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87 Corolla FX16 GTS Track Toy Build

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  • #46



    Finally something to update! Back in February I dropped the car off with a reputable local guy to have a roll bar put in. It still needs a few little additions, plus paint, but I think it turned out fantastic.

    First things first though - electric power steering





    This is out of a first generation Saturn Vue. I pulled this out of a junk yard for under $75 for everything. It's a self-contained system that, when combined with an eBay controller, makes for a very cheap way to convert basically anything to electric power steering.





    Here's the rough plan so far. The upper portion of the Vue housing will get cut out and act as a sleeve around the lower Vue housing (the one that bolts up to the EPS). That will allow the upper Corolla housing to fit snugly and weld up to the Vue lower. This is good for a few reasons, namely that the Corolla support bearing is 3/4" (or so I thought) so it will fit any universal 3/4" shaft (turns out that's not precisely right), as well as allowing me to retain the ignition, turn signals, and wiper controls.





    Here's the section I'm taking out of the Vue housing to make a sleeve. The tapered upper portion also got removed.





    The lower mount was very simple to make, just two 90*- ish bends in some flat 1/8" steel and a few drilled holes lets it mount up.





    After turning the bracket 180* from where it was in the previous picture, and with a little bit of finessing, the front mounts bolt right up to the factory location.





    Next up is the intermediate shaft between the EPS output and the rack u-joint. To create this, I used the Saturn upper intermediate u-joint, the lower spline from the Corolla column, and part of the Saturn's upper column to piece it together.





    And there we go. We now have a mechanical connection to the car!





    While I was messing about under the dash, I went ahead and modified (read: destroyed) the factory rear wiper switch to use as a mounting point for the EPS assist adjustment knob.





    The next step was to take everything apart again and weld up the input shaft. There were some weird constraints involving shaft diameters for the support bearing to consider, and this was the best way to do this as far as I could determine.





    To make sure it was straight, the two pieces were clamped in some 90* steel when tacked.





    After welding all the way around, it was then ground flat for sleeving.





    The lower part of the Corolla column was cut and used as the sleeve to reinforce the new setup.





    If this thing is going to break it's not going to be here, that's for sure.





    And here's the whole thing reassembled, ready to go back in the car.





    Since the stock steering wheel has a deep dish to it, and the Momo going in this car is flat, I needed some extra shaft length (phrasing) to get the wheel closer to me.





    To do this, the end of the stock shaft was chopped and welded to some 3/4 steering shaft from Speedway Motors.





    To sleeve this part, I used the splined lower Saturn shaft, drilled out to 3/4".





    After some grinding......





    ...and more welding...





    We have a steering column ready for a wheel.





    Obviously this needs some cleaning up, but everything is together and very strong. The wheels turn lock to lock with no binding in the joints or bearings anywhere, and the steering wheel is in a fantastic position.

    All that remains is some electrical work to improve the less-than-stellar battery wiring from the previous owner, and then this will be ready for proper testing!
    @thedailydownshift

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    • #47
      Very interesting info here, thanks for sharing. Rollbar looks legit, what color are you painting it? Not that it will affect its purpose, but still interested to see if you would chase a theme.
      "You could roll an E30 in a BMW showroom today and people would think:
      Well, they finally got the 1 series right!"

      3.0 L e30 ground up build

      Comment


      • #48
        Originally posted by gnmzl View Post
        Very interesting info here, thanks for sharing. Rollbar looks legit, what color are you painting it? Not that it will affect its purpose, but still interested to see if you would chase a theme.
        Well I have a six pack of Duplicolor wheel enamel in Bronze so that's what it's going to be. Eventually maybe I'll paint the interior all red so it's not so many different colors, but today is not that day.
        @thedailydownshift

        Comment


        • #49



          After further thought, I wasn't happy with the intermediate shaft design. Rather than relying on two flat-surface to flat-surface welds, I wanted to do something a little more safe in event of a weld failure. So I took a piece of the 3/4" steering shaft and made one end a DD profile with a locating dimple, and the other end was drilled out to fit the splined end into.





          A replacement u-joint was ordered from epowerstering.com that has a splined end to go on the EPS motor output, and one end is a 3/4 DD. Both ends have set screws to keep things from sliding in and out, which is what the dimple on my new and improved shaft is for. In addition to the weld, I also drilled a hole through both pieces and ran a bolt through as an extra backup.





          With a bit of paint to keep rust away, it was all ready to go back together. Once everything was wired up, everything works 100% as expected. The only thing I don't like about it so far is that the effort is a little too light, even with the knob at it's lowest setting. I may investigate to see what the resistance range of the rheostat is, and maybe either try some resistors or a different range rheostat, just to try and get a little less assist, without the motor turning off completely.
          @thedailydownshift

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          • #50



            The previous owner had already relocated the battery to the trunk. I had already added additional cable protection, fuse, and basic cutoff switch. However the location high up and at the very rear of the driver's side of the car - and the lack of a battery box - always bugged me.





            The floor behind the passenger seat seemed like prime real estate. I welded in a few brackets for the battery tie-down to attach to after hammering a spot nice and flat.





            I cut two small slots in the bottom of the box for the brackets to go through. This way the battery will be held to the floor, holding the box in place.





            A few pieces of scrap metal were welded together to make a secure-fitting tie-down. The most common thing cars fail tech inspection for at the track is a poorly secured battery. Additionally, with the new location being inside the passenger compartment, a box is a must.





            The box lid is held on with a nylon strap that came with the box. One of the bolts that held in the rear seat makes a great location for the ground cable.





            The fuse is mounted to the side of the box with some zip-ties. Eventually I'd like to install a proper 4-pole cutoff switch - one that allows the alternator to discharge when shut down, rather than potentially blowing out the voltage regulator. However until then, the fuse should protect the car in the event that the main power line grounds out for whatever reason.





            To prevent the passenger seat from hitting the box, I added bolts to each side of the slide rails to limit rearward travel.





            All installed, nice and clean. I think this will work out much better than the old setup. One less thing to worry about the possibility of failing tech.

            With this whole Covid-19 thing going around, the VIR track event I was supposed to do this weekend was cancelled. Then the backup date in August was cancelled when they re-scheduled Hyperfest, so as of right now I'm scheduled to take this car to VIR in mid-May. I'm not holding my breath that this one doesn't get cancelled too, but here's hoping.
            @thedailydownshift

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            • #51
              Pretty awesome/different build. Keep up the good work.

              Comment


              • #52



                Since the weather was nice, I took the Corolla out for a drive around town after work one evening and spotted this rad mural. I pulled over for a little photo-op.





                Looking at that picture made me realize again how freakishly high the car looks even with the factory GTS side skirts. Since work is crazy slow right now with the COVID situation, I pulled the car in during the workday and make some side skirt extensions.





                I think it makes the car look much nicer, and should help a little with aero too, maybe?





                A friend of mine kindly donated a spare transmission he had laying around with a slightly broken case. It's out of an AE92 GTS so it should be a little bit more stout and have a better ratio than the one in my car.





                Using a paint pen, I made marks on the axle stub and input shaft so I could count the turns by gear to try and figure out the final drive.





                Using the tips from this article and linked excel sheet, I verified that this is indeed a 4.3 final drive C52. After running the numbers on the trans currently in my car, I confirmed that it's currently a 3.7 final drive C50/51. The current trans is from a Chevy Nova TwinCam so I had no way of knowing the ratio without testing it, though I had long suspected this to be the case.





                Here's the broken part of the case - not too terrible. This is where the bracket for the rear mount bolts up. I extracted the broken bolt successfully but the broken part needs work.





                Here's where the slave cylinder bolts up. One bolt came out fine, but the other had to be drilled and re-tapped.





                A few minutes with a wire wheel got the majority of the scale off and had it looking much shinier than before.





                I decided to take the trans to work and try my hand with the aluminum welder there to repair the broken spot. My goal was just to add material enough that it would support a through bolt, at least in a lateral direction.





                I don't trust the added material to hold threads, so some kind of nut will be welded to the inside of the housing. Fortunately the hole ends inside the un-used rear starter hump (this trans has provisions for two starter locations) so there is room to work without hitting the flywheel.





                On another note, the passenger mirror glass was flopping around a lot and was basically un-usable, so I figured maybe it came un-clipped. I gave it a little press back into it's spot and it rewarded me with a nice *CRACK*.





                Rather than try and replace it, I took the opportunity to ditch the surprisingly heavy power mirrors (the only power option on this car) and block off the holes.





                Saves on weight and drag!





                To replace them, I put in a cheap wink-style segmented mirror from Summit Racing. This should give me enough of a panorama that I might be able to get away without the side mirrors.





                Unfortunately it did come in with one broken panel, but some glue had it back together good enough.

                As for what's next, I have no idea. All the events keep getting canceled so I might just do some preventative maintenance on the car - timing belt, oil pump, oil cooler lines, stuff like that - since I have plenty of time now and parts aren't too expensive.
                @thedailydownshift

                Comment


                • #53
                  you have no idea how glad I am that this build is still going.

                  𝔣𝔬𝔩𝔩𝔬𝔴 𝔪𝔢
                  @𝔳𝔦𝔳𝔢_𝔪𝔢𝔪𝔬𝔯_𝔩𝔢𝔱𝔦

                  Comment


                  • #54
                    Originally posted by rice4life View Post
                    you have no idea how glad I am that this build is still going.
                    Thanks for the kind words! With so few of these cars out there, detailed FX16 projects are basically non-existent. I'm glad some people find it interesting, or at the very least entertaining.
                    @thedailydownshift

                    Comment


                    • #55



                      With basically every event getting cancelled, I decided to go ahead and do some preventative maintenance to make sure that, when things do open back up, the car will make it through a weekend with no issues. Timing belt, tensioner pulley, cam and crank seals, oil pump, dipstick o-ring, and crank pulley woodruff key are all getting replaced.





                      While the car is down, why not go ahead and fill the side mounts with some polyurethane to fill those stock rubber voids? Leftover urethane was poured into a soda can.





                      Right away I ran into an issue removing the old woodruff key. Solution? Slot some flat steel and weld that crap up.





                      Works like a dream. The keys are only like $3 from the dealership, and I always like to replace them when doing this kind of job. It's cheap and could prevent lots of headaches down the line.





                      Remember how I said I poured the leftover poly into a soda can? As luck would have it that's the exact diameter of the front and rear mounts with the rubber removed. So these full poly-converted spares will be replacing the frankenstein hybrid ones in there now.





                      As I feared, this oil pump looks to be the original 250k mile unit. The early production pumps have these squared-off teeth that like to crack and shatter with lots of high RPM use. Revised replacements have rounder teeth with fewer stress points that tend to last much longer on track.





                      While the pan was out I also happened to notice that one of the rivets holding the trap door on the TwosRUs baffles had separated, with both pieces chilling in the bottom of the pan. I replaced it with a new rivet.

                      I hope to make some more progress this week if time allows. Some fun exhaust stuff and maybe relocating the oil temp sensor may be in the cards as well.
                      @thedailydownshift

                      Comment


                      • #56



                        Did you know you can get v-band flanges for like $12 on Amazon? Up until this point my entire exhaust from downpipe to muffler tip has been one solid piece, which makes dropping the oil pan super awkward.





                        With this flange installed after the resonator, I can remove the forward third of the exhaust to make things much easier. With the exhaust re-installed and the engine buttoned up, the car started right up no problems!





                        While not specifically part of the FX16 project, I did pick up a new project this week in the form of a double axle trailer. It's a home made trailer from the 80's and it needs a ton of work, but I think it will work great for my uses. Fortunately it seems like getting a VIN and title for a home-built trailer seems like a fairly straight forward process with the DMV, so ideally I'd love to have this done by the October VIR event.
                        @thedailydownshift

                        Comment


                        • #57
                          brings back the days of old when i had my 86 corolla

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                          • #58
                            Not a whole lot of new stuff going on with the Corolla right now since I've been working on restoring the trailer, though I did do my first full-solo track day at Dominion back in July and set my personal best time. Unfortunately my GoPro's battery shit the bed so I only have the video from my phone while it was running the TrackAddict app, with no audio.





                            Though I did finally finish the trailer with just two weeks to spare before VIR!

                            @thedailydownshift

                            Comment


                            • #59
                              Less of a "build" update and more of a life goal update - here's my post about going to VIR





                              I **** job interviews. It's not so much the pressure of impressing the person interviewing you, it's when they inevitably ask some variant of my least favorite question of all time: "what are your goals in life?", "where do you see yourself in five years?" or something like that. I've never really had much of an answer for those questions. But one goal has been persistent in my mine for over a decade now - and this weekend I was able to fulfill that goal. I finally drove on track at Virginia International Raceway.





                              It's been a very long road to get here. Ever since my very first autocross back in 2008 at Langley Speedway, I'd dreamed about getting on track.





                              In 2009 some friends and I made our first pilgrimage to Hyperfest at Summit Point and watched in awe as drifters and track cars tore it up all weekend.





                              In early 2010 I did a circuitcross event on Patriot Course at VIR. It was a rough introduction to the road course world, as my alternator decided to die on the way home, stranding my dad and I on the side of the road - more than 2 hours from home - in the rain.





                              Not to be dissuaded, I made another road course attempt in the fall of 2010 - this time a Hyperdrive session at Summit Point. I made it all of 8 laps in before a leaky head gasket displaced my coolant with compression and I got black flagged for dropping fluids.





                              After two back-to-back failures leaving me either stranded, or very nearly stranded 3 hours from home, I pretty much gave up on road course racing and stuck to autocross. It just didn't seem like it was meant to be. For a time...





                              In 2016 we made another pilgrimage to Hyperfest - but this time instead of being at Summit point, it was at VIR. Even though I wasn't driving, I was reminded of how amazing that place is. It was that year that I made the life-changing decision to ride as a passenger in a friend's Miata as he did laps on VIR's Full Course. I was instantly and unshakably hooked.





                              Within a year, I sold my Cressida wagon and bought a Corolla with the explicit intention of turning it into a track toy.





                              Less than a year after getting the car, I started running trackcross events at nearby newly-opened Dominion Raceway, with HPDE to follow soon thereafter.





                              It was awesome to see myself gain confidence in the car, as well as watching my friends skills improve at the same time.





                              Once I acquired a tow vehicle, whole new realms of possibility opened up. I was finally ready to brave the trek back to VIR and signed up for my first HPDE in March 2020. Unfortunately fate had other plans. When the COVID pandemic started, the VIR track day got pushed back over and over until finally the only date left was in October.





                              The extra time was used wisely however. I bought a very cheap, very rusty used trailer and spent over four months restoring it.





                              The trailer was completed a week or so before the big day. It was an insane amount of work, but the freedom to tow my car wherever, whenever was more than worth it.





                              It was a bit surreal following Eric and his Miata down to the track, as it was that very car which I had ridden in years before that was the inspiration for all of this.





                              We set up our spot in the paddock and I retired to my room for the weekend - an air mattress in the back of the 4Runner. This setup was actually a key factor in choosing the 4Runner as a tow vehicle. The combination of the roll-down rear window and fold-flat rear seats makes for a great camper.





                              The next morning brought a beautiful sunrise over a cold, dew-damp track. Unfortunately those conditions lead to a few crashes in the first few sessions of the day with some higher-horsepower cars.





                              Not particularly eager to follow suit, I sought out some air to raise the tire pressures which had fallen in the cold.





                              Then after meeting my instructor, Rick, in grid - we were out on track. Finally, after all these years I was finally driving at VIR.





                              This track was everything I hoped for. The Rising Esses, Oak Tree, Roller Coaster, it was so surreal to finally be driving through these turns I had seen before in video games or from the passenger seat. I only wish I had been able to do it sooner, before the Tree fell in 2013.





                              All the prep paid off in a big way - the car performed flawlessly with zero mechanical issues all weekend. The only real negative was when I (along with several others) accidentally missed one of the classroom times on Saturday and had to sit out a session. Lesson learned there.





                              After a check ride Sunday morning, Rick gave me approval for going out solo for the rest of the day. Being able to finish out the weekend solo and set my personal best time was just icing on the cake.





                              Speaking of personal bests, here's the best lap I managed - a 2:32.02 (based on my iPhone's not-that-accurate GPS feeding the TrackAttack app). I also got a chance to roll across the scales and found out the car is roughly 200lb heavier than I originally thought - 2197lb without driver. I need to get more weight out of there!





                              I know that was a very long, roundabout way of talking about what was essentially just a track weekend, but to me it was so much more. It was the realization of decade-long goal, and it could not have gone better. In conclusion I'd like to leave you with a quote that, more eloquently than I ever could, sums up this incredible place:

                              "If there is a heaven on Earth, it is VIR."
                              -Paul Newman

                              Additional photography by Dylan Dupee and Eric Madsen
                              @thedailydownshift

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                              • #60
                                Very happy for you, for achieving your goal, that lap looks like a blast.
                                "You could roll an E30 in a BMW showroom today and people would think:
                                Well, they finally got the 1 series right!"

                                3.0 L e30 ground up build

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