinking its weird that that would be the only difference between the struts?

I'll have to check next time i got the stuff taken apart. Need to change the pads soon anyways.

So, i replaced my pads a few days ago, and checked the ae86 brackets on the carina struts again. Unfortunately they don't fit.

I will use the AE86 struts, with the AE86 brackets, and use a spacer between the bracket, and the caliper, so i can use the TA60 brake setup (for now). I have already found some longer bolts i can use, cause i need to space like 5mm.

I've also tried the S13 camberplates on the car. They PCD is like 2mm smaller, so i will just have to make the holes in the car a bit bigger in order for it to fit.

Hopefully next week i will have the coilovers on the car. But first, MOT!

Finally got my car all road legal!

It's surprisingly economical... On a trip to Thames im averaging 9.0 litres and 0.5 police stops per 100km.



I didnt do anything wrong, it's just that it hasnt updated in the systme that the police check yet. So it's still showing that it was last road legal in 2007

Nice picture Suppose police are quite curious to see the car too as it looks really good!
Got stopped with ae86 few times for no reason too, so I guess they must like oldschool too