6G Celicas Forums

Hi, my name is Mouse. I am now working for Dr. Tweak at Phoenix Tuning. I have always been interested in imports, but am new to the Toyota scene.

So, Dr. tweak and I have been talking about me needing another car since me and my girlfriend are new here and currently only have one. Dr tweak wants to provide me with a motivator for the work that we do and give me hands on experience with the joy of being a Toyota owner.

In the middle of the day as we are working on our wiring conversions. He turns to me and says, "Do you want a Celica?". Then tells me that he received an email about a project car that never got completed and needs to be gotten rid of by this weekend. This was on Wednesday. So the guy send us pics of the car. He tells us it is in pieces but everything is there. He originally wanted to do the motor swap to the 3SGTE and had planned on upgrading the suspension.

So on Saturday I meet Dr. Tweak here in Savannah and we go get a trailer from the local u-haul and head off to Daytona Beach, Fl.

When we arrive at Dennis's house I finally get to see what we are working with. I had assumed from the pictures he sent that the front fenders and bumper were removed as well as the engine. This is what we saw when we got there.



We have dubbed this: Project Stuart Little.
Because, as you all now know, everyone calls me Mouse, and Stuart Little drove a convertible:)

Here are the pics as we unload the parts from the car. Dennis didn't just attempt a motor swap, although I'm not sure why he stripped the car this far down, he took out all the harnesses, seats, instrument cluster, disconnected the shock on the drivers front, and removed the headlight and the transmission. The stock motor was still in the engine bay but ready to be removed.



Putting the 3SGTE in the Tundra










Dr. Tweak strapping the engine down





At this point we were unloading everything from the 6GC to load the car on the dolly. Dennis even had the AWD transmission for the 3SGTE.











So as we are unloading the part from the 6GC I begin to wonder what Dr. Tweak has really gotten me into. His eyes are as big as mine as we work together to unload the car and see just how much work there is in putting this back together.



Then its time for the top to come up. It was a lot easier than we thought it would be. There is a switch to unlock the motor for the convertible top in the trunk, so it went up fairly easily.







We were told that the stock motor ran good when Dennis decided to park it and attempt the motor swap. The stock motor never made it out of the car.



With the help of the guys that were there we got the Celica loaded and were almost ready to head back to Savannah. Note the chains dragging on the ground after the Celica and parts were Loaded. When we pushed the car on the dolly I was in it. then tried to open the door only to find that the fender wells on the trailer were too close to open it. All the windows were rolled up and the top up so I had no choice but to climb out the door.



Here is all the parts loaded in the Tundra.



The Stuart Little Project loaded and ready for transport







Dr. Tweak and I with the new 6GC project



So to begin with we are going to reinstall everything including the stock motor and manual transmission to get it back on the road for now. We are going to sort out all the parts that came with this and figure out what is missing for the 3sgte. The turbo was gone, and with all the parts strewn around god know what else. Then we are going to order the parts we need to do the 3SGTE swap.

So I will keep you posted as we decide what else we are going to do to make this a one of a kind build.

damn, art, always the critic, huh? (agreed tho, take that POS off tweak..lol)

looks good tweak, are you planning on polishing those peices, or are you gonna leave them as is?

Funny story, actually. (I was waiting for you to post something about that manifold).

As you very well know I personally can't stand "SSAutocrap" products. However, when I was putting the parts list together for Mouse I noticed that we were missing the factory downpipe. I was on ebay and noticed the ssautocrap downpipes for $35. I was like, man, I HATE to do this because I really don't care for ssautocrap, but $35? I can't even buy the parts to build a downpipe with for $35! So I bought it.

A few days later a box comes in the mail and I'm like, "oh, this must be the downpipe". I pick it up and I'm thinking, why is this so heavy? I open it up and they sent me not the downpipe, but their manifold. I thought about it for a few minutes and then I was like, you know, I can ship this back at my cost and wait around for a refund and THEN go and buy another downpipe. But for $35? I might as well just keep it and order a new downpipe. So that's what I did. Got the downpipe in and then I was thinking.... what am I going to do with this manifold? I could sell it or something but... might as well put it on I guess

So, yeah.

Manny, I'm personally a huge fan of brushed finish (everything in my house is brushed stainless steel) so I'm going to leave it, in fact if I feel like matching everything I would probably brush the manifold and downpipe Though if I end up putting my anodizing line together... who knows what will happen then

-Doc

This post has been edited by Dr_Tweak: Feb 15, 2009 - 9:43 AM

There is really nothing wrong with those downpipes. I've had one for a very long time without problems.
You just have to grind the flange down so that the wg doesn't hit it, use the support bracket, and make sure the flex section in your exhaust is placed directly at the pivot point between the engine and the firewall. If you do that, you should have no problems with it.

I've had a similar experience.

-Doc

josh - hurry up so i can get my rear tranny mount haha. good to see SOME progress though.

i have nothing bad to say about the SSautochrome manifolds. i know the honds community has problems with them but i have one on my Supra and its been awesome! i did cut the T4 flange off and the wastegate flange and welded on a better T4 flange and teh Tial 44MM V-band flange. but other than that its been running perfect for me.

Wait until you guys see how I'm setting up the intercooler. It's going to blow your mind.

-Doc

Say you did want to polish that valve cover to a mirror shine, what would you use tweak? My valve cover could be shinier.

Progressively higher and higher grits of sandpaper, followed by aluminum metal polish and a lot of elbow grease

That's how we did this:

I was thinking of polishing up my valve cover, instead of painting it, and possibly the heat shield. I gave them a scrub in the fall and they did look better, but just not what I want.

Can the valve cover be chrome plated or is it better (more durable?) to polish it up?

Chrome plating the valve cover would probably make it more durable and easier to clean, since chrome is harder than aluminum.

The heat shield is mild steel I think, so you'll want to chrome plate that rather than try polishing it. Though painting it normally does work pretty well.

-Doc

I feel enlightened. I guess I should start phoning around to see what the bill would be for chrome plating. Thanks tweak!

If your going to take the time to polish something up like that, you really need to shoot it with a few coats of clear coat after you are done. If you don't, all of your hard work with go to waste after a short while.

Little bit of an interim update.

Wiring up the 3SGTE...



I've been coy about how I'm going to set up my intercooler. Although it's not finished, I decided to go ahead and get these pics out there. This is not how it's going to look complete, however. After taking a few careful measurements I realized that this setup isn't going to clear my hood because of the tubular manifold. So, I've pulled the stock manifold AND the turbine housing and sent them off to Jet-hot. When they come back, I'll put it back together and redo the intercooler so that it sits lower and at least has a better shot of clearing the hood. But at least you guys can check out how I decided to make the connections from turbo to intercooler to throttle body

First a pic of me showing off my big snap ring pliers















So enjoy the pics, and then forget what you saw because it'll look a little different soon LOL

-Doc

oooo v-bands

put a shield from the mani to IC

Hey, look what I got today





Update coming this weekend

-Doc

BLING!!
jet hot?
looks great!

Yeap! Cost about $300.

I'm a Jet-Hot dealer now so when you guys have cars down here, let me know if you want to get it coated

-Doc

Alright fellas, check it out!





-12 AN fittings welded to the bottom of the intercooler:



-12 AN fittings





Finally got all of the welding done for the intercooler. Next up the engine is going into the car and once all that stuff is out of the way I'll be detailing the install of the intercooler lines and water pump Due to the lack of time that I have (made painfully apparent by the lack of updates), I've decided to have the boys at SCC do the physical engine install since the majority of the custom work is out of the way. That's going down this week, so we should be seeing some faster progress

-Doc