Since 2008 I´m burning money to restore and modify my CS, but now I´m at a point I feel able to say that car is close to the shape I want it and I think all that money wasn´t wasted.
But let´s start in 2008 when the car found me. Yes, I didn´t looked out for a Celica at that time. But the offer for this car jumped right into my eyes at the right moment. So the car fount me, instead of me finding the car.
I was into selling my Corolla to buy a more sporty car with more torque and rear wheel drive. I planed to buy a BMW 3series coupe but had to realize that 325 are exepensive, even as used cars.
At that point a white CS was offered. Already fitted with a 3rd gen 3S-GTE, a set of 17" TTE alloys and a Blitz NürSpec R. The prize was cheap (payed 5300 € for it) ,so I decided to keep the Corolla as a daylie driver and buy the CS as a additional fun car.
The pictures in the selling offer looked good:
but reality hit me hard. The Blitz exaust was ruined:
,the engine bay a big mess after the swap, all alloys had sratches, the exaust header gasket was blown and the standalone ECU let the engine run like a tractor and consume fuel like a truck. As a bonus the inside of the car was ruined too. Some unfixed panels, most panels scratched and a turbo timer that didn´t worked well in combination with the installed alarm system. Outside the car the mess goes on. Sctatches and dents all over the car.
But all that didn´t stop me. I bought the car and started to plan the rebirth:
As first I removed all the stickers from the car and the gauge panel I hated from the start.
Get it registered, give it a quick clean and visited the all year eastern meeting at the Nürburgring.
On the way back home the exaust header gasket blowed up completely.
So I put the car pack to my working cave and removed the turbo, the exaust header and all the little things that had to be removed therefore...
Time to burn money for upgrades, so I ordered a down und front pipe from Aussi, some braces from Cusco and J Speed, some heat insulation materials and a lot of the fine hoses from Samco. I also replaced the airbox with the useless airflow meter by an airbox out of a ST205. Therefor I had to relocate the battery to the trunk because of space problems with the bigger ST205 airbox. I also ordered a display system with sensors from Zeitronix to display EGT, AFR, lambda and boost and made a konsole to fit in the display and a oiltemp and oilpress gauge.
Add an boost controller from Blitz, put the big puzzle back together
and visited the GT Four Drivers Club meeting in switzerland in august.
http://www.turbocelica.nl/forums/thread ... id=42&sid=
For the season 2009 I gave the alloys to the paint shop to get them painted dark grey silkgloss and fitted them with a set of new Yokohama Parada. I also replaced the damaged Blitz NürSpec by a HKS silent HighPower.
Not much more changed in 2009.
Before the season 2010 began I swapped the ECU to a 3rd gen ECU from Mine´s in combination with a custom made engine loom based up on a stock RHD ST205 one to get rid of the poor engine managment of the standalone. A huge improvement in power, driveability and much less fuel consument was the results.
Also in 2009 I had an offer of an set of used forged Work Emotions. Finally I bought them, even as they where 18" and only 7.5" wide. But I love the finish and the look of the old forged type of this wheels and they are really rare as they discontinued since decades.
First test fitting:
I had to add some fat spacers as the alloys are offset 42, but now they fit the car soooo dawn nice.
Me, driving on the Nürburgring:
Later that summer I gave the car to a local shop to get a cat in as it is against german tax law to remove it from a car that had a cat stock.
As the brakes didn´t work as good as the engine I decided to get an upgrade so I ordered two sets of EBC Turbogroove discs, two sets of EBC YellowStuff pads, a set of braided brake lines from Goodridge and two used ST205 rear brake calippers.
Worked fine, but the front brakes where still to weak and still showed fading on the track.
For the season 2011 I finally managed to find the time to finish the inside of car:
But in june a had an accident with the car on the Autobahn. My loved CS was damaged all around:
Leftside quarter panel:
Right front fender:
The biggest damage was the right quarter panel:
So, what to do now ? Give it up after all that and all the pleasure it is to drive ?
NO WAY !!!!
So I stripped it down to a rolling shell
and sent it to a local body shop. They had to use used parts as the rear panels aren´t available anymore. So I bought a ST185 shell and trailed it to the body shop. They took the panel and both fenders from the shell and rebuild my CS:
As a bonus they closed the holes from the side trim, all holes of the windshield washer nozzels, and the the rear wiper. The shell I bought was a car imported from the USA, so the fenders didn´t had holes for side indicators. As the car was to respray nearby completly as it had sratches and dents all over from it´s earlier years I decided to get it sprayed all over. And as I was going so far anyway I choosed a new colour too. My CS was sprayed in "Firnweiss" from Porsche, whitch is a more blueish white than Toyota´s 040 SuperWhite II:
The respray was done by a professional paint shop. Not the cheapest way to go, but I wanted a good finish.
At the paint shop, car primered white:
I received it back pre assembled and flooted with wax inside delivered right to my working cave:
Took two weeks off from work and put the car back together to visit the 2011 GT Four Divers Club meeting in Germany in september.
So the car was back on the street, but I still wasn´t satisfied of how it drove.
But I was lucky again and picked up a good offer for the next step of driving pleasure, in this board ! The break upgrade AP Racing produce since René (aka "Meurz" ) told them to for a good price:
Didn´t made it to get it bolt up to my car in 2011 and wasn´t able to to it in 2012 as I´m out of order because of a heart disease at the moment.
But I had some money free and to much free time to think about upgrades. So I ordered the suspension I want to own since I know Meurz. The Tein SuperStreet suspension:
As I´m not able to work on my car(s) to the moment I asked a good freiend to bolt it to my CS together with the brake upgrade and so the car made the next step to match my dreams:
I´m nearby totally satisfied with the car now. The suspension works very fine, even on bad roads and the brake bites like pitbull. Only the cold braking performance is not perfect. Maybe I´ll go for diffent brake pads to improve it. The brake set included a set of Ferodo DS2500 and I think the EBC pads I used earlier on my CS (EBC YellowStuff) and witch I use in my Corolla currently (EBC RedStuff) perform much better at cold brakes.
As the finish for the moment and hopefully the next time another good friend on mine rebuilded the trunk floor and covered it up with a new carpet:
Next to come is a custom build mild upgrade CT20 turbo that was made specially for me and a upgrade for the clutch and forged pistons when the stock pistons or the stock clutch will blew up.
But at this point my story is over for the moment and I hope You´ll like my writeup.
