ES300NZ

Assuming I've not stuffed anything up this would complete the first phase of the service.

Phase One.
[done] Cam cover seals, and spark plug seals.
[done] New spark plugs,
[done] New oil and oil filter.
[done] Cleaned inlet manifolds and head ports.
[done] Cleaned Sumps (No1 and No2)
[done] Cleared obstructed oil pickup (a discovery).
[done] properly seal intake piping to prevent leaks from poor seals (red gasket goo)
[done] replace damaged/heat brittle vacuum and water lines
[done] repair damaged wiring (heat / brittle)

insert 500km's driving distance to see if any faults from the work so far show up.

Phase Two.
Replace Cam oil Seals,
Replace Main crank oil Seal, (front).
Replace Water Pump & seal.
Replace timing belt, and tensioners, and idlers.
Replace Radiator and coolant.
*maybe replace oil and oil filter again.

insert 500km's driving distance to see if any faults from the work so far show up.

Phase Three.
Wash Car, remove all grease marks,
shampoo carpets
Leatherette seats.
re-Install boot lighting (why would you remove that ?? why .. WHY !!???!!)

Hayk

iTrader: (1)

You've made some awesome progress, your car will thank you for it.

ES300NZ

thank you, things ago going well with it so far.

I completed the check over, found a few minor things to touch up. I'll be draining the oil to refill with the correct oil for the engine, and then I'll run the 500kms test after it's held temperature in the driveway.

speedkar9

You've put a lot of work into this car, especially given its age.

It should last you a good while now.

Good work, and I enjoyed reading your build log.

PFB

Extremely well done. Extremely well documented.

Congratulations

Phil

ES300NZ

Thanks for the compliments people (PFB & speedkar9 & MrBooby

I found the time to work on the car again today. I visually checked out my work, then drained the temporary oil, it was already dark after a 5-10 minutes of running. Some time later in the day after dark filled the motor up with the correct oil (10W30) for the conditions in my area (5W30 for cold climates). I was thinking It doesn't matter that it's dark I''l just leave it running for an hour and let it prove it can hold temp to me.

Good thing I was looking, I heard a hiss, .. investigated saw wetness and thought, gee it's odd for rain to get in there rain?


how .. ~FUEL LEAK~


O-Ring leak, it was actually spraying the first time I saw it, but it self healed for this photo.


So, this is why I always test the cars I work on a bit,. This is not unexpected the O-rings felt kinda dried out and stiff when I disassembled the car. I nearly replaced them but I've only got a packet of cheap crappy ones, and it seemed like a bad choice to use them for this. Only the back ones are leaking, and it seems like only one injector too.

I'll replace all the o-rings on all injectors. Does anyone know the part numbers for this job ?

ES300NZ

I made some time today to take the car back apart. I wanted to see how this fuel leak happened, it had been playing on my mind.

I took the car apart. That took about 90 minutes.


the moment I started looking at the injectors I could see the problem.


Injector One (damaged/shredded lower o-ring, upper o-ring shrunken too)



Injector Two (no damage to seals but upper o-ring shrunken quite alot.)



Injector Three (damaged/scuffed/slightly scarred lower o-ring, upper o-ring shrunken)



Injector Four (damaged lower seal, upper o-ring badly shrunken)



Injector Five (damaged/shredded upper o-ring, also upper is badly shrunken)



Injector Six (badly damaged upper seal and lower seal, also both badly shrunken)


Since I'm going to had to re-do some work. I made a parts list..


My wife wasn't seeing the funny side, she thinks I was rough with the parts and this really was completely avoidable. I had to admit that is kinda of true. But, I swear now I've seen the state of those seals. I can counter that this car was dangerous. Well, I think those would have leaked eventually, what she sees is another parts bill which is not a little one either.

I'm not sure I can convince her, but I can take the grommets and lower insulators off the parts list, I wanted too. I'd rather not though. it would take alot out of the bill and make her happier too.

ES300NZ

I found some more time to work on the car,

I started with the broken coil plugs,



I'd found replacements at a wreakers yard.


I de-pined them by first moving the white plastic tag up (release slider).


then I used a flat head jewellery screw driver to move the plastic holding pin away from the pin inside. This is an insufficient explanation, trust me, the plastic holding tag is there, it's inside, you need to lift it up and away from the pin.


then I replaced several broken injector plugs with old 1991 Levin 4age (silver top) injector plugs which are a drop in replacement using the same method.


Then I moved to replace both lower manifold seals and the bypass hose, and the thermostat (and it's seal).


Here are the part numbers for the lower manifold seals, each one is different.
.

Here are the part numbers thermostat, I replaced this first to empty the water from the engine's top.


there is a bolt on the front head, which holds the metal pipe.


The bolts for the themostat housing are hard to get too.


I had to gently pry the old thermostat out, same with the gasket. I had to drop them to get them out, and install up through the same hole. It was annoying the more effective than fighting with the piping .


In order to get to the lower manifold seal and easily change the bypass hose I moved this water housing upwards only and inch or two.


these washers are on the studs for that housing, .. you'd not expect them to be there, watch out for these they could easily fall into a water way, or inlet port.


I then changed the bypass hose.


There was a water leak in one corner, of the lower manifold seals.


It had eaten into the head's surface slightly. So Wire brushed it with a (special), stainless steel brush I have for alloy prep (pre welding). the corrosion cleaned up easily leaving this.


It tooka while but I cleaned all the surfaces up and they looked like this. I used meths (the spirit/not the drug), and a stainless steel brush.


just to be sure it was sealing I applied a small thin layer of high temp sealant and pushed it into the 'wound' in the head.


New bypass hose, lower manifold seals, and thermostat in place. easy enough just effort and time.


I am still waiting for parts from Toyota so I can put the fuel system back together.

<start rant>
After going back and forth from the local toyota part place three times now.

the first time, they said "we have your parts" I Get there, .. they have two items out of ten.
the second time we have your parts, I get there, they are missing 2 rubber seals out of the whole order, which turn out to be the wrong ones in the end anyway.
the third time, they have all the rubber seals now. But supplied us with the wrong rubber seals. It's just the lower dust seals, but I want them, I paid for them already.

That was a Saturday, and they aren't open on Sunday so I'll have to wait till monday now and go back two more times, once to drop it off & explain what I need and another to pick up.

</end rant>

ES300NZ

I dropped by the local Toyota Parts Dept. Left without my parts again. Apparently there are none of these (6) seals in the country and they have to import them and that will take 10 days. I'm in New Zealand, it's a chain of islands in the middle of the Ocean, .. stuff like is common.

Since the lower insulator seals are actually ok and I wanted to do them because I'm ****, I was like:

"cool, .. let me know when they arrive" ..

........... and went home to put the car together.

I vaseline'd the insulators to soften them up and let them sit in the sun.


Then I wiped it off, and installed all the seals after cleaning up the injectors a bit.


Sucks, but the upper intake seal is damaged, I didn't want to pay for the seal, since I'm likely going to disturb it once the parts arrive from japan so I had to do a temporary repair. I'll sort this all out at the next 5000km service.


After that I filled up the water, let it run in the driveway, then did a short trip and stopped outside the house to check it. Everything was fine so I did a 25km trip. I drove like a dream.

However, a couple of small issues. the idle is a tad low when colder(ish) / not hot. but perfect when hot. I think I've fixed or created a small vaccum leak. If I fixed it, someone's already tried to compensate for it previously by lowering the idle. If I created one, ... I'll find it (using dishwashing liquid: as per normal). and fix it using new parts which cost a bit too much and arrive late (as per normal)

the other issue is the engine held perfect tempature, it got well warmed up, and sat just under half way on the temp. But I never saw the electric fans kick in, not once. I've got all the information on testing and so forth, they did kick in for the AC, and when I removed the plug from the temp switch at the bottom of the radiator the fans went 100% full.

I might be imagining this issue, but I'd rather prove myself wrong first before putting it into daily use.

ES300NZ

I've taken the car for a few drives now.

All back together, with some 'flash' new blue hose in places. I'll get more of that to replace the brittle vacuum hose. Clocking up about 50km's in total. Everything seems fine but the fans were definitely not turning on from the ECT switch.


So, I unplugged it. And the fans now run 100% of the time. at 100%. that's not a solution, but it is a fix for the moment.


Then I had a really close look at the radiator, it's looking pretty stressed. It's really hot when the fans aren't running too.


Yeah, I'm getting the picture here. The fan's haven't been running for a while now, which explains the extremely worn out / stressed condition of the radiator top tank. I’d take a guess its done about 3-4,000 or 10,000kms without the fans. Which has basically wreaked the radiator top tank, and caused the leak I found. Its not expensive or difficult (usually) to solve this sort of thing, it’s probably a broken / failed $ 30 electrical switch / or a failed $50 water temp sender, or a bad $20 relay.


so I checked out the part numbers on the relays.


and the part numbers on the sensors I can get too,


and I got some prices from places. .. wow .. toyota really are unreasonable about the pricing. (GST = Goods and Services Tax @ 15%)


I'm busy with university assignments, and my wife has just returned to her job after several months on maternity leave. Money's tight, and I want to repair the radiator at the same time so this might have to wait several weeks.

ES300NZ

I opened the boot to check the spare had air in it. Found a brand new mag, and tyre. Nice.


Floating in 3 inches of water. not nice. You can see the tidal mark in the wheel well.


I worked out that this bolt was letting water into the car. The water staining is visible under it.


The leak did alot of damage.
Over flowed from the wheel well into the corner wells.


Water had filled the corner wells.


Damaging / ruining the 'cardboard' supports in the rear.






I disassembled the car. Removing the bumper and tail lights.


these bolts are the easy to get ones, the rest are hidden in strange places.


I removed the side vent, to clean it too.



And I re-installed it with a nice new sealant / seal. Not necessary, but I feel better for it.


Then I cleaned the car, cos it was filthy under there.


Then I set about putting it all back together, I sealed up the seam which was letting in water.


And the bolt holes for the lights, and I didn't show it, but I also did the holes which attach the bumper. Every single one.


I also washed out the wheel wells, (underbody side) .. wow .. just wow... (omg what a lot of dirt), and removed the wheel well trim to clean in between that too (moss growth). I put the car both together. As I did this I noticed the ariel boot was loose, it was doing no sealing at all, so that's the _real_ leak. I tighted it up, and put alot of black sealant under the boot, and on it's sealing edge. The result was invisible but that should solve the leaks.

It's not shown but I did rust treat the rust and the seams, twice actually. fish oil, no odour, .. my ****. I took 30mins to scrub the oil out and the smell is still in the cabin slightly. I ended up washing the entire boot with lemon juice and bleach. the wife was not freaking amusing at all. The second time I used a no odour-ous rust convertor.

01LEXPL

iTrader: (10)

^ I'm surprised to see there's no tubes in the side compartments. My 01 had those tubes running thru there to the underside of those compartments. Basically the tubes were sunroof drains. They are inside the c-pillar an inaccessible. So if they crack you can't see it.

I basically did the same. Treated it, then hit the compartments with rubber undercoating to prevent further water from sitting on the paint, but in a covered undercoating 'bathtub' so to speak.

For the wheel tub, I drilled out two holes from the underside of the rubber plug that sits at the lowest point of the tub. It does serve as a removable piece but with winters & very cold weather the holes made more sense in my case.

-------
On my ES I had the same fan 100% of the time 'on' issue right before I sold it.

It turned out to be the green relay as in your fuse box. I simply had one kicking around from some GS300/400 parts cars out at a friends' yard.

Those relays are very common and 'generic' for all Toyota vehicles. The 70$ price is a joke. Seriously. You can scoop them at the same wreckers I'm willing to bet! Save your money.....

ES300NZ

There was a single tube on the righthand side, seemed like a drain, not sure where from though (no sun roof).

- the always on fan issue is something I caused, because they were always off before. I pulled the plug from the fan switch at the bottom of the radiator, that made the fans run 100%, 100% of the time. Which is better than not at all. I'll fix the issue later.

- I did hunt around and found the relays for $17 each new, .. I'll probably go that route, and throw a refurbished radiator in, and a new fan switch too.

Deal

Great read OP. I am gaining all kinds of courage to try some engine work that I'm totally unqualified to do.

Hayk

iTrader: (1)

The trunk leak was probably caused by tail light gaskets. Water got in and filled the side compartments, rusted the bolts, and the overflow got into the spare tire. I had a similar issue, until I replaced the tail lights and their gaskets.