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Toyota RAV4 GX "Jack" - Scrapped 20th August 2021 // Final Video To End 2021


St.Jude

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Finished fitting the wishbones and drop links. It took about 20 minutes, as I looked at the phone recording as I turned it off - because I got the allen key stuck and couldn't get my spanner out! Can't be filming such fuck ups like that 😉

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Dropped the car, felt like a good moment. Until I started thinking of the welding, and the dropping of the fuel tank, resulting in the dropping of the propshaft, resulting in the dropping of the exhaust which I had welded together in October. So I took the Corolla to my mom's while I thought of what to do.

Helpfully, I stuck half a tank of petrol in this thing, and petrol is heavy apparently. So I'm getting a hand pump from screwfix tomorrow and going to empty the tank. I've depressurized the tank, but according to the Haynes manual I should turn the engine over until it stops. I mean, I would. But I've no oil in it, as the servicing is for when it's ready to go back to the MOT man! Honestly I'd like to know how daft I'm being by just depressurizing the tank and not the system?

4 hours ago, louiepj said:

Loving your hard work and write up.
I would have walked into that pole on one side of the car while working then swore at it then walked into it on the other side having forgotten how far it sticks out. emoji16.png

I've done that on the Corolla, hit it so hard I felt sick. Not concussion sick, just sick from the pain. And I knew it was painful as plenty of people punched me boxing and I never felt sick from that!

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The college I work at has 4 zero mile, never registered Toyota Auris models. There from 2011 to 2013 and have no chassis numbers or I.d. Had one on the 2 post lift today. It’s mental how rusty it is underneath, not floors, sills etc but steering arms, subframe etc nearly as crispy as my old Fourtrak. 
Toyota must salt dip the undersides before delivery.

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Well I had said that it was one broken bolt away from being scrapped. That was until I got the car in to this position...

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Absolutely no bother. We've been here before. Drained the rear diff, started to film stuff for the video. As I'm here filming, I think "my God, I am quite religious with this car so far". I think I should actually document the rust it failed on, and look to see how much the rust present spreads.

The phrase "the devil makes work for idle hands". And he does, especially if they've got a screwdriver in their hand next to the arches.

It's rotten.

The passenger side rear most sill ladies and gentlemen, with rust galloping all the way up the wheel arch, thanks to the muck and shite that the plastic arch covers have held.

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The same goes for the drivers side arch as well. 

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The rear as well under the door I sort of knew about, but it just feels that the whole arse of the car is gone really. 

I mean the Lada was kind of bad, but it had the excuse of being a 45 year old car.

I'm trying to get the arch covers off, along with the rear bumper things to see how bad it all is. But the screws have decided they like being on the car.

I very nearly went all John Cleese and gave it a damn good thrashing, but I don't have a tree handy and the lump hammer would just damage it more.

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44 minutes ago, Dick Longbridge said:

That's a shame, especially after all the work you've gone to already. 

Thing is, do you enjoy welding? 

Edit: Just seen the second update above. Hmm. If you had a sentimental attachment to it...

I enjoy it. I can't say people looking at my work enjoy it though 😂.

I think if there was sentimental value attached to this thing, I'd have paid the garage to sort it out. The amount of any sort of sentiment I have towards this thing right now is a matter of pride, as I don't want it scrapped on my watch, and plus it took a fucking month for those bastard wishbones to turn up!

I've the steel, I've the welder, I've the gas. I just need to work out whether I can actually bring myself to do it really.

I've taken the plastic guards and shit around the passenger side. The arch on the outside is alright, to a point. Hiding behind the rear plastic bumper was a good 5cm deep of wet shit.

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Which has caused this.

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It's safe to say the entire inner arch is either cardboard or mud, and there's little to no steel left. I'm more than certain the drivers side will be equally as bad, so take this side as either the worst it'll get, times it by 2, and add it to the rust I actually knew about!

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It's all much of a muchness now.

The drivers side inner arch isn't as bad, but then again crabs isn't as bad as syphilis. You wouldn't want either.

This is delightful though.

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I'm packing up for the night now, I'm cold and I want a beer. I have no beer in the house, and the wife's gone to her mother's with the only working car* in the household. So I'm walking to the off license.

I may even have a Twix.

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1 hour ago, Tickman said:

What a war this is giving you!

It's unreal really. I had a bird shit on my head last night that wasn't the wife, did 4 lucky dips on the lottery and got one number on each line, and then the rot. I thought it was supposed to be lucky but it turns out it isn't!

Now I have also had the wife and mother-in-law both telling me to get rid of it. Anything that is too much like hard work for the pair of them and they just give up, and they seem to think it's a good bit of advice to give people.

Nope. Not happening.

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On 3/13/2021 at 5:47 PM, Minimad5 said:

I know most folk would have binned this off from page 1, so well done for ploughing on.

Granted you could bin it and buy another, but that could shit the engine/ gearbox etc in no time. Hopefully once you've sorted the welding out, this will return good service 😎

Yeah exactly. I explained as best I could to the MIL and wife that if I scrap it, I've spent this hard work on nothing to get back the money I spunked on a subframe. At least if I do this extra welding, get it MOT'ed, I can drive it then move it on if I'm fed up with it and recoup at least the subframe and initial outlay. "Just get rid of it and get a new car" as in some PCP bullshine was the answer.

The return of "if I gave up on things that were hard work all the time I wouldn't have married your daughter" did not go down well!

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42 minutes ago, puddlethumper said:

Hey (St) Jude don't feel so bad

Take a Rav 4 and make it better

Remember you let her into your heart

So you can start to make it better.

And when you start to feel the pain

Hey Jude, refrain:

Don't carry the sills upon your shoulders.

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  • St.Jude changed the title to Toyota RAV4 GX "Jack" - Crustier than baked breaded crab.
15 hours ago, dave j said:

Have you looked at it today? Is it as bad as you thought now you have slept on it? Must be gutting after spending out and doing the other work. 

I'm just going to do it. I reasoned in my head that I knew I would have to do some welding anyway, which is all weather and time dependent. So I am going to take a week(ish) from work when I know I can get a solid week of no rain and get it smashed through. So I can get good at welding on the RAV4 and make a better job of it on the Lada! Every cloud :)

14 hours ago, spartacus said:

I feel for you, it must be fucking soul destroying, like it's ungrateful or something. It does make for an excellent thread though...

The bullshit I had from it with that stuck bolt, along with the oil sump etc, that destroyed my soul more than this. When it happened I just looked at it and though "of fucking course you'd decide to drop your arse here wouldn't you". I'm almost expectant of it now. And I wouldn't even go as far as to say "well it's done now so nothing else can happen" because it invariably will. I am getting a faint wiff of petrol, which is worse when the tank is full, and I think it'll just be the vent. But I'm expecting there to be an issue with the fuel tank when I drop it. 

BUT! If if it's all good, I may treat it to a water pump when I do the timing belt :)

Pity the Beatles are a bit too tight with their copyright, because I am definitely recording that to raise funds for the MOT!!!

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16 hours ago, bunglebus said:

Might as well crack on now you've got this far. Do one side before you dig too much on the other then it won't seem as bad. .

Yeah, I mean it's scrap really so I can't personally make it any worse.

I've a full week to decide which side to start with!

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After doing incredibly well picking horses fit for glue and/or Findus Lasagnes, I decided to tackle the exhaust and propshaft removal this evening.

All went well, in terms of finding the right socket for my wrench and taking off the one nut holding the exhaust to the downpipe. 

I could not work out how you were meant to get access to the bolt hiding above the exhaust. I was there scratching my arse wondering, and then it hit me - when I put the subframe back up, I should've put that rubber bracket on the exhaust side first, then the subframe. Instead, putting it on the subframe first then fixing it to the car, pushed on that little hanger and pushed the whole exhaust up in to the car.

I couldn't separate the back box from the mid section, but thankfully the back box had been taken off a few months ago so it was easy to just pull that all off. Still, because of the hanger fouling the rubber subframe bracket, I couldn't access the last remaining bolt. 

A dremel later, I cut enough of it off and it lowered the exhaust enough to access the bolt. I didn't cut it all the way off, it's still attached a little to the exhaust. So when I'm welding I can just weld that back together.

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It then got dark and I needed my dinner. So Saturday now I will drop the propshaft and the fuel tank. 

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Well it's that time of the week again!

"What glorious corrosion is the RAV4 hiding today?"

If you answered #192: Fuel Filler Pipe....

You'd be RIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIGHT!

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In fairness this is the one place where I expected to find something wrong, given I've filled it up twice and both times there was a big stench of fuel at the back of the car. I had in my head it would either be a new water pump when I do the timing belt, or a new filler pipe - as it's a non-interference engine and I'd rather a broken belt than a blown up car!

I vaguely remember someone on the RAV4 UK group moaned about paying £80 for a new one of these from Toyota. It's just as well they didn't check eBay! 😂

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It's not so bad at the moment, as I expected this even before the welding. Helpfully though, because of that listing, I have the part number. And a quick search on eBay brings up a few under £90, one being £45.

Pay day on Thursday, so I will order that then. Now I must continue to remove the fuel tank!

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On 3/18/2021 at 7:44 PM, warch said:

That bloke on here who's welding himself a new Volvo 240 would be delighted with so little rust on a car

That might be me, and incidentally I also had a rusty Toyota!

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That was a 2005 car!

I love Toyotas, they are mechanically indestructible, lovely to drive, but man do they rust. It doesn't help that they are mostly constructed from multiple layers of spotwelded 1mm steel, plus in some places they have no underseal or seam sealer to speak of. 

The Volvo is comparatively easy to work on as despite the large volume of rot, it is localised to small areas and there's not many overlaps.

I wish I could have saved the Celica as only a year later the prices have skyrocketed.

Get that RAV saved, man. (Great work so far).

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2 minutes ago, juular said:

Get that RAV saved, man. (Great work so far).

It's mental, as the underside of my 1998 Corolla is in great shape. All of it had some sort of rubber coating, and the only rusting bits it has are to do with bolts and other things that aren't to do with the chassis. I'm really surprised that the 2005 RAV4 you showed there was more rotten than this! I won't ask to swap 😂.

Anyway, just as well I need a fuel filler neck, as they come as a unit complete with the filler neck and vapour return pipe. It's the last thing to do before the fuel tank gets dropped, I have the jubilee clip of the filler neck loosened, and as I went to do the vapour pipe...

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It broke in half. I'm glad I wasn't going mad thinking it was normal to smell petrol when the tank was filled to the top! 

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