[Han Solo]

Here's what I brought back to the garage apartment today. A one owner '88 that had really good maintenance until about four years ago. The owner lost resources to repair a non-start condition and the car was parked outside. I found the ad on FB market and made an offer after looking it over. Known issues at this time. Non-start but the crank turns when pushed in gear. Battery missing. Some rust on the hoods and right rear wheel arch. Passenger window regulator non-functional. Roof and c-pillar trim missing. Dash has some cracks. Shifter boot completely toast. The good stuff. Motor oil looks really good. Tires are holding air but will need replaced. E-brake works. Interior is not wet. Plan of action. Continue cleaning and drying. Install a battery and energize the electrical. Put on lift and inspect the underside. Drain the fuel tank. Put in fresh fuel and try to start. Photos 1 thru 4 are from Marketplace ad. The next three are after cleaning today.

 

[Marcus Davies]

It seems like you have a lot of work to do. Good luck with this build, hopefully, it will turn out well.

 

[Han Solo]

I was able to spend the day working on this project. Went to hook up a test battery and found why there was no electrical. The white wire on the positive battery terminal was bad. Someone spliced in a smaller gauge wire that failed. I corrected that with the proper size wire, butt splice with solder and new terminal. Bingo! The instrument panel lights up and it will crank. A couple shots of ether and it's catching. Add some fresh fuel to the tank and it's running. High idle initially then it settles when coming up in temp. The headlights turn on, lower and raise. Most all the marker lights work. Flasher is non-functional. Fan motor works and there's cabin heat. AC compressor kicks in but probably need refrigerant. Exterior mirrors pan and tilt. Even the OE radio turns on and gets reception (marginal as the antenna is broke off). So I'm feeling really good about this and go to the auto parts store for a correct battery, wiper blades and a fuel hose (mice chewed one from the hard line to filter). After installing those, I decide to degrease the engine. When done, the car starts running rough. I give it a little throttle and it dies. Crap! No restart and I suspect no spark. Lots of water in the plug valley and I dry that up. Dry up the distributor as well. I'll let it sit over night and see if it catches tomorrow.

 

[rmeller]

That wire you replaced is called the main fusible link. It is actually an inline fuse that provides the last-ditch protection against a hard wiring short. It didn't necessarily blow out. It is common for it to corrode through. It is a good idea to replace it with spec if you want full electrical protection.

 

[Han Solo]

Okay, disaster averted. There was still moisture in the plug valley this morning so I pulled the center cover off and really dried the plugs and wires. Put the wires back on and it fires right up. That's a relief as I really didn't want to start throwing ignition parts at it. The distributor, rotor, wires and plugs were replaced about 15,000 miles ago.

 

[Han Solo]

Cold morning last Thursday and the MR2 was not wanting to start. I figured it was a cold start issue but I was able to diagnose no little or no fuel getting to the rail. Replaced the fuel filter but still dry. I did find a 15A fuse blown in the engine bay. I suspect the fuel pump locked up. I'll confirm that by applying 12VDC directly to the fuel pump plug in the console. I found a very helpful video here

 

[Han Solo]

Confirmed the fuel pump was toast today. Pulled the console, took loose all the fuel hoses and dropped the tank. The pump is covered with gunk and corrosion. Same with the sender. The good news is the tank is almost completely rust free! I'll replace the pump and screen. The sender is NLA so I'll try to clean that up and get it functional. I also cleaned up the intake hoses, resonator and AFM.

 

[Han Solo]

Replaced the FP, gasket, screen and all the associated hoses. Cleaned the sender up but I'm not sure it's functioning. The worst part of putting the tank back in was getting the fill hose lined up and clamped down. The car started right up after putting in a few gallons of fuel. Got all the under panels, e-brake brackets and interior back on. Next up is getting the PS window regulator repaired.

 

[Han Solo]

The weekend 1/16 and 1/17 I got the new window regulator installed. Another quality assembly from Twos R Us! Installation was pretty intense and I finally figured out the window had to be dropped all the way into the door (not attached to the regulator) to get the inner felt guilds bolted back in place. Last weekend I installed a coolant reservoir cap with hoses. With that plumbing corrected, I bled the cooling system and added fresh coolant. Also bled the brakes and clutch. Now I'm starting in on cosmetic issues like the peeling and rusting rear truck lid. The rear of the car needs the most attention except for the front truck lid which has multiple layers of paint peeling.

 

[ALEXSOL]

nice write up and nice to see the efforts are producing results. also interested to see more pics of what the interior, engine bay, electrical, coolant, fuel, a/c, oil, systems look like with age... mine is a week new to me so learning lots here!!

 

[Han Solo]

nice write up and nice to see the efforts are producing results. also interested to see more pics of what the interior, engine bay, electrical, coolant, fuel, a/c, oil, systems look like with age... mine is a week new to me so learning lots here!!

Thanks! The interior is coming along nicely as I shampooed the carpet and cloth seats. Once I get the shifter boot I ordered, I'll put the console back in and take a photo. Unfortunately I broke the DS A pillar trim investigating the radio antenna (that trim material is super brittle). Got one coming from eBay. I was able to resurrect the windshield washer motor this morning by disassembling, lubricating and reassembling. Works like a champ now. The paint work on the rear trunk is done and it's much better than it was. Another success today were the wheels. The tires are shot so before getting new tires mounted, I media blasted those. Those looked really good just bare alloy so I had a partial can of clear spray and shot one. Super nice look with very little effort!

 

[ALEXSOL]

like the swirl and didn't notice that at first... i'm running 9 yr old snow tires on black steelies... got out this morning with an inch of snow and was really fun.. easy to break loose, easy to catch and put the 'power' down... do you have stock muffler? wonder what it looks like from the inside. i think i have stock with a cat attached to the muffler into twin pipes coming out into four tips...
if you have a picture, I'd really appreciate! from underneath the car... showing the connection to the engine (does the stock have a flex pipe?) and then does 90* into the cat, then 90* into the muffler..

 

[ALEXSOL]

HERE'S my weird looking tail pipe.. cat goes into muffler then goes out four tips...

 

[ALEXSOL]

center pipe going into the flex pipe broke and separated. curious if this is oem or aftermarket... after 33 years not surprised there been some goofing around in there.

 

[ALEXSOL]

hope op doesnt think i'm hijacking the thread. my first mr2 also and have had it less than a week.... took out in snow and was super balanced, drift happy and fun!

 

[Han Solo]

like the swirl and didn't notice that at first... i'm running 9 yr old snow tires on black steelies... got out this morning with an inch of snow and was really fun.. easy to break loose, easy to catch and put the 'power' down... do you have stock muffler? wonder what it looks like from the inside. i think i have stock with a cat attached to the muffler into twin pipes coming out into four tips...
if you have a picture, I'd really appreciate! from underneath the car... showing the connection to the engine (does the stock have a flex pipe?) and then does 90* into the cat, then 90* into the muffler..

Here's what's on my '88. According to service records, the muffler and tail pipe have been replaced but I believe it has OE configuration. The flex pipe and cat appear to be original.

 

[Han Solo]

Update to progress. Installed the new tires on the refinished wheels and those look great. Put in console back in with the new shifter boot. I also did some paint touch up on the PS rear quarter panel and fixed and rust hole using rust kill, fiberglass and body filler. I've taken the car out for drives the last two weekends and it's fun. Feels heavier than I expected and the suspension is sloppy but that's expected. I could replace the the struts with Konis and lowering springs for about $1000 but I'm not sure I want to go there now. I got all the marker, stop and turn signal lamps working but the flasher relay is misbehaving. I do need to repair the DS window regulator as it needs help raising and lowering. Hopefully that's just the gear on the motor. Temps are really low in the garage so I'm not working on any interior bits as they're just too brittle.

 

[rmeller]

... Temps are really low in the garage so I'm not working on any interior bits as they're just too brittle.

Everything will still be brittle when it is warm. Don't force anything. Find out how it comes apart before you get impatient. There is probably someone here who knows where the fasteners are and how much force is reasonable.

 

[ALEXSOL]

I’ve searched a couple YouTube vids to
Figure out how to remove the dash and interior to repair the hard dry weatherstrip seals. Will report my findings if theres interest. I have major gash on the dash. And around the passenger side round vent so hope to fix.

 

[Han Solo]

Everything will still be brittle when it is warm. Don't force anything. Find out how it comes apart before you get impatient. There is probably someone here who knows where the fasteners are and how much force is reasonable.

I found that out with the DS A-pillar trim. Another project I'm considering is recovering the steering wheel. Removing the horn button could be dodgy. From what I've seen so far, push up on the button and then pull outward.