Poor thing was sitting in the bushes at an elderly couple's house for about three years. When I asked about it after finishing some phone repairs the old guy said if I wanted it he would sign it over to me on the spot. I told him I would think about it and kept it in the back of my mind. Two weeks later, after selling off a different car, I was looking for a new project and I stopped by with some jumper cables to see what kind of shape it was really in. To my surprise, after about 10 minutes of charging the car cranked over, sputtered once then started right up on all 4 cylinders. The owner was as amazed as I was to hear it run and actually move out of the bushes under it's own power. I left to do some errands but came back a few hours later, aired up the tires, added some water to the radiator and some fresh gas w/ SeaFoam to the tank and let it warm up while verifying the alternator was still working. They had already dug out the title and before I knew it I was creeping down the driveway in it. Drove it about 7 miles to my garage with rust slaking off the brakes and body and began to survey my newly un-dead Tercel.
Today I spent the morning changing the oil, replacing the fuel filter and attempting to free up the sticky brakes. While the rear drums were rusted on I was able to rap them enough with a hammer to get the scaled stuff inside to flake off and allow the rear tires to spin freely. The front was a little more disappointing as it had apparently had new pads shortly before it was parked, which gave me little play to try and free up the sticking cylinders into working again. Any application of the brakes causes them to hang and severely bog the already tired engine of 208,000+ miles, not to mention filling the air with the aroma of toasted brakes on rusty rotors. But that's the easy fix. The more difficult problem lies in the rear axle rusting to where one of the sway bar mounts and the body-to-axle crossbar's body mounts are eaten away. Amazingly, the car tracks straight, but clearly I won't be winning any cornering competitions. The motor ran well enough and didn't smoke but felt congested so I went back to basics and checked for vacuum leaks, sprayed in some carb cleaner and broke out the SeaFoam again and let the brake vacuum line suck up the stuff and work it's magic while I ate dinner. The immense cloud afterward lasted for at least 15 minutes, even as I pulled out onto the highway to keep my neighbors from calling the fire department. Actually I think I fogged the road for at least 3 miles before it finally cleared out, leaving the engine a lot more responsive and running smoother. The whole day I was riding a wave of nostalgia as it seemed every bit of maintenance I did was second nature. I grabbed the correct size wrenches for every bolt, knew where everything was and even fixed a few issues I remember having with my old Tercel, many years before. (eg. window track on driver's door.) Can't guarantee how long this one will last, but the ride will be fun...
MR2Di4
