Restoring a Toyota Sprinter Trueno

[Devinda_Z]

Just curios.. Nowadays how much can u expect for a Trueno AE85 in topping condition?

Same car as below... has red & black instead of white & black...

Subjective, but will go out on a limb & fancy a punt at 450 ~ 700k

[Jaliya48]

A levin (fixed lamps) AE85 was sold for about 750,000 sometime back. Of course, the seller may have added extra thousands to the sale price, just to show how rare it was!

[iRage]

I was visiting Sri Lanka for a few days last month and was playing around with the Trueno.

In the process of driving around I managed to rub the front wheel on the arch which broke off layer of cataloy which revealed some rust spots so she ended up going to the tinkering shop for the most part of my stay. Discovered a few of these spots and stripped it off and replaced it with metal paneling. Most of it was inside so it is barely visible from outside. The pics were taken just before I ripped out the body work…

Apart from that I am getting acquainted with the joys of pop-up light alignment…OH JOY OF ALL JOYS !!!

Second on the list was to get the piping measured out for the installation of the Fujitsubo exhaust (unit and pics courtesy of Rachitha), which was originally for a Nissan. In order not to cut off any of the mounting points plan is to make some custom pipes.

Thirdly, I managed to get a hold of an AE86 brake upgrade kit which got installed and taken off. After the installation the brakes were too mushy and almost scary to drive. Was considering a booster and MC upgrade as the AE86 units were slightly larger than those of the AE85 (which requires a pedal box swap to an actual AE86 unit to relocate the clutch cylinder so that it creates more space for the booster which results in obstructing the fourth stack more than it currently does which means I need to look in to custom stacks made). Also, whilst reading up I also came across the fact that only the later models came with a brake bias. Hmm….so all that is on the second shopping list . Also on it would be TRD blue/orange springs (yes I am keeping it old school and from first glances it will look like the AE85 SE it used to be with the internal mods)

Managed to transport some of the cosmetic parts by hand from Japan…

those signal lights are a pain to come by...managed to get the inner door mirror covers for the door form the guy selling the lights too.

the lower dashboard part was showing its age and luckily found an entire lower unit for less than a couple of cans of paint for the dash.

then the 80s steering...

well that is it for now

[Jaliya48]

OMG that steering wheel! I've dreamed about one of those for so long! Lovely photos, iRage!

[Komisiripala]

Oh very very nice. Encore. Bravo

[Hoonigan]

Very nice. Your time was spent well apparently And that steering wheel is a peach! great find!!!

[iRage]

Thanks ! Yes time was well spent <although some people find it hard to see >

I think I packed the parts too tightly and now there is a slight indentation on the steering wheel...hopefully I can massage it out

Edited February 2, 2014 by iRage

[iRage]

So I have been looking around at suspension upgrades. I wanted to go the old school TRD short-stroke/lowering-kit route. The spring rate I was thinking of was 6kg in the front and 4.7 kg in the rear (I impulsively bought the rear springs as these are hard to come by).

Any take on this ? Would it be too harsh for a street car on CMB roads ?

According to the AE86 bible I can expect the front to drop by about 50mm in the front and 70mm in the back (of course this would be specific to the car itself) with the front struts "modified" according to the TRD specs (TRD made special struts but they made it available only for N2 competition cars). Considering the car is pretty high as it is I don;t think going down that much would be too much of an issue.

There is a difference of 20mm between the two sides. Hopefully it doesn't look too awkward. Dunnowhether it is just me but looking at some pics of AE86s with TRD suspension the rear does seem to be lower than the front. Measured the wagon this morning and there is a nearly 3cm difference between the front and the back.

[Komisiripala]

There really isn't as much a problem as you think there to be with a lowered car men. Mine is pretty low and I still get around. Without any hassle I'd say about 95% of the time. Our roads are far better than we take them to be

[madmax]

Yep, drop it, put some fat ass wheels and stretch the tires.

[Jaliya48]

So I have been looking around at suspension upgrades. I wanted to go the old school TRD short-stroke/lowering-kit route. The spring rate I was thinking of was 6kg in the front and 4.7 kg in the rear (I impulsively bought the rear springs as these are hard to come by).

Any take on this ? Would it be too harsh for a street car on CMB roads ?

According to the AE86 bible I can expect the front to drop by about 50mm in the front and 70mm in the back (of course this would be specific to the car itself) with the front struts "modified" according to the TRD specs (TRD made special struts but they made it available only for N2 competition cars). Considering the car is pretty high as it is I don;t think going down that much would be too much of an issue.

There is a difference of 20mm between the two sides. Hopefully it doesn't look too awkward. Dunnowhether it is just me but looking at some pics of AE86s with TRD suspension the rear does seem to be lower than the front. Measured the wagon this morning and there is a nearly 3cm difference between the front and the back.

sounds good! Komi has a point too.

[iRage]

It is not the height that worries me but the spring rate. They are quite high (stock AE85 is 2.5ish kg in the front and closer 2.0 in the back) and I am worried that with the TRD shock combo the ride might feel a bit "getting smacked in the ass by a pol parale" feeling.

Well need to get the car height measured again and do some mock up I guess, I get the feeling the current 15" wheels might have to be swapped to 14"

[Octanehead]

I am going to enjoy this!

[iRage]

So a small update on the direction of suspension...finally went ahead and got the TRD 8-way adjustable short stroke dampers for the rear (to be mated with the TRD lowering springs (4.7kg))...

as for the front....after some research nudged on by our resident doctor I decided to go ahead with coil-overs...so got Techo Toy Tuning's AE86 front coil-over conversion kit (supposed to be a direct bolt on..yeah right...and got a decent price for it as well) with AGX dampers and 6.2kg springs. (and no !! the fact that it somewhat matches the color of the car is purely coincidental)

and something that is purely superficial (uhhummm....it makes the car goes faster ??) find...

a well aged still in tact trunk lid garnish

other than that is just a whole bunch of overhaul kits for clutch master+slave cylinders and the brake master cylinder...I had no idea Toyota still made them....well Toyota still carried them they come in actual Toyota boxes

then there is (are) the pedal box (boxes) and the light and wiper switch knobs

Edited April 28, 2014 by iRage

[Komisiripala]

Jumping around like a 7 year old aren't you? Congrats man!

[Davy]

Woah! How in the world did I miss this thread???

[Jaliya48]

Very nice haul!

[Supra_Natural]

Niiiice!

[Hoonigan]

Congratulations mate! That no small update, that's some impressive bit of kit!

[iRage]

Now that I am finally back...here is the first step of a long long journey:

After much difficulty the engine was pulled out...(hate to think of the pain to put it back in but that is so far far away).

Although the outer panels were pretty decent the inner frame was full of extremely dodgy work (no disrespect to the previous owner) and is full of putty covering rusted frame panels and covering some serious gaps. Thus, it was decided to completely strip the car and completely do up the body work.

At the end of the whole journey the car is not going to be anything drastic and will look completely stock with just a very small drop sitting on rather modest Watanabes (actual ones), DIXEL front brakes and the only bonkers component would be Rachitha's 7A-GE and some kind of intake that clears the clutch maser cylinder/oil reservoir. Apart from the above everything else that is going on the car are pretty much components that were stock or options provided by Toyota/TRD.

All that was done today was to pull the engine out and all I did was help a bit to lift it up...I am tired already...GRR....

[Hoonigan]

Awesome! It sounds badass already did you already find the watanabes? I'd imagine it's easier to find a set in Japan?

[iRage]

Thanks Yes..I was lucky enough to get a really nice used set. Although one wheel has a slight scratch. The new ones are way too expensive

[The Don]

I was offered a set of Watanabe's delivered for £500, sadly used ones. They seem to cost in that region for one brand new.

Great to hear updates on the build. Hope to visit it when I'm in the country

Edited November 18, 2014 by The Don

[iRage]

I was offered a set of Watanabe's delivered for £500, sadly used ones. They seem to cost in that region for one brand new.

Great to hear updates on the build. Hope to visit it when I'm in the country

Oooh...that would have been a steal...checked out a brand new set (R-type) it came to about 215000 yen (with a discount for buying a set) + tax + delivery charges (Japan domestic).

Yeah, the whole rolling project was not working as when considering the work that needed to be done it seemed to be a case of taking 1 step forward and 2 steps back...so decided to cut my losses and start afresh....

Depending on when you head over you might just see a carcass of a car

Edited November 18, 2014 by iRage

[The Don]

Oooh...that would have been a steal...checked out a brand new set (R-type) it came to about 215000 yen (with a discount for buying a set) + tax + delivery charges (Japan domestic).

Yeah, the whole rolling project was not working as when considering the work that needed to be done it seemed to be a case of taking 1 step forward and 2 steps back...so decided to cut my losses and start afresh....

Depending on when you head over you might just see a carcass of a car

You think £500 for a used set is a steel or one for £500 is a steal? I'm obviously quoting GBP here. They were RX8 types (you know 8 spoke alloy, not a mag versions)

I'm used to carcases. I have a couple lying around