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Jeff's new semi-beater project, pt. 7

jeff

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#1
Hey folks,

Still loving my Fiesta and hitting the 7-year mark of ownership in a few months. In the meantime I'm wrenching on whatever else I find that seems fun. Driving north 5 hours tomorrow to hopefully pick up a new project and thought it would be fun to see if you can guess what it is...if I buy it (I feel good about this one) I'll post some usual banter as I do with the projects in our "General" forum for whomever to enjoy, and likely start another series of YouTube videos on the stuff I do to the car.

Side note, I make these drives often now since I have more time as my life is becoming increasingly uncomplicated....for every one project I get, I looked at 500 online, called on 50, test drove 10 and probably drove 1000 miles in all the searching, lots of wasted trips. Meh, yolo, I'll be dead soon. So it's a commitment and you have to be ready to drop everything and travel and come back empty-handed looking for a gem...that said I've found some real deals so the reward is worth the risk. Since I've been doing these beater projects over the last 3-4 years I've profited a good $10k which isn't much in the grand scheme (there are much easier ways to make extra money) but at this point every project is "free" since it's paid for with my profits. Actually the more I think outloud it's more than that because if I sold some of these cars I'd pull in a ton of money. That said I hope I don't waste 10 hours plus my gas costs tomorrow...but we shall see. If nothing else it's a road trip with a good buddy and a good memory.

OK can you guess what I hope to bring home tomorrow? CLUES:
+ 4 cyl, well under 200hp, N/A...
+ 0-60 in the low 7s...
+ can be had for $4000-$8000 these days depending on condition...
+ pretty low production and hard to find...
+ sleeper of sorts, generally unknown to most humans...

Who can guess it? :sneaky:

Caballo Blanco is all ready for the trip; wish me luck:
 


TyphoonFiST

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#2
Hey folks,

Still loving my Fiesta and hitting the 7-year mark of ownership in a few months. In the meantime I'm wrenching on whatever else I find that seems fun. Driving north 5 hours tomorrow to hopefully pick up a new project and thought it would be fun to see if you can guess what it is...if I buy it (I feel good about this one) I'll post some usual banter as I do with the projects in our "General" forum for whomever to enjoy, and likely start another series of YouTube videos on the stuff I do to the car.

Side note, I make these drives often now since I have more time as my life is becoming increasingly complicated....for every one project I get, I looked at 500 online, called on 50, test drove 10 and probably drove 1000 miles in all the searching, lots of wasted trips. Meh, yolo, I'll be dead soon. So it's a commitment and you have to be ready to drop everything and travel and come back empty-handed looking for a gem...that said I've found some real deals so the reward is worth the risk. Since I've been doing these beater projects over the last 3-4 years I've profited a good $10k which isn't much in the grand scheme (there are much easier ways to make extra money) but at this point every project is "free" since it's paid for with my profits. That said I hope I don't waste 10 hours plus my gas costs tomorrow...but we shall see. If nothing else it's a road trip with a good buddy and a good memory.

OK can you guess what I hope to bring home tomorrow? CLUES:
+ 4 cyl, ~180hp N/A...
+ 0-60 in the low 7s...
+ can be had for $4000-$8000 these days depending on condition...
+ pretty low production and hard to find...
+ sleeper of sorts, generally unknown to most humans...

Who can guess it? :sneaky:

Caballo Blanco is all ready for the trip; wish me luck:
Honda Civic SI*

Sent from my SM-S908U1 using Tapatalk
 


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#3
I feel like that describes about any older import... my original guess is going to be one that I always wanted to modify: '00 Toyota MRS (MR2 Spyder) - but I just looked those up and they are pricier than I thought they would be! So, then I went "Subaru SVX", but quickly realized that's a 6... so I'm having trouble thinking of something niche that fits the bill.
 


the duke

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#4
I feel like that describes about any older import... my original guess is going to be one that I always wanted to modify: '00 Toyota MRS (MR2 Spyder) - but I just looked those up and they are pricier than I thought they would be! So, then I went "Subaru SVX", but quickly realized that's a 6... so I'm having trouble thinking of something niche that fits the bill.
I heard it's got 4 wheels.
 


OP
jeff

jeff

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Not Si though I looked at a bunch and drove several but even a ragged 6th or 8th gen Si costs $7-8000 these days...
Not MR2 though I looked at a bunch but if you want a decent one get ready to shell out some coin...
Not a Scooby...

Can't get too specific or someone will guess it.

This car is similar to some of the guesses so far but since it's mostly unknown and underappreciated they can be had for a bit less than a comparable condition and mileage Si.
 


OP
jeff

jeff

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Thread Starter #10
No SE-R...though I've been looking for a '91-'94 forever and they don't exist...
No Focus SVT
No Talon
No Shadow

You guys are on the right track...this is proving my "generally unknown" point true so far...
 


OP
jeff

jeff

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Thread Starter #13
OP
jeff

jeff

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Thread Starter #15
Pontiac Vibe GT/Matrix XRS
Dodge Neon ACR

Those are my last guesses.
Aha. 1/2 way there. But close enough. It's a gen 1 Corolla XRS. 180hp in 1.8 liters which means 100hp/liter which back then was unheard of and even now is quite impressive. 8,200 redline with VVTL-i "lift" which is Toyota's version of Honda's VTEC but it's much more aggressive. They put this same engine in the Lotus Elise. Test drove one along with a gen 8 Civic Si and the XRS was so much more interesting. They only made 4,000 of them. Looks almost exactly like a Corolla S of which there are millions on the road so it blends in and appears vanilla and uninteresting and nobody knows they exist. Saw a review way back in the day and always thought it would be cool to own. Just the kind of quirky car I love.

We shall see....
 


the duke

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#16
Aha. 1/2 way there. But close enough. It's a gen 1 Corolla XRS. 180hp in 1.8 liters which means 100hp/liter which back then was unheard of and even now is quite impressive. 8,200 redline with VVTL-i "lift" which is Toyota's version of Honda's VTEC but it's much more aggressive. They put this same engine in the Lotus Elise. Test drove one along with a gen 8 Civic Si and the XRS was so much more interesting. They only made 4,000 of them. Looks almost exactly like a Corolla S of which there are millions on the road so it blends in and appears vanilla and uninteresting and nobody knows they exist. Saw a review way back in the day and always thought it would be cool to own. Just the kind of quirky car I love.

We shall see....
And the engagement is like 6800rpms and there is zero left in that motor. Yamaha took that thing to the edge.
 


OP
jeff

jeff

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Thread Starter #18
Got the car today. 5 hour drive one way but it was worth it, this car is a 2005 and is nearly mint, 101k miles, garaged, way nicer than I expected. Driving this thing is quite the experience. Looks like a rental car, drives like a pocket rocket. The motor sounds like a motorcycle and wow when that high rpm cam profile engages, it's like VTEC on steroids. Gonna do a few mods and see what happens.

https://public.fotki.com/greentrees2/xrs/1656203130466.html]

https://public.fotki.com/greentrees2/xrs/1656202818448.html]
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https://public.fotki.com/greentrees2/xrs/1656202811515.html]
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OP
jeff

jeff

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Thread Starter #20
That looks fantastic. Great find. Wasn't there a TRD supercharger for this car?
Thanks. TRD didn't offer one for this car, compression is too high. They did offer them for various standard Corollas but the final hp was still less than the XRS. Some folks have done superchargers on XRSs but that gets risky. IMHO this is a car to be enjoyed as is, boosting it sort of defeats the purpose of enjoying the journey to the high rpm band and what happens when you get there.
 


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