The Moonlight Collection

[mlracing.co.nz]

Facebook is mostly filled with garbage but sometimes you see something that makes you wonder why didn't I think of that? I saw a post of a guy one some Celica page with his build, usual update stuff like you see on here but of particular interest was his front suspension.

If you've been around a while (in particular in Honda world) you may have heard of a brand called Ground Control. They probably pioneered using an adjustable sleeve and spring that replaces your OEM spring but kept OEM shocks. For old cars like Celica actually using this kind of sleeve and then welding it is how you generally make coilovers however I never thought you could use a smaller sleeve and keep the original spring perch in tact, no welding!

Turns out a friend of mine tried to use one of these made for EG Civic to get his 70s Accord adjustable but the Accord strut was too large. I thought why not try it on Celica and guess what? The sleeve fits perfectly! Well, it only works upside down but it'll work.

I set the height to about the same as what the other spring was that I pulled out (a basically cut in half King spring for a TA23) and it was way too high.

Then I set it full low and it's still too high, in fact higher than the springs I removed. Not only that but there doesn't seem to be any spring in the spring.

At first I thought perhaps the shock was bottoming out but if that were the case then the spring should be flopping around when it's on the ground but it's not moving at all. Then I thought OK probably the spring rate is way too high which seems more likely as Civic coilovers are usually around 8-10kg front and go up from there typically whereas the springs I removed are probably 2-3. The internet suggests 3-5kg is the sweet spot and I actually really liked how the other springs felt so I'll see if I can find a spring of similar dimensions but much softer.

However before I do that there was also another pair of springs in the package (came as a front/rear set) which are smaller in thickness and also a bit less height so I'll try those and maybe see what happens with that before going out to try and find some other springs.

[mlracing.co.nz]

My experiment has been successful! As expected (after I got in touch with the company that made the coilover sleeves) the front spring rate was 9kg, and rear 4kg so I've swapped out the front and rear springs. You can see there is a height difference as well as thinner spring. Additionally I removed the bottom collar from the adjuster as it wasn't doing anything anyway. I'm getting quite fast at removing the suspension. 

Worked a charm. There is some spring in the spring now and it's at an acceptable height. This is wound all the way down as well, I think I need to wind up the driver side maybe 3-4mm to even it out but it's hard to know because the guards are probably both bent so difficult to compare. 

Thing is now is the exhaust is an actual problem. That stupid middle muffler is only around an inch from the ground now so I'll have to actually do something about it. At least I can wind the front up to drive it to an exhaust shop now.

[mlracing.co.nz]

I'm not a fan of floor mounted pedals at all. I can kind of see why they exist in luxury car situations as the idea is it generally smooths out the pedal movement for a nicer acceleration. Why they put it in Celica I'll not know as this is not really marketed as a grand touring-type cruiser, or is it? I don't know, maybe it was the fashion at the time. 

I read some years ago maybe on Toymods about how someone used an RA40 Celica pedal in their TA22 and I haven't stopped thinking about it since. Perhaps it was that supermoon but while I was having lunch yesterday I just had a quick google and amazingly on Ebay an RA40 pedal was for sale just up the road from my shop. Hit buy now and old mate dropped it off this morning. 

Here you can see my original on the left and the RA40 on the right. The other reason for me wanting to change it out is the original one was broken anyway, the pedal pad mounting bits on the back were all busted so actually the pedal would slip under the hanger when I floored it, not ideal. 

First thing I did was just bolt it into the original holes because that all lined up. As you can see the pedal is too close to the brake, this I knew about but was curious anyway. There were suggestions about heating and bending the pedal stalk? (lets just call it that) so that the pedal was further to the right but I didn't have any way to heat it. I did give it 20 fuckn whacks but probably made it worse actually. 

So then I just bolted the top up and rotated it until it was in a position that looked like it would work; marked and drilled. 

Much better placement although you can see the pedal now looks a bit weird but I assure you it performs well. The linkage at the top I just had to rotate it around so the ball went in the other side. However I did not mount it so the spring on the pedal stalk was being utilised so I may experiment with that too but the floor mounted one didn't have an additional resistance spring. 

Problem is now maybe it performs too well, which leads back to the original point about the smoothing of the throttle. It's ultra responsive now! I have to have a look to see about adjusting the rods perhaps because I don't think the range of movement will be correct now with the different pedal but its nice not to have that floor mounted garbage anymore. 

[mlracing.co.nz]

Today's the first time I've had it outside since I started messing around with the front suspension. I only drove it around the estate parking because not convinced it can actually get out of the driveway as it sits. This is just getting out of my unit.

I will say the front suspension is bouncy as fuck, my titties were goin flying everywhere. Might have to tone down the spring a bit more. Love being able to even out the height though, very useful. 

Didn't notice any immediate rubbing at that height but I didn't take it on the road. 

I did get some measuring done and have confirmed the new lips for front pair of Longchamps so now they'll be built to match the rears. 

I think what I'll try to do is cut this muffler out and run a straight pipe slightly larger and clamp it either end like slip joints. See if that works or not. I figure the exhaust can't really get any worse than it is at the moment; looks like 30 muffler shop Barrys have fingered this one. 

Next problem I have is trying to get it to idle properly. I reckon these carbs are so cooked that air is leaking in from everywhere so it pretty much only idles when it's on choke. I get some new gaskets and give refreshing them sometime in the future. Good news is the gas pedal works well but I think I'll install that other spring back in. 

[mlracing.co.nz]

So I only really had one task for the Celica today and that was get the exhaust off. As you would have seen in earlier posts it's a problem now that those huge mufflers are literally about 2cm from the ground. I picked up 1m of 2.25" pipe just to see how that would fit into the equation as I was thinking OK I could replace one of the mufflers at least with that. 

I was fully prepared to cut this exhaust up as at a cursory glance it looked to be entirely one piece but once I got under the car I found a slip join hidden above the axle which made life considerably easier. 

Once out I could see what I was dealing with and interestingly parts of the exhaust are 60mm, I was expecting smaller. Kind of moot seeing as there are so many joins and size changes anyway. My initial plan of removing just one muffler looked like it wouldn't really work due to some angles however in a stroke of luck if I removed both of them and run a pipe across it looks like it might just work. 

I will try to reuse the muffler that's on there as I don't entirely hate it and it already has a somewhat complicated bend but I'll try give it a bit of a spruce up. Then I'll have to see what kind of bend I can use to make it match to the straight pipe up to the front. It looks like the exhaust takes the route it does due to the mufflers so if the mufflers are removed then I'm thinking I can just go straight across and it may be OK.