I'm a tinkerer and I thought I'd start a thread where I can share ideas/fixes I come up with for my tercel.
I have a 1985 sr5 with 247k on the odo and 200k on a 4AC from an 84 corolla. I've been on the forum for a while but haven't had a running tercel until about a month ago. I showed some of the interior restoration in my 4ac acquisition thread.
Thanks to everyone who helped me get it going!
For today I fabbed up some new chassis brace bars because one was broken in half and the other may as well have been.
I ordered a 3' stick of .75OD - .083 wall thickness DOM tubing from mcmaster.com for $20 (the factory bars are 5/8 - .049)
chopped them in half, smashed the ends in the vice and drilled some holes using the old broken ones as a template:
these ought to withstand some pretty serious abuse. plus they're red so that's worth a few horsepower.
nice work, I always thought the factory braces were a bit light. now you can complete the "triangle" and add one from the left to right lower suspension pick-up points, the bolts you can see in this picture. This brace would pass under the transmission, also give a good place to add a skid plate if you want one. this would greatly stiffen and brace the lower suspension pick-up points.
the red you painted your braces reminds me of a relative of mine who collects cars. he has all kinds of neat cars, mostly restored classics, but he has one hot rod that he built. i got on the ground to look underneath and not only was it pristine but the drive shaft going from the trans to the rear axle was painted black and white checkered. i was surprised and impressed, it looked so cool.
now that i think of it, the next person here to remove their rear drive shaft should do something similar!
I drove the family out to Smith and Morehouse reservoir on saturday afternoon. lovely!
when I got back I filled it up for the first time: 31mpg!!
..also, sound advice petros. Getting a triangle in there and making a skid plate is a great idea.
i think you said you removed all the vacuum lines, is that right? i hope you still have the PCV connected since the crankcase needs to breathe a bit, but i would also suggest reconnecting the vac advance hoses to the bottom of the dizzy. advancing the timing at idle and on hwy cruising woud yied even better fuel economy.
to ease your mind, yes. the pcv, vacuum advance on the dizzy (bottom nip) and the brake booster(obviously) still have vacuum. it idles pretty terrible i'll admit but it runs great and has gobs more power than the been-had-3A. I definitely cut a few corners with the current carb setup and i'd like to spend the time to figure out how to hook up a few more of the carb widgets. But I'd also like to swap the carb out for the 32/36. I can't justify it yet.
