SimonB

Ooo, nightmare! I've always dreaded turning up at a meet and then driving into something due to the amount of pisstaking that would then occur! There was a video posted up ages ago of someone in the US at a Corvette meet I think it was who pulled out to leave in a convoy and spun it straight into a tree, at least it wasn't that bad!

Ok, what did I miss? Who drove into what?

They did change them, they always change tyres every stop unless sometimes if they are on intermediates on a drying track when they leave them in the hope the tread will wear down and turn them into slicks effectively.

I was going to put in an appearance at the next one (albeit in my oil burning beemer) since I haven't been at the last few. Unfortunately I can't do tomorrow!

Yeah, I do have that book. I knew I'd read it somewhere but couldn't remember where, that'll be it then! Found some stuff on the internet about it too.

No chance, the amount of time it's taken! I reckon I'm going to sit it in the lounge and admire it... Good fun though.

So, that's the pistons in, time to sit back and admire the lovely shinyness of it all!

Time to install the pistons. First up, I cleaned the cylinder bore out thoroughly.Then I coated it with oil. Next I installed the rings onto the piston. To do this you really need a decent ring expander like the one in pic 1 - makes it a doddle and avoids twisting the ring or scratching the side of the piston.The compression rings are marked (with an R in my case) - the mark goes uppermost. Pic 2 shows the rings fitted. The ring end gaps must be positioned in the right place - I used the stock positioning from the engine manual. Then I coated the piston with oil, and my ring compressor and clamped it round the piston. Position the crank at bottom dead center for the piston you're installing, then it's a case of carefully lowering the rod into the cylinder (pic 3) and tapping the piston down into the cylinder with the handle of a hammer or something rubber like that (pic 4). The pistons have an arrow which marks the front by the way. Pic 5 shows a piston in. Once in, I carefully guided the big end of the rod onto the crank journal. I then used some plastigage again to make sure the oil clearance was correct and tightened the rod caps up to the torque I found out using the stretch method earlier. The clearances were all spot on so I then undid the caps again, lubed up the bearings and tightened them up again. The bearings are all the same on the rods, there is no upper and lower. The tangs go on the same side (it's important to get the caps of the rods on the same way round.

Next up, fitting the oil squirters. Pretty straightforward really, see pic. Then I installed the crank for the last time. I lubed up the bearings, lowered it in and then bolted up the caps. You must use the supplied grease on and under the washers and nuts when doing this with ARP studs so you get a consistant torque. There is a sequence you must use when tightening the caps, and you do it in three stages. So I used 30 ft/lbs, then 50ft/lbs, then 70 ft/lbs. The sequence is in the engine manual, but basically goes from the center outwards like this: 13 9 5 1 3 7 11 14 10 6 2 4 8 12

Next it was time to assemble the pistons to the rods. The pins are held in by circlips which fit into a groove in the piston (see pics 1 and 2), which are a total PITA to install! You put the first one in, which isn't too bad (pic 3). Then lube up the pin, pin bore and small end of the rod, slide the pin in and then swear and shout at the little bugger while trying to get it in without stabbing yourself with a screwdriver and bleeding to death! Ta dah, pic 4! You do get the hang of it - I ended up using a screwdriver to hold one end in while simulataneously bending and levering the other with a small pair of pliers. Eventually I got them all assembled, pic 5.

So, moving on, time for final assembly. First up I installed the new core plugs. I used a thin film of hylomar universal blue round each which is a non-setting sticky sealer. Then I hammered them in using a socket just smaller than the plug in the middle. Job done.

Ok, let's deal with the bearing issue first! First thing is that bearings are eccentric - that is they are thicker in the middle than at the parting lines. So the difference between the two bearing half thicknesses where they meet is no more than 0.01mm (I measured it). Also, there is an oil channel that continues across the parting line, and then there's the tang that locates the bearing. See pics. So there's actually not much width where there will be a very slight step (we're talking less than 0.01mm here as I said). As Chris said, in theory I suppose it could effect the oil film but given the oil channel I can't see that happening. As for offseting the crank, yes it will effectively move the crank up in the block 0.0125mm, but that's barely more than you would get by just using thicker bearings - the max runout of the crank is 0.06mm in any case so it could be off by that amount anyway!

No not at all. If you're rebuilding the engine you'll end up changing those gaskets anyway - the full gasket kit from Toyota (which is by far the easiest way of getting all the other gaskets and stuff you'll need) comes with new ones anyway.

Probably just a slightly leaky cam cover gasket - you then get a bit of oil running down into the plug wells.

That's the one I have, does the job nicely. Only thing you will need is a set of bolts to bolt the engine to it. They can be hard to find as you need quite long ones - longer than the standard bolts that hold the gearbox on. I was given mine, not sure where you'd get them from otherwise.

Quite right. Fuel cells aren't powered by water, they are powered by hydrogen and produce water as a waste product along with electricity. Since the only way to make hydrogen in the first place is to use electricity which must be generated some other way they are most definitely NOT zero emission. The advantage is that the emissions are centralised at a power station, and in theory if anyone had invented a decently efficient renewable energy source you could use that to generate your electricity. Anything that claims to produce energy from water is patently complete and utter bollocks I'm afraid. It's the modern day equivalent of a perpetual motion machine - physically impossible.

LOL! I cleaned my garage out with the Dyson before starting my build too Just wait until he starts using the dishwasher to clean parts up...

Also, not having an MOT does NOT invalidate your insurance. It's a common myth that one. The only thing that could happen is that if you had an accident the insurer could pursue you in the civil courts to recover their costs IF they could prove the car was unroadworthy and that caused the accident.

My new 0.025mm undersize ACL bearings arrived today (thanks to Dusty at MVP for that one, I was expecting them to take ages being a special order). What I'm doing is mixing these with the standard size ones. So I'm using a standard size half bearing on the block side (i.e. the top) and a 0.025mm undersize (i.e. slightly thicker) bearing half on the cap side (i.e. bottom). That gives me 0.0125mm less oil clearance. So I got the plastigage out, stuck the crank in and checked it again, and woohoo, spot on! They are all pretty much bang on 0.038mm now apart from the centre one which is a bit tighter at 0.030ish.

I'm pretty sure as long as there was no corrosion within a certain distance of a structural bit it would pass an MOT anyway. It's not a check on the condition of your car, it's a check that it's roadworthy at the time.

It'll be a real shame to see this one go Charlie I bet. It has to be the Supra with the greatest level of attention to detail I have ever seen. You just need to look at the ducting for the intercooler to see that.

Precision are a well known and respected turbo supplier in the USA, it won't be a cheap copy, it will be a genuine Garrett. Precision do create hybrids though, so it will be a Garrett core with their own compressor and exhaust housings probably.

Well pretty obviously it will leak if it's cracked! There's a fair amount of oil circulating through the cams and being whipped around in there. If your cam cover is cracked it's going to leak bigtime.

Well, it means you need another cam cover. Dunno how much they are but I bet it's not cheap.

You'll probably be ok. From the service manual they are supposed to be 5.4Nm, which is so low it's hard to find a torque wrench that goes low enough.