eight

iTrader: (1)

well...it's a decade late, but i wanted to play in the mountain offroads after my sc4 was ruined by some fool with a trainers license. now, i wanna play on pavement again.

so i picked up a 92 sc3 5spd with 174k, for a reasonable sum of $3400. i found others on the great 'list' for better prices, but didn't have anyone local that could check em out. but this one was in the region and near my uncles place, so i sent him on down. after a couple calls, few pictures and a bit of insanity....i was off to omaha to re-enter the world of lexus with a manual sc....on halloween heh.



brought her back home a day later with the plan of parking her for the winter and playing on the mountain slops with my board. winter ended up sucking and i found myself in more random projects around the house than on my board. so i pulled the car out, made my list of missing parts and kicked myself up to the junkyard for goodies.

of course, the list i thought would of been small...but that never happens. i knew the engine had been swapped at some point, found out it was from a 93 gs300 with nearly the same mileage as the chassis(give or take 20k). the a/c components weren't put back in, egr was deleted, and the radiator fan was converted to dual (cheap - as they just stopped working about a week ago) electric fans. the stereo worked but only the front right speaker and the antenna didn't move - but buzzed. the usual dash needles were out, along with the cluster lcd. i knew this before i left omaha, what i found while digging around was more. missing were the front door speaker enclosures(replaced with particle board with cuts for the 5" or 6" speakers), rear speakers, sub, sub amp(put in a 350w kenwood instead of the oem), disc changer, mini tire jack, spare tire(have lots at home), floor mats, front lower grille plastic plate, and left and right lower front fender wall plastic.

replace mostly all of that from stuff picked from the junkyard for a cheap sum, also picked up a baroque red 97+ kit off a junker(everything was nice on it too...maybe blown engine or something) with fogs, grille, and a fugly painted pre 97+ spoiler from another sc(the only thing good on it...cept the rear seats).

i did put on the 97+ parts as it was quick in the still chilly days, also hooked up a relay for the fogs. still need to put on the non TRAC version throttle body and intake manifold with egr and piping i picked from yet another sc. i found a clutch fan mechanism off the same sc, still haven't been able to nab a fan or shrouding. the fun part is gonna be trying to rip all of the crap for the a/c when another pops up....at that point i may try to just buy the whole car and drag it to my yard as it would be nice for the spare parts if i ever need em.



at this point i had gotten sick of the rims....really sick of em. but i missed my chance for some local supra tt rims that were in windsor back when i had just brought the car home. found my chance again....in omaha - same exact rims that left co. called up my uncle and sent him on his way(sure glad he's a big car guy as well). test fitting a homed lip, been lazy and haven't taken it off to template it for v2. i also noticed while randomly looking at the carfax again i picked up an sc that started her (leasing) life in my hometown, just odd heh.
...i've become the colorado sc (labrador) retriever ><





after getting restless from redoing a kitchen i decided to grab the drill and start making marks for the pre 97+ spoiler, ended up with a few offset holes that needed better placement. but i ended up with a pretty decent mounting that is only off by about an 1/16-1/8" in at most. it's still the ugly dark green(deff a spray paint job with lack of skill). so that'll be coming back off and headed to my 'shop', for a sand down, prime and repaint(i've read color code 202's didn't have clear coat, but i question that). also picked up an hic rear window visor to complete the slightly more aggressive look with the spoiler.




i'm now feeling satisfied with the look of the car and can turn my focus to other things. i plan on going na-t at some point, but realistically it should be on the bottom of my list. no point in power if the car can't handle the corners and deceleration.

so the list continues...
suspension work:
bushings - every flipping one of em pretty much. may go with poly's (stiffer iirc).
shocks - i think mine are nearly blown.
springs - cause i drive a truck/suv for work, sc must be lower =P.
^ or just screw it and toss on a whole new set of coilovers, all depends on shocks.
steering rack bushings - there is a bit of odd wobble when going over bumps, it may not be the bushings but something else. more digging!
lots and lots of reading required before i stick to anything. the goal is to have a stiffer and lower stance for days i'd like to play on the track, while still not having a ride that is pure crap for a long 400mile journey when i want to travel.

after that is brakes:
ls400 95+
should be simple...maybe. math and reading required again, at least after finding this thread. but it shouldn't play into the plan to much as i was already planing for just ls400 front brakes once i found old intellexual on wayback machine. i'm glad to have sampled some of the cl community way before hand, it's made things much easier to plan with some background.

other things down the line will be sourcing parts, gotta have those spares - engines, trannys, diffs at bare min. repainting parts, gonna try out this paint that you can peel off when ya don't want it on the old bumper. it's matte black but i'll give it a shot if it works on the old bumper. if i can find a cheap junker with decent interior parts i'd like to try to SEM paint them black and see how it looks. gotta rip out the dash needles sometime soon as it's just a hazard and do the LED tips mod. may change bulbs in radio and backlit dash when i fix the HVAC bulbs, i'd like to go white. lots of crap to do, all part of the fun.

as far as na-t plans go, it's just a big debate in my head still. i have no need for anymore horse/torque than a gte(1jz or 2jz) would make, so the thought of a swap comes to mind....so does the idea of sourcing parts for the kaboom times. twins would be fun, but the quality of whats left of the quantity starts to come into play from what i've been reading(could be wrong). in the end, i'd just like to recoup lost hp/tq from being at altitude - i play on mountain roads in the xterra, the sc shale do the same....just pavement. in the end, i think a small/mid single(or one of those new confangled turbos they have now) with 7-9psi will do me just fine. that may recoup lost hp and then a hair more, or at least enough to satisfy me.

------------------------
7/3/2015 update

so, been a few things that have changed since i last posted.
put on some plastidip(?, spray can says ez-peel), red was getting annoying.
it's a decent temp coverup till i finish everything else on the car



i mentioned before the electric fans weren't working, after testing everything i found the control mechanism was shorted (something broke on the inside that was unrepairable). bought another one and relocated it to an area i think might be better (old one wasn't really securely mounted).



cleared out some cel codes



this was just flipping funny. really glad i didn't order parts and wait for them to get here before starting work, for some reason a fool decided to put the o2(post cat) on...just never connect the flipping thing. easy fix, no more smelly starts....
btw, no egr, no o2 sensor even hooked up...still passed emissions, that combo sure didn't work on my old work truck.

next was the annoying low oil level light. gonna blame the same fool here. just an fyi for anybody that swaps a 2jz from a gs300 the oil level sensor has a slightly different connector than the female connector on the harness. off to the junkyard for a spare oil level sensor and a female connector from a donor gs300.



hit 10k miles of my own ownership of this car and took it to glenwood springs, at some point my rear passenger caliper seized(moves now, thought my c-clamp or my hand was gonna give out before it would move...could probably use a rebuild kit though).





it ended up cracking the aftermarket drilled and slotted rotors the PO had put on. i had noticed this two weeks before the colorado lexus/toyota/scion meet while i was putting on a plastidip black recoat and clear coat on the 97+ parts, gave it a better blend - still requires proper repainting of course.
so i dove off into late night readings and such about brakes, finding info on rear brakes was hit or miss and sometimes just vague. whole week was a mess with work and trying to locate 291mm rotors for some reason.
back to CL searching, more vague stuff, but i did find some info on ls400 rear brakes, apparently not enough though. i interpreted something said about the ls400 95+ brakes being a rear brake upgrade for the sc3, made sense...307mm vs 291mm rotor. so i looked into getting 95 ls400 rear calipers with brackets, rotors and pads. before i went to order i tried to find more info on the topic to no luck, but i did get lucky. while bored i decided to start calling some junkyards and see what the current inventory was, found a lot that had a 95 and a 97 ls400. broke out the tools and went to work, the 95 was already ripped of the front calipers and rotors, but the rears looked horrid...the 97 looked as though it was only there for a week or two and had the fronts still on. picked off f/r calipers with brackets. bought new pads n rotors and started work on the car, fronts went on fine but the rears...eugh. the ls400 rear bracket mounting holes wouldn't line up much less fit the 307mm rotor. ended up putting the ls400 caliper on my old sc300 brackets on 291mm rotors that were a pain to find. seized caliper fixed and upgraded the....fronts only (grumble grumble). guess ill have to drop coin sometime for supra tt rear calipers...or maybe try supra n/a rear bracket[+caliper].







that's all i've done and planned for now, if you happen to read a part/some/most/all/(cheezitz) and have something i should know, please hit me with info. i'll update things when i have something interesting.

be easy ladies n gents.


kicking at a-basin

eight

iTrader: (1)

reserved for updates

KahnBB6

iTrader: (5)

Excellent find and already looking great!

I'd recommend the brake upgrade first. It's very straightforward:

https://www.clublexus.com/forums/sus...how-to-do.html

Sounds like you are going right down the list. Good luck!

eknine9

iTrader: (8)

It's true, 202 is a single stage paint from factory with no clear. The reasoning was that scratches would be less visible in a single stage black paint than in a clear coat sitting on top of a black paint. Personally I feel like it holds up pretty well without a clear coat.

eight

iTrader: (1)

Thank you Kahn, been running around with this list for a long while. Also been kicking myself for the missed chance to get ls400 calipers on the cheap off a junker (that was reborn - some dealer picked it). But o well heh, more will come.

Thank you for the info eknine, now I gotta figure out how I'm gonna paint this spoiler. Had plans for the clear coat as that's the only way I know of to get that mirror effect on the paint.

MOAR RESEARCH!
Again, thanks for the info gents.

megamax

iTrader: (9)

not sure why you hate pre 97+ body style??

eight

iTrader: (1)

I dont, I just happened upon a 97 junker and was looking for other parts. I don't like the pre 97 lack of skirts, to flat for how long it is. But if I find the right hid fogs I'll be putting the 92 bumper back on after mod ding the corner lights to hid fogs and rehousing. Found a good thread somewhere around here that some did to his 92-94 cornering lights. then I'd have to find a pre 97 front lip, heh.
But really, no hate. Just found a great deal that also gave me some skirts and proper fogs for now.

Kris9884

iTrader: (7)

Off to a GREAT start! What are your plans for the color of the car?

KahnBB6

iTrader: (5)

I think the pre-97 body lines are perfect. It's the front bumper that needed that 400 lip standard on ALL models. I had a full 97-00 kit that I bought for mine but once I put just the updated bumper on... that was it for me. The car does look long but with the high rear and sides and lower front end the rake vaguely reminds me of 70'-75' muscle cars with larger and fatter tires (i.e.: TT rims or others) But I'm a fan of that look. I like wide tires to slightly dominate the lines more than the body itself does.

All individual preference, really. The full 97-2000 look is great too and so are the 92-94 and 95-96 front ends. All those looks pull well with the metal body lines in different ways. Can't wait to see yours with paint, eight!

eight

iTrader: (1)

thanks much kris!

202!! at some point i'll scan a photo of my old spruce sc4, i really enjoyed the sparkle in the color. but in the end, i really wanted black with white rims. i'll rock the baroque red for a while or i may stay with this ezpeel stuff, just as a temp. paint is near the end - if not last - on the list. many a thing to do, like get a/c heh.
but i also lack the tact and skill for painting at the moment, so a lot of test painting on the old rear bumper will prove it's worth - with a lot of sanding for retry.

i don't think i really mentioned it in the first post, but i'd like to do as much as i can on the car myself. all about the bond. car, bond. hehe.

i was all about the 92-94 style on my first sc (still wanted skirts), but it also was in a mountain look (iirc it was the mountain package, don't remember the source of that info though). had the front lip, mud flaps, 6-spoke(can't remember now) sc4 wheels, with some rubber guards that were like a body guard line. my original goal was to go for a 92-94 bumper that i have and convert the cornering lights to fogs with proper lighting (bit of a challenge still - i think), 97+ skirts, 92-97 spoiler. but now, it will at some point be that setup, but with a 97+ rear bumper and the valences (hey, i'm getting some terminology down lol). though....i think the 92-96 lip is fiberglass....the jyard guys bumped up the 97 car i was pulling from on the front-inside fog light while i was dragging a cig....came back a lil pissed cause i told em i wanted the side skirts off the rim jacks AND the front bumper. but the bumper molded back into place with only paint crack lines...was kinda amazed, i don't think the lip would do the same though.

i have a secret love for muscle, just hated that they could only really drag....(unless your crazy with mods, rtr(-x?) mustang ftw!!). if i understand rake correctly (front lower than rear), then yea...it's a great look on the sc. i always hated one thing about muscle....areo made no sense to them, almost all muscle has the areo look of trying to fly(everything below the door ***** has the feel of no downforce). but damn...good ole sc is like a buick gnx in my mind (i think i came with more power to it's counterpart, but wasn't suppose to really super-seed it), n/a sc's and supra's resemble that in there aftermarket life - in a small way. but more, they are a jdm interpretation of 70's muscle with that jdm tech....and scexiness. loving my tt wheels too, 6.5 to 9.5 gives me so much more traction on that flipping open diff.

jdm muscle
low and pro with a little bit of woah!
jea, heh.

eight

iTrader: (1)

did some updating after my rear brake problem, updates in post #1.

while working on the front calipers i noticed what i think is the most likely cause of my wobble steering over bumps, no lca bushings, all gone, cept some bushing dust n clumps. so ill have to order some of those, might as well do uca's as well. tie rods seem ok, ill have to read more into proper play n such. also have some steering rack bushings that i need to put on, should be the easier set of stuff ill be doing.
figured i might as well toss on some tanabe gf210 springs since ill be pulling some suspension as is, gonna put those on order as well.
and joy of joys, i had an aching feeling that i needed to check my rear bushings again. they seem fine enough to last till the next round of severe maintenance, but i noticed the rear bushing on the diff were dead....and holy. wooo, lol. the car will just have to sit for a bit till i can get those...she can settle in the springs while waiting heh.
gonna try to remember to use the camera while working, never seem to take during pics. o well, i should have enough time to remember, it'll be my first real work on suspension....and flipping bushings.

at least it is still on the same route that i wanted to go with the car. just gonna have my brakes/suspension done a whole lot sooner than i planned for heh.