I was just looking at a parts thread by supra90turbo, and it reminded me of how I found my Supra. Here's the story (sorry for the length)........
A couple years back, for extra money, I was running a newspaper route. I was subbing for a guy (making tax free cash money), and running a route putting papers in machines. One night, on the way to my route at 3am, my always turning head caught this http://img56.imageshack.us/img56/5772/dsc04130jv1.th.jpg as I passed a building on a main road (click link before proceeding). I swear, that's all I saw (pic borrowed from Kurt), in the dark at 3am. I whipped it around, and found that it was a used car lot, and YES! it was a Supra.
A little after 8 o'clock that morning, I was on the phone with the place. The place was owned by two guy, and ya, it belonged to the silent partner. He wanted $2800 for it. I didn't have that (remember I was running newspapers to feed the 4 kids). They said they'd finance me, but didn't have a key for me to test drive it. This went on for 2 weeks, then the car disappeared. The owner that was there didn't know where it was, but assured me it wasn't sold. A week later, I finally found the car. It was at the Toyota dealer with a BHG.
During this 3 weeks, I did everything I could to put together money. I put a bunch of stuff off my parts car on ebay, and out of the blue a guy called wanting to buy an old broke down truck I had. I was able to put together $3000 in 3 weeks. BUT, as soon as I got it together, I found out it had BHG. Good news was, the car dropped to $800 just like that.
I bought the grey car in my sig, just like you see it, with perfect leather interior, Leather, 5-speed, and Targa top. So, with the extra money I had, I bought a $600 motor off ebay. It came with everything under the hood of a turbo car. At that time, I had pulled and torn down several 7m's, but had never put one together or installed one. So, I paid to have it installed. I figured that I could part my bad motor and sell all of the extra parts, and more than pay for the motor and installation. Well, that motor was bad as well. I parted both motors, and sold all those extra parts (radiator, IC, Igniter, etc). That left me at the same place I started.......with a good car, and needing a motor. And, I still had about $800 total in the car after selling of what I didn't need.
Well, my family of 6 found the need to use a good bit of my saved money. Now, I'm on a budget needing a motor. I had a buddy in Atlanta (350 miles from me) who had a JDM motor he was saving for his car. The block and internals were in great shape he said, and he had already installed a new head gasket (damnit it's stock), but that's all he had of the motor. I got that for $250.
At that time, I decided that I could build the rest of the motor, and install it myself. Remember I had no experience at all here. I took my time, and made sure I did everything right. I found that my wiring harness was toast, so the search was on. This took several months, and a couple harnesses to get what I wanted. That gave me time to do some little things. I sent my intake manifold, injectors, cps, and a few other parts to my buddy in Atlanta for rebuild or polishing. I also had time buy some other parts before the install. Jdub supplied a ported elbow and a set of turbo heat shields. I got a Meagan downpipe as well. And I believe it was bobiseverywhere (or was it bobsgt?) supplied my greddy BOV. Now it was ready for install. I also found a cool new website named SUPRAMANIA along the way. With you guys help, Believe it or not this motor cranked the first time I turned the key.
A couple years back, for extra money, I was running a newspaper route. I was subbing for a guy (making tax free cash money), and running a route putting papers in machines. One night, on the way to my route at 3am, my always turning head caught this http://img56.imageshack.us/img56/5772/dsc04130jv1.th.jpg as I passed a building on a main road (click link before proceeding). I swear, that's all I saw (pic borrowed from Kurt), in the dark at 3am. I whipped it around, and found that it was a used car lot, and YES! it was a Supra.
A little after 8 o'clock that morning, I was on the phone with the place. The place was owned by two guy, and ya, it belonged to the silent partner. He wanted $2800 for it. I didn't have that (remember I was running newspapers to feed the 4 kids). They said they'd finance me, but didn't have a key for me to test drive it. This went on for 2 weeks, then the car disappeared. The owner that was there didn't know where it was, but assured me it wasn't sold. A week later, I finally found the car. It was at the Toyota dealer with a BHG.
During this 3 weeks, I did everything I could to put together money. I put a bunch of stuff off my parts car on ebay, and out of the blue a guy called wanting to buy an old broke down truck I had. I was able to put together $3000 in 3 weeks. BUT, as soon as I got it together, I found out it had BHG. Good news was, the car dropped to $800 just like that.
I bought the grey car in my sig, just like you see it, with perfect leather interior, Leather, 5-speed, and Targa top. So, with the extra money I had, I bought a $600 motor off ebay. It came with everything under the hood of a turbo car. At that time, I had pulled and torn down several 7m's, but had never put one together or installed one. So, I paid to have it installed. I figured that I could part my bad motor and sell all of the extra parts, and more than pay for the motor and installation. Well, that motor was bad as well. I parted both motors, and sold all those extra parts (radiator, IC, Igniter, etc). That left me at the same place I started.......with a good car, and needing a motor. And, I still had about $800 total in the car after selling of what I didn't need.
Well, my family of 6 found the need to use a good bit of my saved money. Now, I'm on a budget needing a motor. I had a buddy in Atlanta (350 miles from me) who had a JDM motor he was saving for his car. The block and internals were in great shape he said, and he had already installed a new head gasket (damnit it's stock), but that's all he had of the motor. I got that for $250.
At that time, I decided that I could build the rest of the motor, and install it myself. Remember I had no experience at all here. I took my time, and made sure I did everything right. I found that my wiring harness was toast, so the search was on. This took several months, and a couple harnesses to get what I wanted. That gave me time to do some little things. I sent my intake manifold, injectors, cps, and a few other parts to my buddy in Atlanta for rebuild or polishing. I also had time buy some other parts before the install. Jdub supplied a ported elbow and a set of turbo heat shields. I got a Meagan downpipe as well. And I believe it was bobiseverywhere (or was it bobsgt?) supplied my greddy BOV. Now it was ready for install. I also found a cool new website named SUPRAMANIA along the way. With you guys help, Believe it or not this motor cranked the first time I turned the key.
