Pic heavy intro

Hello all. I'm Steve from Knoxville, TN. I proudly own a 1996 Corolla (My 5th one) and this is her introduction.

I bought the car in July 2012 and this is how it all started..


She had a blown head gasket and had been sitting for a few years, so on the 4th of July weekend I sent my wife out of town for the weekend and got crunching. I started by finding all the needed body parts, some of which I had from previous cars and some from my $400 parts car (this car sold shortly after I got what I wanted from it)..


And since I was cracked out on Amp and pizza, I went ahead and swapped the beige interior for black. My son helps in every step..



After that weekend the car was streetable and became my daily with add ons along the way including new struts, mounts, and fresh alignment..

And some new stopping power up front, for free..courtesy of my pals at the Zone..


Started to form an idea of what I wanted the car to be and bought this heap of junk to flip for profit..


After a few months the Dakota was sold for decent profit and I began body work on my multi-colored Corolla. I have always wanted to have shaved doors so I went for it at this time too..





In hindsight, I regret doing the shaved doors because they frequently have problems and I have been forced to leave my door panel off in case something odd messes up...again. But, more pictures of paint process..




New lights all around..


I got it all back together and turned out with this lovely creation...(For record, the paint color is facotry 3E5 Brilliant Red)


The shaved handles look good from outside LOL..



And while it was in the paint booth I purchased and installed fully adjustable coilovers for that low and slow lifestyle and pulled the nearly new struts out..



Now, as before stated, my son helps with every part so here he is approving the ride height..

He seems to like it...


And we rolled fenders that day as well.

Sometime in the last year, I ran out of room for tools and had to buy a larger box so the car got put on standby to buy it...


And of course, small things will happen like breaking your headlight switch in the middle of the night...


So I began to get annoyed with life and let my car sit for a few months. But I continue to fall in love with my car and the joy my son gets out of working on it. Here recently I let my son pick the wheels we would put on it (from a group I had chosen of course) and he chose this setup...
STR 15x8 0 et on 195/45/15 Toyo T1R





We were all ready to mount them but then came the terrible winter so I stayed on steelies for a little while longer...


The weather cleared up and we got to fitting...





Many fitting issues, atleast 10 alignments, and some fabrication got it good to go. So a day of scrubbing...


Lexus!!


And this is how she sits...




Some may have caught a glance of my AE86 in previous pictures...



Well I sold that car recently to begin my 4AGE ST swap with auto to manual conversion. So stay tuned because me and my son are just getting started. Heads up on that progress...picked up some parts already including clutch pedal, clutch master, hardlines, shifter assembly and linkage, and a new cluster with tach.

Before..

After...


And today I installed the pedals and clutch master. Will post pics at a later time.

EDIT: Pictures of pedals and clutch master finished today..


I'm not to keen about the pedal covers but figured I would leave them for a while since I have them.


Any advice on the swap is welcome, it was shipped this morning. Hope you guys like the progress thus far. Thanks.

Oh and switched up my sticker collection for those HP gains on the 7AFE..

Welcome! Looks great so far, good luck with the engine swap

Thanks man, I'm sure I'll need it

looks good, good luck with the swap, you will love the upgrade in HP. Oh, and I voted by mistake...wasn't sure what I had clicked. Anyway, let me know if you have any questions regarding the swap.

welcome to the club, awesome work with it btw

trife96 wrote:

looks good, good luck with the swap, you will love the upgrade in HP. Oh, and I voted by mistake...wasn't sure what I had clicked. Anyway, let me know if you have any questions regarding the swap.

Thank you, engine arrived today so I'm taking all the luck I can get to get it done. Not sure what you meant by "voted by mistake" btw. And thanks for the offer, I'm sure I will have questions along the way.

miib14 wrote:

welcome to the club, awesome work with it btw

Thank you, I've been lurking as a guest for a while and finally decided to join up. She's getting there slowly.

nice

pretty good so far mang keep it up!

The very first post, at the right is a little green/red slider bar that when you point at it says "message reputation" I have no idea what it's for.

nice progress so far dont know about the lexus badge on the back, the cam you had was that sprayed matte black with rattle cans or a gun, the silver top conversion should be easy enough? i think you have ato drill one/two holes for the engine side mount, so would be your passenger side mount

joe bloggs wrote:

nice progress so far dont know about the lexus badge on the back, the cam you had was that sprayed matte black with rattle cans or a gun, the silver top conversion should be easy enough? i think you have ato drill one/two holes for the engine side mount, so would be your passenger side mount

The Lexus badge made sense considering the amount of Lexus suspension I have modified to fit the car, and not done yet. The AE86 was plastidipped to protect the fresh bodywork.

I seen I have to drill one hole on that mount, but the rear mount toward the firewall is the one I am having trouble aligning. Suggestions or experience?

This was tonight. Progress.

If you need to know anything pm me, my mate swapped a 4age silver top into his saloon Corolla so I can ask him

I don't know how to PM on my phone. First question would be a pinout for the 16p connector at PCM. Going from auto 7afe to manual ST. Thanks

Just asked him, he said his conversion was plug and play that his interior loom mated up with the silver top ecu, he said all you could do is to extend the wires inside because of the whole rhd to lhd wiring loom, and that should work

The interior plug I started with is a 22p connector, but the ST ECU is A 16p if I remember correctly. Won't have an issue with wire length that is can see.

There are some cut wires in the engine bay I have to figure out as well.

That's a lovely corolla you got there. The stance is a total WIN!

Thanks man