The Semi-Unofficial Pistol-Forum Car geek, gearhead, hot rodder, and vehicle thread

[Duelist]

Probably going to buy a car this week.

Since SWMBO wants a smallish SUV/CUV, it will probably be a 2016 Escape Titanium, 2.0L Ecoboost, 57K miles. We rented one several years ago and liked it, and my folks just bought a 2022 and love it. We can’t afford new in this market, can barely afford used of this recent vintage.

Any reason not to jump on something like that? We test drove an Edge, but then read reports of blown water pumps and blown blocks as a result being the norm rather than the exception, and so eliminated it.

[OlongJohnson]

I don't know why, but every single time I do adjust lash on one of these shim-over-bucket Toyotas I manage to have a few valve lashes that fall wildly outside of my expectation for my first shim swap. This time it appears I got confused on which bank I was measuring for 3 of the exhaust valves... Does this happen to you too JRB & Olong?

JRB if this car had come in for a ~120,000 mile service would you have bothered to adjust it with 1 valve just 0.001" loose, another valve 0.0005" too loose, and a bunch at/near the limit? 3.3 3MZ grocery getter...

PS: Is there a good online toyota parts dealer? I used to use Champion or Jay Marks, but I can't find either anymore...

Never had that happen. Mine always come out right the first time.

Since it's shim over bucket, with the right tools, it's no big deal to get it right. I'd go ahead and adjust them. Shim under bucket is a lot more PITA. If someone was paying me for it, I definitely would.

There are lots of dealers selling online now. I'd just go with whoever seems to have the easiest to use interface and cheapest shipped prices.

[OlongJohnson]

On Friday, I realized that a junk pile I ride my bike past from time to time includes remnants of an 11/05 build date 350Z with a manual trans.

Hey, free CD009!

Putting it in storage. Don't know whether I really want it to grow into a project yet. But I've run the numbers and it looks like it might be the best possible option for the project I can't get out of my head, even if I had to buy it.

[Suvorov]

Probably going to buy a car this week.

Since SWMBO wants a smallish SUV/CUV, it will probably be a 2016 Escape Titanium, 2.0L Ecoboost, 57K miles. We rented one several years ago and liked it, and my folks just bought a 2022 and love it. We can’t afford new in this market, can barely afford used of this recent vintage.

Any reason not to jump on something like that? We test drove an Edge, but then read reports of blown water pumps and blown blocks as a result being the norm rather than the exception, and so eliminated it.

I had an Escape while traveling in Europe this summer (called a Kugar there) and was very impressed with it. It however had a euro diesel motor so I spent most of the trip cursing the EPA and Kalifornia regulators for their asinine anti diesel attitudes. I have heard that some develop transmission problems, might look down that hole just to be sure.

I don’t envy anyone having to contend with todays automobile market.

[Suvorov]

Spent yesterday afternoon degreasing the engine bay of my Mustang Cobra. This is the most extensive time I’ve spent in the bay in the car’s 24 years. While I would wipe in down occasionally the years were showing inside.

Looks a lot cleaner now, next step is to detail it, remove what surface rust I can on fittings, touch up the black paint, polish the bare metal, and treat all the plastics and hoses (and identify hoses that need replacing).



The engine bay is so crammed full of stuff (this was state of the art when the SVT DOHC 4.6 engine debuted in 1996 and the hood had to be modified for it’s height), I doubt I will every get it Concours ready as it is impossible to get around everything (plus the body paint is not 100% anymore) but at least it is pleasing to the eye and a good example of what at that time was the fastest general production car Ford had ever made.

Finally I can install my SVT owner plate in the bay.



Oh, and it goes in for new shoes on Tuesday to replace the hockey pucks I’m currently driving on that still provide surprisingly good traction.

Oh, and I really REALLY want to thank @JRB for all the time and effort he has taken in helping me with my “slow restoration and modding” of this car!

[Bigghoss]

So let me tell y'all about my Friday...



This is my 1994 Ford Ranger. Total pile but I refuse to let it die because I hate new trucks. Anyway, I'm driving to work Friday evening and the truck dies on the highway. I see fuel leaking out under the truck and take a quick peak and it looks like the fuel line at the front of the fuel filter is leaking but I can't quite get my eyes on it. Keep in mind, I'm on the shoulder of a 65mph highway. If I accidentally swing my leg out too far trying to get under the truck it'll get taken off by a car. Let alone the chance of someone driving distracted and creaming me and the truck. So I call a tow truck and then call work and tell them I'm not making it in. It took maybe 45 minutes for the truck to show up because they were way far away when I called. To the tune of $150.

The driver drops me and the truck off at my apartment and I change into some grungy clothes. Sure enough...



This piece of crap is supposed to be holding the fuel line on the filter. If you know much about 90s+ vehicles you may know that these pieces of crap are notorious for doing this exact thing. I take my K5 to the parts store and they are totally out. I go to the next parts store and they closed 4 hours early because of a staff shortage. I drove past another parts store that was obviously closed (it's about 8:45 pm at this point). The 4th parts store closed 10 minutes before they were supposed to because that's the shit that happens when you're trying to get something done. Finally the last store is just about to close but the guy knows exactly what I'm looking for and where they are. I have my parts! And of course it's $5 for a 5 pack.

I get home but it's fully dark outside so I give up for the night and decide to wait until daylight. Except my asshole friends are giving me shit for my old truck always breaking down so I run outside and stick the clip in and bolt the fuel filter bracket back in and button the truck back up by the dim light of a Black-and-Decker angled head flashlight and fire it up. I took a video but it's just me telling everyone to get fucked and you can't even hear the truck idling. I go back inside and it's 9:55 PM and I smell like a million bucks because I've been laying in a puddle of gasoline. The next day I drove the truck to the next city over, 45 minutes away and spent half the day driving to gun shops only to not actually buy anything.

[JRB]

OCD desire to be within 0.001" of the middle of tolerance range + Toyota valve shims = waste of a Saturday

Attachment 91929


I don't know why, but every single time I do adjust lash on one of these shim-over-bucket Toyotas I manage to have a few valve lashes that fall wildly outside of my expectation for my first shim swap. This time it appears I got confused on which bank I was measuring for 3 of the exhaust valves... Does this happen to you too JRB & Olong?

JRB if this car had come in for a ~120,000 mile service would you have bothered to adjust it with 1 valve just 0.001" loose, another valve 0.0005" too loose, and a bunch at/near the limit? 3.3 3MZ grocery getter...



PS: Is there a good online toyota parts dealer? I used to use Champion or Jay Marks, but I can't find either anymore...

That's never happened to me, but I prefer to label shims individually with a sharpie, on a V-motor I use a different color sharpie for each bank, and label them I1, E2, etc from the front to the rear of the engine.

Given a 120k service with on a 3MZ that's right at the limits of too wide on the intake side, I'd try to use a scope down an intake runner to see how gunked up the valves and ports might be. If there's a lot of carbon buildup or other crap on the valve surface it can cause the valve to not fully close to the previous spec by a thousanth or three, and the fix might be as easy as running some seafoam into the intake and re-checking the lash and discovering the valves seat further up with all the crap cleaned off of them.

If it's too wide on the exhaust then usually a re-shim is required or worse, it's a dropped valve seat etc. But that's uncommon on Toyota engines IME. Usually I've found the exhaust valves tend to 'tulip' over a great deal of time and that causes the lash to get too tight instead of too wide, and going too tight on exhaust valves is bad because eventually there's not enough seat time to cool the exhaust valve. At that point it's one good highway merge on a hot day and you've burned an exhaust valve or two and you're down on compression.

Most of the OG Supra guy hookups for Toyota parts are all long gone.

For OE Toyota parts I've had good luck with Olathe Toyota's online parts ordering. Pretty decent discount right off the bat, and if you call them they're generally willing to try to order weird JDM part numbers and all that kind of stuff.

Oh, and I really REALLY want to thank @JRB for all the time and effort he has taken in helping me with my “slow restoration and modding” of this car!

Truly, it's been my own pleasure dude. I've got a soft spot for SN95's and I love seeing how nicely yours is coming together!

[hufnagel]

convertible is < 40 miles away from rolling 200k.
at that point, mom gets it while I work on her PT.
also might be heading to north of Albany soon to pick up a parts car.
seller is selling it cheap because "Recently won’t start so selling as is. Don’t have time to try and diagnosis the problem."
obviously I'd try and fix it first, because why not. if it started working I might just do an interior swap then try and flip it and look for another parts car.

[Duelist]

Probably going to buy a car this week.

Since SWMBO wants a smallish SUV/CUV, it will probably be a 2016 Escape Titanium, 2.0L Ecoboost, 57K miles. We rented one several years ago and liked it, and my folks just bought a 2022 and love it. We can’t afford new in this market, can barely afford used of this recent vintage.

Any reason not to jump on something like that? We test drove an Edge, but then read reports of blown water pumps and blown blocks as a result being the norm rather than the exception, and so eliminated it.

Well, the Escape didn’t happen. They did a safety inspection on it and the turbo was bad.

Test drove another small SUV - Jeep Renegade Sport. Was okay, not inspiring.

Looked at a RAV4. When we opened the hood, there was a big brown rat sitting on the top of the engine.

I’m not even kidding. It ducked down behind a heat shield or something over the right wheel-well and sat there staring at us out of the hole, stamping its feet on the sheet steel.

Sales manager pulled the plastic housing off the top of the engine to see if it had made a nest, and there were no droppings or chewing in there.

We laughed - a lot - but when I mentioned it to my wife later, she said, “I don’t even want to drive that one! I’ll always wonder if they actually got it out of there, and I absolutely refuse to park it in our garage. Ever. ”

LOL.

[OlongJohnson]

Well, the Escape didn’t happen. They did a safety inspection on it and the turbo was bad.

Test drove another small SUV - Jeep Renegade Sport. Was okay, not inspiring.

Looked at a RAV4. When we opened the hood, there was a big brown rat sitting on the top of the engine.

I’m not even kidding. It ducked down behind a heat shield or something over the right wheel-well and sat there staring at us out of the hole, stamping its feet on the sheet steel.

Sales manager pulled the plastic housing off the top of the engine to see if it had made a nest, and there were no droppings or chewing in there.

We laughed - a lot - but when I mentioned it to my wife later, she said, “I don’t even want to drive that one! I’ll always wonder if they actually got it out of there, and I absolutely refuse to park it in our garage. Ever. ”

LOL.

There's a good chance it has chewed on wires. Rats like to do that when the 12V is energized. I don't know how they can pick it up through the insulation. But my understanding is that taking the battery out, besides preserving the battery better, makes the rodents uninterested in chewing on everything electrical when it's in long-term storage.