There’s three old Toyotas in this shot. I ran into the brown Cressida wagon (in the distance) earlier this summer, and did a post on its youthful owner’s work in transforming it from a Broughame-sque beater into a Bosozoku-style cruiser. I knew he lived in the neighborhood, and the other day when I saw these two old Toyotas being worked on, I realized it was him. There’s some interesting things going on with these too, especially the 70s Corolla wagon, which is in the process of getting a totally new drive train.
I could tell right off that the Corolla was getting a new rear end, and not just another solid axle like it had.
Independent rear suspension, and from a Supra (I didn’t ask what generation). The temporary wheels and tires are just that; the Corolla will be shod with 17 inchers when done.
He said he just needs to fab up some new mounting pads for the IRS. I wish I had been as adept with such skills when I was young.
Under the hood, the Corolla is getting an engine out of an MR2; the legendary 4A-GE. And it will be backed by a five-speed stick. That should make for a fun little car.
And the Cressida?
It’s going to be his first drifter. He picked it up for $300, because it has a blown head gasket. And he wants to learn drifting, so the Cressida will be his mount, in the stock class. And here I was thinking its big six was going to end up in the Corolla. That would be a bit overkill.
That little brown station wagon is going to be a lot of fun someday.
I sure hope this guy doesn’t run out of cash and/or energy before he finishes his current projects. He seems like a lot of us guys: he saw a car that could be a “runner” with just a bit of work and with a lively imagination, he chose to go “big” on his choice of mods…..as in the wagon with IRS.
Kind of ironically, I would have turbocharged the Cressida, and stuck with the “stock” rear on the Corolla but still gone with the MR2’s engine. The other Cressida? I might have junked as too rusty.
I hope that once he’s 90% done he doesn’t run out of energy to conplete the second 90%, that’s what gets most projects like this.
Love the western lack of rust on the wagon, if you tried this in my area you’d be doing a lot more than making suspension mounts.
Can we request a paint job similar to the Kia Sephia last week?
To add to the comments about finishing projects, I think it is often all too easy to find one’s self with too many projects/ repairs going at one time. Sometimes by choice, but often by chance. I have two DD vehicles, and it seems like usually when one is having an issue, the other is also, at the same time. Then they will both be fine for months until they both have an issue again.
I wish this guy luck. Between my bad back, my elderly parents, and rescuing my unlucky friends from their latest misadventures, I’m having a hell of a time getting any of my projects done.
I’m almost tempted to unload everything but my Olds, buy a C5 Z06, and call it a day. I hope it doesn’t come to that 🙁 .
So cool to see a young hotrodder’s projects. I am going to go out on a limb and say that he may not have children yet–it gets far more complicated to have this type of project load when you have an hour or two a day to work on them vs. all of your weekends and after-work hours.
Agreed ~ it’s very nice indeed to see a young man tackling this sort of project .
Hot Rodding is alive and well .
-Nate
Hes having a swim in the Toyota parts pool its quite deep and the parts are everywhere around here and quite a few Frankenotas roam local streets legally certified so hot rodding is certainly alive and well over here, Lexus V8 into anything smaller is quite popular choose what you want and get a front cut mailed in from Japan.
Hey Bryce- one of my dream projects is an early 510 with a full – house Nissan VG30 stuffed into it.
I would imagine that the Cressida will only need a new headgasket and head bolts torqued to the correct spec, new timing belt(if he is smart as it is already off to take the head off) and a valve cover gasket.
That generation of Corolla is mostly extinct over here–the last wagon I saw was back in the summer of 2012, and that one was several years after any previous. Sounds like a cool project, hopefully when he’s done you can see the results!
“$300, because it has a blown head gasket”
Blashpemy! The Toyota Quality Squad will surely punish him for spreading such lies!
Otherwise I wish the owner good luck, the wagon sounds like it’ll be a neat toy with its MR2 engine. He should just fix the Cressida and use it as a second-hand parts hauler, and practice drifting when it snows out.
Three cool projects. I wish him godspeed. (And I’m sure we’ll get followups from Paul.)
I like how even in this final generation, Toyota still used the Cressida’s unique logo on the grille instead of the Toyota badge. A bygone era.
Not completely; there are still a (very) few cars that have their own logo still in active use. Off the top of my head, I can think of the Hyundai Equus, and of course the Corvette.
Don’t know if it’s still this way, but when the Equus went on sale in this market, there was an option where the car could be ordered without any external Hyundai badges, only the unique Equus logos. So you didn’t have to tell your friends at the country club that it was a Hyundai if you didn’t want to…
I’ll add my voice to those wishing the owner all the best in his plans. Oh to have that sort of skill!
Cool. It would be quite a job to narrow that rear end. Maybe he will just use some massive wheel flairs instead. Just keeping a stock vehicle roadworthy is about all I can handle. Hat’s off to his motivation and mechanical skills. Hope we eventually get to see the finished product.