Engine and drivewheel swaps

This may be kinda sacrilegious, but I have a 1991 Celica GT and I love the car, It’s beautiful and the entire cabin is in great shape. The problem is that without mods it’s a little underpowered. I also happen to have a 1987 Supra Turbo with a body that’s completely rusted to hell.

You might be seeing what I'm getting at...

Now I'm not willing to try to mount a straight six transverse in that little engine bay, and additionally I don’t really want to put that kind of power in a FWD car. What I’d really like is an inline-six RWD Celica. I’ve been told I'm crazy and that the work isn’t worth it but I’d like as many opinions as I can get. It’s my project car so I'm willing to do what would normally be considered a little outrageous. Does it sound at least feasible?

Thanks for any input you can give, even if it’s telling me I need my head examined ;)

-Jeff

im in the process of doing that same thing...but mines an 85 so its already RWD

All I have to say is have fun...and i hope (for your sake) that you have a full garrage at your disposal.

oh it will be fun. i dont have much for a garage but i got gearheads with experience that wanna help.

Heh...I hope you arent in love with your firewall. Because your probally going to have to take it out.

I've read about some successful older model 7m-gte swaps but none about what I'm proposing. I do have a full garage and fabricating equipment, and a couple of friends who will help me w/ whatever I decide to put the engine into. I'm really just trying to get some ideas at the moment. I may find something else, or just decide to go with another MKIII bod.

-Jeff

Ill go ahead and give you my game plan. I am the proud owner of a 93 Celica GT. The 5S-FE is a very nice engine, absolutly nothing wrong with it. Good power to size ratio and nice torque for a 4 cyl engine. Basically my friend what I plan on doing is rebuilding a 5S-FE to high compression.

I am going to replace everything except for the block itself. I personally prefer high compression to turbo for a few reasons. One is that you get the nice horsepower at all your gears instead of having to wait for your turbo to spool up. Two is that if you do it right the engine is as good as new, unlike with a turbo where you pretty much have to rebuild the engine to low compression first THEN pay about two grand for a turbo kit. I would personally go with the 5S-FE man, great engine, and yes...you can make it a very fast car for under about $3000

Well, the 7M-GTE is already a turbo engine, so there's really no helping that.

If I planned on suping up the 5S-FE I'm not sure what I'd do. I know you just spoke out against this but I had considered snagging a turbo kit for it once or twice, but kits are extremely pricey. I think I may just leave my 5th gen stock for a while longer.

I'm really a turbo fan myself, so if I ever kill this engine I'll probably just buy a 3S-GTE and drop it in. The post was really more a 'What should I do with the potentially powerhouse straight six sitting in my parking lot?' question.

Don't get me wrong, I love my celica, I'll just wait until I have another reliable daily driver before I go messin with its insides =)

Speaking of which, if anyone cares, I got pictures of it on www.cybermesa.com/~jtfisher. It's, shockingly, under the link to 'My Celica Page" (I'm sure you're all surprised)

-Jeff

Don't get me wrong, I love my celica, I'll just wait until I have another reliable daily driver before I go messin with its insides =)


Heh thats why I went to the junk yard and got myself another 5S-FE block to rebuild :D

Very good plan. I'm slowly collecting hoards of parts as it is, though, and I think 2 cars will be enough for the time being. I am just a lowly college kid, after all!

Once this one is finished, I'll see about going for #3. Who knows maybe I'll do something else silly with that. Seems like a 5S-FE would fit in an MR-2 just fine...

I dig the supra man, '87, can still pull 130mph, only 114k miles on it....... my car is an 85 Celica and dont pull after 4k rpms and wont go over 80 (tranny fuck up) and 190k miles..... Nice find dude

Thanks man,

The engine is in great shape. Ran like a dream and I even dismantled the top portion of the engine bay to do a compression test, passed with flying colors. Sadly like I mentioned the body is a pile of rust with paint holding it together, hehe.

It made it from Ohio to New Mexico with absolutely -0- problems on the road, though, and at that age a lot of cars can't say that.

-Jeff

Thanks for the tips but I think my Celica is going to remain a celica.

I may have found a recipient for my 7m-gte. I'm going to be snagging the body of an old 78 280z. We'll shoehorn that badboy inside the engine bay and cut ourselves a custom targa top. Call me a crazed loyalist but I'm also planning on sticking the Toyota Supra emblems on the Z's body. I'm weird like that.

-Jeff