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After I recently purchased my 1993 SC400 I noticed that the stock splash shield was hanging down. Not really a surprise on a car that is 23 years old, and has lived its whole life in the Chicagoland area. To be honest I never really looked into it any further and just assumed it was damaged, missing hardware, or likely both. You can see that part of it is hanging down in this pic, but I actually photoshoped the worst of it out,
Sometime shortly after taking that pic (the first time I saw that it was hanging down) I saw the JZZ30.com aluminum splash shields. I thought they looked pretty nice, and the price seemed reasonable. One of the big selling points for me was the oil filter access panel. After some back and forth about if I should even run a splash shield I decided to just order one. I went with the standard one and not the thicker heavy duty version mostly because this is not a car that will be driven in snow or anything, so I shouldn't need the tougher panel i ordered it up, along with the mounting hardware since I knew I was probably missing some. Everything came packaged nicely, and arrived quickly.
I was pretty impressed to see that it had a protective film on it to start out. Other than that it looked like a nicely cut piece of aluminum, not much to see Saturday I finally had the car at my house (I keep it at a friends house for now), and had some spare time so it was time to install this thing! First things first I opened up the envelope and was surprised to see OEM Toyota hardware. It says OEM on the website, but I just assumed it would be whatever stuff that worked.
Here you can see my stock shield. It was actually in pretty good shape, just missing some hardware (and had some improvised hardware).
It is very straight forward to remove, and only took a couple minutes to do. Here are some shots of the stock one vs the new one. Also notice that the back side of the new shield had protective film on it as well!
Here you can see that the oil filter access panel is laser etched as well, not exactly needed for guys like us who work on our own cars, but a nice touch regardless. Would probably be really nice to have if you take your car to get oil changes, reduce the risk of them messing up the shied to gain access.
This one black bolt seemed out of place in the hardware, so I actually opened the instructions to see if it was mentioned. It actually was, and was very clear (with a diagram to boot) explaining what it was and where it goes. It was for the power steering lines, some cars have longer bolts (mine did) and they would hit the shield.
Back to that access panel, It is held in place with OEM Toyota hardware, which is a nice touch. Also I was surprised to see the bumpers at the corers to stop it from rattling, very nice little touch.
New OEM hardware
Compared to the old hardware. I was missing a couple bolts, and had some non stock one in there as well.
New shield went on very easy, and everything lined up spot on. I expected to have to fight it much more since it isnt actually flat under the car, but I didn't have to fight it at all. My only hang up was there was still one bolt in one of the holes that must have ripped through the stock shield. Once I got that out of the way it went on like a glove. You can see even that drain hose lined right up with the hole in the shield.
Overall I was VERY impressed with the quality and the small details on this part. I was surprised more than once while installing this at some of the attention to detail on something that seems like such a simple part. The shipping was fast, I had email updates from the time of order until it arrived, and the fit and finish was very very good. I cant think of many times I have had such a great experience with an aftermarket part/company. Before anyone asks, I am not affiliated with them in any way shape or form. After I posted some pictures on a couple FB pages they asked if they could use them on their site.
This is really a pretty simple part, and most people will just not run a shield at all. I wanted to have something there, and metal is better than plastic in my opinion. Who knows if this will still be on there as I start doing other, more extensive mods, but for now it looks great and closes up the bottom side better than the stock piece.
Looks awesome, and should help prevent some issues. Out of curiosity I wonder how hot the metal gets after the cars been running a while. Probably not a big deal as aluminum cools fast, but I wonder if you could accidentally burn yourself by touching it too soon...
Looks awesome, and should help prevent some issues. Out of curiosity I wonder how hot the metal gets after the cars been running a while. Probably not a big deal as aluminum cools fast, but I wonder if you could accidentally burn yourself by touching it too soon...
Hmmm, never thought about it. Probably not all that hot though. The exhaust is not anywhere close to it, and most components are a couple inches above it. Now when I go turbo and have some piping close by that will be a different story
Great write up! If i may ask, where did you order this from and how much was it?
thx!
i'm sure you've found the answer already, but in case anyone else needs to know, i just ordered mine off ebay. you can find it searching "sc300 splash shield" and it'll pop right up. (or "sc400")
08-29-16, 04:32 AM
Installing an aluminum splash shield
Saturday I finally had the car at my house (I keep it at a friends house for now), and had some spare time so it was time to install this thing! First things first I opened up the envelope and was surprised to see OEM Toyota hardware. It says OEM on the website, but I just assumed it would be whatever stuff that worked.
