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New Member From Lincoln


technoprospirit
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hi folks,

thought i'd join up here as i know how useful forums can be for maintaining a car and for those niggles that are easier to sort when you know how! anyway heres some blurb about me, im 28 and male, so no perving over a new female member im afraid, i live in central lincoln, and ive made the swap from the world of honda, ive had 3 mk2 crx's over the past 7 years, the last of which was a 183bhp, caged, tein'd, lsd'd, delete spec'ed monster, but after 4 years of tweaking and sprinting/trackdays in it i felt it was time to move on to something sporty but refined so i opted for a 54 plate thunder grey corolla, ctr's have never impressed me much, but the corolla has always caught my eye.

the said car has done a few miles over average at 94000 but knowing japanese reliability im not too worried, it has a fairly complete history (something my last crx failed to have when i imported it) and overall is in good condition, it has a couple of small soft dents, a laquer chip on the rear bumper behind the wheel, and a wing mirror that needs colour matching, it also has a very minor front end rumble at low speed, which im assuming is a tired balljoint or track rod end but its not completely shot, it drives very nicely and is un-noticeable above 10mph. the car set me back at just under £4k privately.

the previous owner had apparently had a proffesional valet recently but that was balls, i gave her 4 hours of cleaning yesterday (so much easier on 6 year old paintwork!) the interior is mint, but had a minor dog odour, luckily my brother in law works for a big car firm and has access to autoglym pdi kits so i used one on the corolla, a new poppy coral later and its like new!.

the drive is really nice, its very smooth, fairly responsive, the driving position is spot on, toe and heel is easy, and the gearshift is nice, engine wise im so far not blown away, the 'lift' isnt quite the vtec of old but it is progressively quick, it handles nicely and responds well to lift off oversteer, im not too sure about the heavy clutch though, when driving in anger it feels like (when depressed) the clutch is vibrating slightly? its not slipping but feels slightly odd, almost like the car revs slightly for you to make it pick up better in the next gear? also the brakes feel a little spongey to me, bear in mind ive only had the car for 2 days so its an initial impression!

as for mods i'm keeping this very near to standard, firstly i'll get the bodywork up to top condition, i'll have an oil and filter change, then its in for some subtle jdm styling, i have some yellow fog tinting film which i really like the look of, and yellow light travels further in poor conditions, so the fogs will be tinted, i have some wind deflectors on their way (something my ef8 had and added an aero look to the top of the car), a set of 4.3k h.i.d's will be fitted, i have a trd white duracon gearknob on its way (to match the dials) and a couple of subtle decals for the rear window, nothing chavvy, only dedicated japanese car fans will know what they are, and further down the line i may have the stock wheels powdercoated off white, and i'll pop some ferodo ds performance pads in when it comes to replacing them, so all insurance friendly stuff really, im tired of having 3 insurance companies to choose from because of the cage...

anyway, thats it for now, hope to get chatting to some of you lot soon,

cheers, james.

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Wow... biggest intro i've seen! :lol:

Welcome to the club dude thumbsup.gif

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Welcome, your right the brakes are spongy and they dont get any better the longer you have the car.

Pads will help a little, but to get rid of the spongy feel think about braided lines. apprently they help with spongy feeling alot. A few members have done this a reported good things.

Personally i haven't got braided lines. When i chnaged my pads went for EBC red stuff rather then ferodo, i find the red stuff good all rounder. But the pedal still have some spongyness about it.

I would recomend a short shift kit. Again its a worth while mod that is insuance friendly. Gives that sportier feel to the gear change and generally enhances the driving experience. The stock shifter i felt was a bit long and limp wristed.

The dog oder could be the AC. I know for sure my car hasn't had a dog in it, but when it has stood a few days the first few mins the AC stinks of old dog. Im sure this could solved with an AC service but meh, its not annoying enough to spend the money on.

Joel

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I cant believe after getting rid of my corolla SR there is now another Corolla owner in Lincoln!!! Welcome to the club.

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Decals for the windows...

hmmm...let me guess, same old Soshinoya/Koleshiya

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the drive is really nice, its very smooth, fairly responsive, the driving position is spot on, toe and heel is easy, and the gearshift is nice, engine wise im so far not blown away, the 'lift' isnt quite the vtec of old but it is progressively quick, it handles nicely and responds well to lift off oversteer, im not too sure about the heavy clutch though, when driving in anger it feels like (when depressed) the clutch is vibrating slightly? its not slipping but feels slightly odd, almost like the car revs slightly for you to make it pick up better in the next gear? also the brakes feel a little spongey to me, bear in mind ive only had the car for 2 days so its an initial impression!

I get something similar to this on my new shape, if I do a quick gear shift in 4th or 5th - just as you release the clutch after the gear change I get a little vibration through the pedal. Its probably something to do with slight clutch misalighment? or almost likely the master slave / cylinders.

Its not like it slips or anything, so i'm not paying for a new clutch / or cylinders until the clutch is slipping which it aint and I use lift on almost every journey. Note the pre-facelift I had didnt have this problem, but the master cylinder again - squeaky!!

Engine takes a while to get use to, unfortunatly you have to work it hard and keep the revs up high to see the performance + keep the weight to a minimum. Would have been interesting to see a 2.0ltr 2ZZGE, may have milked that extra 10hp for some even odds vtec rivelry.

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Decals for the windows...

hmmm...let me guess, same old Soshinoya/Koleshiya

Fail, bestmotoring international.

My trd shift knob came today, but due to the standard knob length I'll have to have a collar machined up to fill the gap, should look great once fitted though, feels sportier too, I'm slowly getting used to it now, did 200 miles today and it's much better than the Crx for comfort, I like the 6 speed close ratios and find the shift quick as standard, but still find the brakes uninspiring, think the ferodos will come sooner rather than later, I've never been impressed with ebc's, think I'll invest in a new a/c filter, it's in at Toyota for a free check over on Tuesday, so we'll see how that goes!

Anyone know if you can remove the fogs without removing the front bumper?

Cheers, james

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you can get them by taking the wheel arch liners out.

I would get braided brake lines, then the sponginess will disappear totally.

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you can get them by taking the wheel arch liners out.

I would get braided brake lines, then the sponginess will disappear totally.

Thanks for that fella, I'll get the wheels off and get in there.

As for braided lines, my Crx had braided lines, brake master cylinder stopper, dixcel type z pads, and motul rbf600 fluid, and tbh I found the pads made the biggest difference, pads are a hard one for insurance companies to spot in the unlikely event of an inspection, whereas lines stand out a clear mile, but lines are possibly the weaker link in the cts's chain, I really told myself to not go overboard on this car, just minor visual mods, not performance stuff, but there is a definate lack in braking performance, I know it's a heavy machine in comparison to the metro and Crx's I'm used to!

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