85 86 toyota camry engine switch

[glennk]

Hi all
I am trying to install a 85 2.0 toyota camry engine into my 86 toyota
camry everything matchs with the exception of the advance on the distribitor. The 85 is vacumn and the 86 has a spark ignitor. My question is can I run the 85 engine with vacumn advance distribitor in the 86 or will I get some sort of engine light from the computer. Or would it be better to replace the 85 distribitor with the one from the 86. I got the 85 engine in a wrecked car that the owner had just spent $1300 at a shop to have one of the 37k mi Japenese takeout engine installed. I have all the reciepts and the balence of a 6month 3000 mi warentty is still in effect from the supplier. The car had 487mi on it when his wife wrecked it. So the 85 distribitor has less than 40 k on it.
Thanks for any imput

glennk

[Mike Gerber]

glennk,

If you are worried about the 85 distributor throwing a code I would use the distributor that matches the ECU in the car. If you are using your 86 ECU, then I would use the distributor from the 86 engine. If you have switched the ECU to the 85 ECU, then I would use the distributor out of the 85. If you use the 86 parts, I would however, keep the distributor (and ECU if you have it) out of the 85. It might be fun to play with later on. You could try putting it in and see how the engine runs. If it throws a code, you only have to change things back and/or pull the ECU fuse for 15-20 seconds to erase the code.

Incidently, I had an 86 Camry that my wife and I purchased new. We put 173,000 miles on that DX 5-speed before we donated it to a charity and replaced it with a new 98. It was the best car we ever owned. At 173,000 tough, Chicago area miles, it still had the original clutch.

Mike