Celica Tsport - story so far....

[MrsJuular]

Since I haven't been active in a while I thought maybe it was time to update my goings on. 

The purchase of the Celica has been almost painless. I've had to do very little to this car since October. 

Went to pick it up from @GMcD with my last purchase from @GMcD

This is my 3rd celica but my first 190bhp one so was looking forward to playing with it.

@juular's volvo amazon took its firsts steps not long after I bought the celica. It was nominated as its emotional support vehicle for that very important journey.

The celica had a few niggles developed over months that I ignored until @juular urged me to take a look.

One of the abs sensors was faulty and the car had a clunk. 

After investigation the front left abs sensor was not seated properly and was also covered in rubbish. I dremeled out the hole and cleaned the sensor, problem solved.

 

As for the clunk that took a lot longer to find.  It turned out to be a few issues. The drop links were buggered so @juular kindly replaced them while I done some other tasks.

The other issue was the brake pad carriers were very loose causing them to clunk when going over the smallest bump. I purchased caliper slider pin kits in the hope that that would fix the issue. It almost did but one of the pin holes was slightly ovaled (common apparently) so I have ordered a new carrier.  The car is admittedly much quieter and more enjoyable to drive.

The engine light decided to come on late spring and the car would not go into lift.  Went to investigate and found the lift filter to be rather gunked up. Took out, cleaned up and put it back. Light went out and car worked fine. I'm glad it was a simple fix as I this is my daily car and really couldn't be arsed chasing a fault.

 

The brakes then started to squeal quite a bit so I spent a little money on it and fitted new discs and pads all round. 

A friend then borrowed the car for twixfest and had a lot of fun throwing it around the back roads.

So that brings it to the dreaded MOT. 

It failed on a headlight bulb and handbrake not working on rear left. Not a problem I will get that done and back to you same day..... NOT!

Headlight bulb was easy. The handbrake cable was seized solid and access to it was shite and almost inaccessible without removing the full exhaust (under the heatshield and under the silencer).

The car got jacked up and left until the new handbrake cable arrived. During that half a day a bird was murdered under the car.

Once I had the cable, the heatshield got ripped out and I managed to get my hands under the silencer to put a new cable in its place. This involved a few hours, a face full of dirt and lots of swearing.  It also involved the patience of @juular handing me things and also taking turns trying to adjust the shoes and handbrake. It didn't help that the whole centre console of the car needs to be removed to access the handbrake adjustment and that the wheel needs to come off every time you need to adjust the shoes.

After 50 attempts or so to get the handbrake to work both sides we gave up and I fitted new shoes in the hopes that it would help.

The car was taken for a retest and myself and @juular watched the car on the brake tester with our fingers crossed...

It worked and the car passed. Thank fu.

The celica rarely gats taken to car meets so I took it to a local meet with @juular and @rml2345. It looks tiny beside the american muscle.

[junkyarddog]

Great little car,I had a 190 version also .

Had it four years and apart from servicing needed absolutely nothing.

They can't half shift too!