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The owner of the car was a traditional Sri Lankan - cheap, lazy and ignorant. He was kind enough to not empty the fuel tank, so I was able to make my way to a fuel station and top up the car. A few ghosts had to leave the fuel tank as it had not been filled fully since Chandika was president. The next port of call was the service station. Here we emptied the dark tarry engine oil and put in some fresh (hopefully real) Toyota oil. We next replaced the oil, air, and other filters). After that it was off to the garage to do the suspension and brakes. I can't remember exactly what was done (have to look at the paperwork) but all 4 struts, front CV joints and a lot of odds and ends were replaced. The brakes were overhauled and front rotors (is that the correct term?) polished. I forgot to get the wheel bearings replaced so there's a continuous hum. Need to do that. Total, I think it was 150-200k

Last year, I decided to purchase a second vehicle for travelling around Sri Lanka, as well as regular use. I set a modest (by Sri Lankan standards) budget of LKR 3m + 10%++ for restoration. In this price range, I had a choice between Indian and Japanese vehicles I ruled out the Indian ones, because I wasn't satisfied with build quality and comfort in this price range. I could have got an Alto but I don't consider them safe (too small). This left a few Japanese and Korean vehicles. I steered clear of the Korean ones, not for any bad reason, but because I simply don't understand them. I suspect there may have been some excellent vehicles by Hyundai/Kia. Among Japanese vehicles, I steered clear of Mitsubishi as I have seen rust issues with these cars (older ones). One of the most important things for me was the availability of spares and body parts, as well as the simplicity of the vehicle. I shortlisted the following vehicles: - Toyota corolla - AE100/110, Carina, Camry, Corona etc. - Toyota Station Wagon (90s-2000s) mostly the van variants. - Nissan FB14/15 and N16s - Cefiro/Bluebird/etc I decided not to go with a Carina/Corona simply because I couldn't find a good example, also, being rarer cars, I figured out the body parts may not be available (internals are mostly shared so I didn't foresee major issues there). With Nissans, the FB14s I saw were mostly salvage grade, I saw a few decent fb15s but most had absurd prices in the 3.5-4.5m range. I looked at quite a few N16s but they were either wrecked or the owners wanted high prices. To expand on pricing, I preferred to buy a simple corolla Vs one of the more exotic cars, as I believe these are simpler to maintain. I saw a few corolla vans (wagons) but these were in poor condition. The ae100s I saw were in poor condition. I finally found an ae110 and selected it, as I felt it was in reparable condition. I'll provide more updates on the car here soon. I want to sincerely thank a number of people in this community for their mind help and advice. In particular, @iRage and @matroska

It is my humble belief that Japanese automakers may have perfected their craft in the late 90s. None more so than Toyota themselves. I have always been a fan of Toyota and my family owned many (though I didn't personally), so when I was looking at cars I paid particular attention to this corolla (I believe it's the 8th generation JDM corolla?) I saw a few sprinter equivalents, I liked them as they included an RPM meter. Along the way, I chances upon and e110 which was (in my opinion) in passable condition. When I say passable, I mean the vehicle could be restored, Vs most other cars which I would consider in salvage/write-off status. In my nontechnical assessment, I graded the car as follows - body - passable/repairable. No major signs of visible rust or structural damage. - engine - average condition for age but serviceable -i felt a tuneup plus replacing belts, electricals etc could do. -suspension - unsurprisingly, 30 years on Sri Lankan roads meant replace everything. -interior - passable, cleanable. - transmission - functional. The next step was to take it to an inspection company. There are two, so I tossed a coin. I had my heart set on the simian variety but I landed on the other. The inspection was very interesting. I expected a 5 minute check, but they really took their time, which I appreciated. At Rs7,500 I considered this good value. The inspection confirmed my assessment. For me, the biggest relief was that the chassis appeared to be reasonable, with no major accidents (usual fender benders etc) - I consider chassis issues to be mostly unfixable. Suspension, as I suspected, was gone, so they advised replacing the basics - struts and bits, which seemed reasonable. Engine and transmission, they did a test drive and agreed with me that it was Ok, could do with a service. An understatement, as suspect the current owner hasn't serviced it in 50k km The owner has the vehicle under "open papers" registered in the previous owners name. I told them that if they transfer it to their name, I can buy it. The owner was able to do this, so I went ahead and purchased the car.

I thought I'll talk about what it's like to visit a garage In Sri Lanka. Interestingly, like most experiences here, there's a way things are done. The test drive Where the owner of the garage identifies what problems exist, and how to mask them while maximizing his earnings. Pole position Depending on how screwed you are, you'll be asked to sandwich your car in a corner of a garage. Between the wrecked insurance write-offs usually. If it's a serious issue, you are parked deep inside so you can't escape. Kota uda phase Here, they disable the car. It is symbolic to remove a tire and or a part of the engine. Ostensibly to remove the part to be fixed or find spares, but mostly to prevent the customer from escaping. Spares You'll be given a few unidentified components and asked to go find them. If the owner feels charitable, he will take the spares on his morning drive. The other work phase Here, everyone forgets your car, and works on other things. Your engine remains open. Crows defecate on your cam shaft, thereby ensuring better lubrication. 4:45pm If your vehicle is a day job, at 4:45 PM, the tired staff will suddenly remember it. Grease monkeys will put everything together at warp speed. What's an extra nut between friends? Something old, something new broken When everything is put together, you will discover one extra nut. You know your engine needs that nut. You'll discover what that nut did, 3 months later, on the highway at 7:54PM It is tradition at this late stage to break something. Cynical people say it's so you return to the garage, but it's actually to remind you of how everything is impermanent (and so you can drive home with a broken AC) and remind yourself to feel gratitude.

Since the aftermarket bracket was smaller and no aligning holes in the door my choices were limited. Either drill new hole or custom bracket was the option as far as I understood. But both of them would include drilling the door metal which I was not comfortable doing. I remember @iRage mentioning in an old thread, if you drill the holes, you better put some primer to prevent rust issues. Also finding a custom bracket would be much harder here. So, I was left with just one option. It was to put the factory mount back where it was, and fix the new speaker on top of that, which was the same suggested by a shop guy in the first place. Since I had no option after all this work I thought to just do it that way and be done with it. Now the factory speaker with mount was in my hand. I cut around and rip off the speaker and it's connections so I was left with the plastic mount. drilled and took out the socket which was there to insert new wire. I installed the plastic mount using 1/2" screws with bolt washers both side and a lock nut. Then installed the new speaker on that with the self tapping screws came with the speakers. This part was an easy task. Note that there was only about 1-2 mm meat in the mount to screws to go through. I just hope they will hold. Factory speaker wiring came in blue and green where blue is the positive wire and green is the negative wire. I connected my wiring with factory wiring matching the colors above, soldered them to hold the connection better and put insulation tapes around each connection and covered everything again with insulation tapes to look cleaner. As I was installing a one screw the thin plastic part broken in one place as you can see in above pic. Speaker is held by just 3 screws now, maybe it's ok but I thought of rotating the speaker a bit and put a screw there as well after installing the passenger side door speaker. Sound quality is great and I feel the improvement in one side. But I have to install the other one and feel the real difference. Going to do it tomorrow hopefully Although I couldn't do all sound proofing things due to these unexpected reasons I hope the job was done reasonably well. It's just a start and good experience, I got rear doors to attend too (Later of course) But for the other side there will be no drilling, just removing the factory speaker and insert new one. I hope it should be a one hour job. I will update here once it's done.

So, why I wanted to do this as a DIY? Answer: Most shop people and technicians are very reluctant to replace or remove factory fitted speaker from the front doors... I don't know what's the big deal with that is but they would rather keep them as it is and tend to put new ones in the rear. One guy told me that the most of sound is coming from the rear speakers once installed. He also said the bass sound will slightly be reduced if I were to remove factory speakers and put aftermarket ones. But that's not what I wanted. I wanted to put new ones in the front and maybe put older ones back if I feel like it or put new ones in the back too. Since I thought to do myself, I will first settle with 2 and later going to add rear speakers. Another shop technician was fine with removing factory speakers and his method was to cut around and rip off the speaker and it's content from the unit (speaker and mount come as a one unit) while keeping the base intact. Then installing the new speaker onto that factory mount with screws. I was ok with that first but after watching a YouTube video of a clean and neat installation, I was like wow! how pretty is that? I wanted to do like that. I will put the link below. But we can't always meet our own expectations 🥺 You will see why. So based on that video I started gathering required tools and accessories. I found speaker terminals (lugs) without the rubber cover, speaker wires and a wire stripper (it was indeed came in handy). Sadly, some accessories required for a clean install as in the video were not available to find. I already had prying tools and a soldering iron. I also tried to find some foam tape which was used to sound deadening/better quality output but not available. So instead I got a double tape , borrowed a drill from a friend and bought a 5/32" drill bit to drill out the rivets as indicated in a video. The night before the intended operation date, I prepared the speaker wires using the tools I got. Since there was no rubber cover on lugs, I attached the wire and crimped using the crimping section of the wire stripper and a pair of pliers. It would have been a nice job if I had a proper crimping tool. I put a solder dot just to be safe and covered using insulation tapes. And I was ready to start the job next morning To be continued...

It was time to put into practice what I've been learning online for a couple of weeks. Vitz KSP130 door panel is fixed by only 3 Philips screws and some clips as usual. One screw near the inner door handle and two screws visible once you remove the center console with a prying tool (Highlighted below image). That's the easiest part of this task. Then I had to detach the wire harness of the center console and this killed me. I tried so hard to pull it off by pressing the small plastic clip, tried every direction and position but failed. My fingers were aching so much, lost courage and gave up after about 2 hours of trying. I was so frustrated and felt like going to a shop and get it done. Then again I thought there must be a way, giving up won't give anything for me. I needed this experience. So it was next weekend I could try again. This time, after watching videos and reading more, I knew it could be harder but using a tool safely is an option. While pressing the small clip hard, I carefully pushed a plastic plug using a flathead screwdriver and I took time. Slowly it came out and I was so happy this time Then it was time to take out the panel carefully disconnecting clips and the 2 cables attached in the back for door lock and central lock. Just pull from the plastic piece carefully and you can safely pull it out after taking out the steel ball like part attached to the end of the cable and that part is mechanically attached to the black color plastic panel visible in the image. It's a simple task you will understand when you look at it. So here it is. As you can see they are riveted to the door using 3 rivets. I carefully drilled the rivets to remove them and I will put a video link where I got the inspiration for all this. It took some time but managed to finally remove the factory speaker. To my surprise though, factory speaker was actually a 4 ohms one with a reasonably big magnet if the size of that matters but not as big as the new ones I bought. In many videos and forums, it was mentioned and shown that factory speakers with a tiny magnet in the back. Screenshot from a video on YT ⬇️ Not that it matters now as I was going to put new good looking ones but when I got the aftermarket mount near the door to see if that fits without a fuss, the stars ⭐⭐⭐ started floating around my head. Yes it was much smaller and not aligning with the wholes available from the factory mount. But these were all lessons and experiences. Thinking like that I planned my next steps which I will post in the next entry. Sorry if I'm extending the blog but with the available time, I have to continue in another blog post. PS: Here's the link for the video I mentioned earlier.

...and in the blink of an eye 3 years have gone by. It only occurred to me/us when the dealer called up to remind us of the upcoming shaken inspection and tax payment and to inquire what I wanted to do with the car loan. So off to inspection it went and decided to totally pay off the car. So now she is totally mine At the 3 year mark I have put 10,xxxkms on it and each one of those kms have been more smile worthier than the other. Interestingly as the engine broke in the car became more lively as the engine was way more rev happy. In 2022 GR Garage started a personalization program called GR Personal Selection. The program offered owners the chance to take the car for a track day, drive it and tune the car according to their own driving style. This included a software upgrade which bumped up torque to 390Nm (an increase of 20Nm from the stock 370), adjustments to steering weight, throttle response and AWD torque split. Unfortunately, the track days didn't work out with my schedule so got it tuned to some presets that were offered. So now the car has 390Nm of torque, heavier steering and high throttle response. I didn't do anything with the torque split of the AWD system as I felt the changes introduced a bit of understeer which I didn't like. The upgrades have made the car a lot easier to drive. So much so my wife, who always made the car leap from stand still or jerk when accelerating and shifting gears, found it a lot easier to drive than before. I bought the GR Yaris completely out of impulse. The original plan was to buy a standard Yaris with a MT until the GR Corolla was released. Thus, once the GR Corolla was released in Japan I had to go try it out and put my name down for one. The GR Corolla was a nice car. It is a lot easier to drive. The two rear doors make the car a lot more practical. The car does have a larger cargo area, however the usable space is not that much larger than the GR Yaris. The best thing about the GR Corolla is the engine improvements. The power delivery is much smoother and the engine is more responsive (the updated engine is going to be offered in the facelifted GR Yaris). Performance wise, although the GRC has more power, you cannot not actually feel it due to the added weight. Track runs have shown both cars to be equal in things like 0-100 times, etc...the main difference seems to be in terms of handling. The consensus seems to be that the GRY is better for rallying and B-roads (due to the shorter wheelbase) and the GRC is better for track use. Which brings me to what I did not like in the GRC. The weight...and the longer wheelbase. The GRC feels less nimble and playful than the GRY. Albeit...straight line, flat-out..the GRC is a lot more stable. Which I support is in line with the above mentioned consensus. So, after a lot of driving around in the GRC and a track day with the GRC and a bunch of other GR cars, I decided to stick with the GR Yaris (I was hoping to keep the GRY and buy the GRC as a second family car for its practicality. Wife insisted I had to trade in the GRY). Then there was the whole purchase method for the GRC. The cars were offered only through lottery with each round of lottery having only 550 cars (Toyota closed its 2nd lottery a few months ago and the next one is supposed to come up in a few months). To give you an idea of how crazy the lottery is....I went to the dealership/GR Garage to apply for the lottery the morning after the lottery started (1.00pm prev day). The system already showed 5000+ lottery applications. The low chances of actually winning the lottery reaffirmed my decision to hold on to the GRY. The GR Garage is a total car person's den. It has two racing sims, a library with car books, mini cars...and always has a selection of fun cars. In this instance they had their (Toyota Corolla dealership's) GRMN Yaris and GR Corolla Morizo edition apart from the white one in the previous pic). Now..the second moment of temptation.. I was so mad with Toyota that I went and ordered a Civic Type R. Now that was a very refined car. FWD and wonderfully balanced. Interior was well appointed. The adaptive suspension was quite good. The car came in at 4.9mil yen fully loaded (compared to the GRC's price of 5.8mil) and the car made you feel special for all that money you spent on it. At the time of placing the order the delivery period was 4 years. To my good fortune, Honda called last December and said I could have mine in April 2024 if I still wanted it. So... am I getting a Civic Type R in April ? I suppose we will have to wait and see. For now..life goes on with the GRY .... Yes...we still have the old Corolla. She turns 25 this year and has 52,000km. Still runs strong and along with her shaken inspection next week I will be replacing some oil seals (for good measure as some are 25 years old and some 10). Other than that I replaced two engine mounts and replaced the clutch and pressure plates about 2 years ago Its amazing how small the Corolla wagon is compared to the GRY. The day Toyota was crazy enough to ask a bunch of us to drive their cars The blue Supra was a manual and LOVED it ! If I could have afforded it that would be a car I would give up the GRY for in less than a heart beat. The pure grunt and glorious sound of a V8 was mesmerizing. Now....about that family car I wanted until a new toy comes around. Because the chances of getting a GRC was so low...the dealership managed to sell us a facelifted Corolla Touring ! Our/my first Hybrid car. The facelift has some exterior/interior design improvements, but the main change is the hybrid system. It now uses a 5th gen HSD mated to a 1.8L engine. Has a total combined output of about 137? hp and tons of torque thanks to an updated control unit and lighter batteries (so it has more power than the pre-facelift model and weighs less). It is interesting how the system handles the charge/discharge. The car does not let the battery charge up to a 100%. Only time it does is when driving long distances on the highway or going up and and down hills. At such times it just starts cruising on EV mode. Its biggest let down is the eCVT and has a little bit space than the old Corolla wagon...but everything else is pretty sweet. All in-all the (temporary ?) purchase of the Corolla Touring worked out quite well considering some unexpected life changes.