Toyota MR2 SO863 HistoryThis vehicle was originally purchased in February of 2003 from Jeff Torkington and Lloyd Ives. At the time of purchase it had the following modifications :
06/03/2003 - Well a week or two ago Jeff & Troy took this vehicle to a hillclimb at Bayers Farm, unfortunately some last minute checks on the car weren't performed and a loose bolt ended up causing a suspension arm to drop in the dirt while Jeff was driving. No serious damage was done to the car, or its occupants, although it did spin on a very narrow section of road. Unfortunately the suspension arm was broken beyond repair and several lugs on one of the wheels have been broken. Troy, Jeff and Lloyd spent most of this evening trying to repair these so Troy and Richard can take the car to the Bent Sprint at Ruakaka this weekend. A replacement suspension arm was taken off the wrecked MR2, ME8579, although it too was bent required some 'percussive maintenance'. New lugs have to be bought tommorrow, but it looks like our team will make it, and this weekend will hopefully be this cars debut under our team. 10/03/2003 - Well, after our first event we've discovered some work we need to do on this vehicle.
26/03/2003 - Trevor, Lloyd and Troy spent Wednesday night working on the car. So far we've dropped the fuel tank out so we could get at the brake and clutch lines which we have removed and replaced with the ones from our wrecked vehicle (ME8579). We hope to get the appropriate fluids and next Wednesday, bleed the system and check its not leaking before reattaching the fuel tank etc. Lloyd and Troy also spent the previous Saturday working on the drivers seat which has now been moved forward to suit Troys smaller stature. 02/04/2003 - Trevor, Lloyd, Jeff and Troy spent this Wednesday night working on the car again. Some minor repairs were made to a cross brace using a welder and disc grinder. We attempted to fill and bleed both the clutch and brakes, however the master clutch cylinder was not functioning properly. Further inspection lead to the discovery of a broken seal, so a new part has been ordered from North Western Toyota on Lincoln Road. This part should be available on Monday and we hope to install it on Wednesday evening. We also discovered the front left brake nipple has a damaged thread, and new one is being located. Assuming all goes to plan we expect to have the car fully functional this coming Wednesday. 09/04/2003 - Well another
Wednesday eveing saw Trevor, Troy, Timothy and Jeff all hard at
work on the car. The new clutch cylinder ($NZ130) went in smoothly and
worked well. The newly obtained brake bleed nipple also fit,
despite not being an exact match to the original. All of the various pieces
are back together and the whole thing has gone for a small,
successful, test drive. We're looking good for Taupo in May !
Troy did make some comments about having to get used to the car though... 13/05/2003 - This car performed extremely well this weekend when Troy used it to compete in a Circuit Sprint at Taupo. Unfortunately the stress proved too much for some of the newly installed parts. While the brake system is still fine after its last batch of repairs, there were problems with the clutch all weekend which has now seized up completly. Also the left rear wheel has a tendancy to come loose, and we think at least one of the wheel nuts may have stripped itself over the weekend. 01/06/2003 - Trevor and Troy spent some time today fixing the clutch, which turned out to be broken line instead of a faulty slave cylinder. They also spent several hours cleaning the vehicle is preparation for the static display next weekend at Snells Beach. The only thing left to do now is fix the back left wheel to stop it coming loose. 09/06/2003 - We still need to fix the rear wheel that keeps coming loose, and we also need to get the car a warrant and registration so we can use it at the Dunlop Tires Targa Dash Event. 14/06/2003 - We have sent away for an Authority card so we can get SO863 registered & warranted. This is a requirement for the Dunlop Tires Targa Dash because we must drive it on (open) public roads to the between special stages. Thanks to Lloyd Ives for filling out the parts of a form that are required to be completed by a licensed scruitineer. We have also got 3rd party insurance - another requirement for the same event. After having been turned down by every other insurance company we called the National Auto Club finally came to our rescue and provided us with insurance at a very reasonable rate. If you are looking to insure a competition or historic car we highly recommend them. Our driving team (Troy & Sean) are also preparing to sit an examination to upgrade their Clubsport licenses to National Rally licenses, thanks to HCMC member Dale Crossley for examining us. 18/06/2003 - Troy, Jeff and Lloyd repaired the back left wheel tonight, replacing the studs and reseating all the wheel components properly. Troy is going to purchase some more wheel studs to match the ones on the front wheel, as we think the taper might be different on the ones that were being used. Troy will also be getting some more wiper blades for this vehicle, hopefully it will be already for the motorkhana/autocross this weekend. 19/06/2003 - The authority card for this vehicle turned up tonight, so we'll be able to get the car warranted and registered soon 23/06/2003 - Jeff, Sean and Troy spent this evening changing the tires and and respraying some of the silver paint on this vehicle to tidy it up for the Dunlop Tires Targa Dash event. We have got a warrant and consequently registered this car. 26/06/2003 - Jeff, Lloyd, Sean and Troy spent almost all night (from 9:00 pm on anyway) replacing the four brake discs on the car and applying the event sponsor's decals for the Dunlop Tires Targa Dash. A huge, huge thanks to Jeff and Lloyd for their massive effort. A big thanks also to our newest sponsor, Race Brakes Ltd who provided us with brake discs at a very reasonble price in exchange for their decals on our vehicle. We probably wouldn't be competing had they not done this for us, so thanks again. 27/06/2003 - Some of the studs weren't properly seated last night which caused us some problems. Trevor & Lloyd were able to replace the studs this afternoon and are happy with them, so hopefully we are all go now. Troy and Timothy have spent the evening checking the fluid levels and tidying up last minute items before scrutineering tomorrow. 16/07/2003 - Jeff, Tim and Troy spent a few hours tonight working on the car. The bulb for the blown brake light has been removed, with Troy intending to get a replacement shortly. With the car up on axle stands we took a look at the brake line, and it seems the leak has once again occurred at the T-piece that takes brake fluid from the front of the car and sends it out to each wheel. The leak is just at the join between the line coming from the front and the T-piece itself, although nothing actually looks broken. The next step, which some progress has been made towards, is to drop the fuel tank out so we can remove the section of brake line with the problem. Troy has also decided to purchase Jeff's close ratio gearbox as we've discovered the car is quite overgeared, particularly when used on Tarmac. We still need to take care of the following :
30-07-2003 - Jeff,
Lloyd, Tim, Troy and Trevor spent the evening working on or
talking about the car. Three simple jobs were completed - we removed
the brake line (and discovered it was infact broken), replaced
the blown brake light and removed the top engine mount which has since been
taken to Auto Line on Lincoln Road to have the nolathane re-poured..
The rest of the time was spent discussing how best to proceed. The
brake line will probably be replaced by a custom built one which Jeff and
Lloyd have kindly offered to build for us. As for removing all of the
equipment that still belongs to Jeff, we had a few issues. 06/08/2003 - Trevor, Troy, and Jeff spent another Wednesday evening working on the car. The engine has now been completely removed from the body and we are preparing to swap the gearbox on it. We hope to post some photos of the work in progress soon. The top engine mount has also had the nolathene repoured by Auto Line on Lincoln Road, and is ready to go back into the car when we put the engine back. 13/08/2003 - Yet another Wednesday night saw Troy, Timothy, Jeff, Lloyd and Dean working on the car. We've discovered why the brake line keeps snapping, the tear on the bottom of chassis we've mentioned before is actually much worse than we'd thought. A second tear is also evident on the top of the cross brace, with virtually nothing holding that piece of the chassis on. Of course that piece is exactly where the bottom engine mount (and brake line) bolts on to the car, so the engine is twist the metal when it's under power and consequently braking the lines attached to it. Dean and Lloyd have come up with a plan to repair the damage, which probably occurred previously when Jeff owned the car and three of the engine mounts failed at once. We've also disconnected the current gearbox from the engine and are working on moving the linkages and starter motor etc. on to the new one. 10/09/2003 - This Wednesday Troy, Jeff and Lloyd set to work on SO863. Lloyd had already welded in the replacement part of the cross-brace (taken from the old ME8579 body). Troy got onto the welds with a grinder, Lloyd did some more welding, Troy did some more grinding and so it went... 22/09/2003 - A Monday night this time, Troy, Jeff and Lloyd all present although they were providing minor assistance as they had other vehicles to work on. Troy spent most of his time doing some more grinding, then cleaning the entire engine bay, followed by putting an undercoat of paint on the newly welded parts. Troy also got into the pedal box, reattaching the accelerator pedal and making a start on getting the new throttle cable back in. This week Troy is supposed to find some 'appliance white' spray paint to use in putting finishing coats over the new painting just done. 24/09/2003 - Well, Troy finally managed to get a picture of the crack on the old cross brace, the picture is shown below and the second image has the original crack drawn over in red. There were also more cracks along the bottom of this piece.
28/09/2003 - This Sunday Jeff, Chris Subritzky and Troy made good progress on the MR2, getting the remaining brake lines in and the bolting the engine back onto it's mounts. The seats and fire-extinguisher are also back in, and most of the hoses and wires are connected to the engine. The inlet manifold still has to be installed, but first Troy needs to order a new gasket from North Western Toyota.
29/09/2003 - Lloyd, Jeff, Trevor, Tim and Troy all spent this Monday night working on the car again. The rear brakes have had the seals replaced and the calipers are mounted again. The missing wheel stud has also been replaced and various things have been lock wired or hose-clipped properly to the engine. Timothy connected the exhaust as well. The inlet manifold gasket should arrive tomorrow ready for installation on Wednesday night. Wednesday is the last day we have to work on the car before the hillcimb on the following Saturday. We still need to :
01/10/2003 - Lloyd, Jeff, Troy, Timothy and Trevor set to work again tonight. The brakes were fitted, adjusted and bleed as was the clutch. The inlet manifold was installed and some bolts tightened up in various places, such as the exhaust. Troy managed to purchase some Water Wetter to use a coolant and will be buying some oil for the engine tomorrow. The gearbox has been filled with a suitable (ELF) oil. 01/10/2003 - It lives ! Lloyd,
and Jeff spent some time on the car tonight before Troy and Tim could turn
up. Once the latter two turned up with the oil we topped up the fluid
levels and put the wheels back on. After a quick spanner check we took the
car out for a test drive. Unfortunately a wire fell of the engine about
1km from Jeff's place causing the engine to die, but this was easily
fixed. There were almost no brakes, but these are feeling much
better now that we have re-bleed them. The speedo is still not
working, but we can use the Brantz computer for now. It was
extremely difficult to get into first or second gear as the linkages on the
shifter were not aligned properly, but Lloyd soon took care of that.
There was also a leak near a join at one of the heater hoses, but that was
easily solved too. Troy and Tim really would have liked to have taken the
car for another test drive but we ran out of time, so it will be a matter
of fingers crossed on Saturday for the Hillclimb.
13/12/2003 - It's been a few weeks
since I've updated the site, so work has progressed well on the car.
Thanks to a big effort by everybody SO863 was able to compete at the HCMC Round
(4) of the Interclub Hillclimb Series. The panels damaged at Quine Road
have all been replaced and some work has been done on the gear linkages.
It is now easier to shift gears than before, but still needs work.
The shocks were also rebuilt and the car is now handling superbly. |
