Project Kancil: DIY Clean Aircond Blower (JBJL Mira L502s)

If you happen to notice that the air flow is weak from your aircond and weird smell, it is most probably that your aircond blower is dirty and is time for you to clean it up. Unfortunately there is no aircond filter for the Mira L5 so the aircond blower will easily get dirty and this happen to my Kancil as well. 

There is not necessary to send your car to a workshop to clean the blower. You may DIY it at home to save up some money because it is pretty easy whereby you just need to unscrew 3 screws to remove the blower from the aircond system. The blower of Mira L5 is located at the driver side, some vehicles might be at the passenger side.

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Car Modification: The Thing You Need to Know When Choosing a Sport Rim

I did some researches during the time I chose my sport rim for my Celica. When you plan to go for flush or hellaflush, you will need to take into consideration of the front and rear spacing of the rim to clear off your wheel arch. So the offset and width of the rim are very important when you choosing a rim. 

Here are some rims size information for Toyota Celica which I researched and how to calculate the front and rear spacing based on the rim offset and width. The important note here is to clear the inner wheel arch spacing because if the rim offset is selected wrongly it will hit the suspension and inner wheel arch. However it is important for you not to only consider about the inner wheel arch spacing as well, if the wheel offset is towards to negative, the rim will poke out of the wheel arch and the wheel will poke out. Thus negative camber and tire stretch may be needed.

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Project Celica: Finally the Shoes are ON! (Update Images)

HAPPY CHINESE NEW YEAR!!!

Finally I am able to squeeze out some times to share the update of my Celica while I am enjoying a week holiday for this Chinese New Year. As you may know that I bought a set of new rims a long time ago but I had totally no time to fit them in. My rim comes in 2 different specifications. 18x9 ET30 for the front and 18x9 ET20 for the rear. Let me explain why 2 different offsets in the first place. As you might not know that the rear of the Celica will sunk a little if running on same offset with the front. So this drive me to get a different offset for the rear to avoid this. The stock rims measured at 16x6.5 ET39 all around.

The rims are wrapped with Achilles ATR-Sport with 225/40/R18 specification. Although this is not the correct size for a 9 inch width rim but consider the current trend of flush style, tyre stretching and my budget, this is the best I could afford. By the way, the tyres are cheap for size 18 inch which I bought it at RM285 each. Maybe this is not the cheapest in the market but it is the best bang for the buck. 

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Project Kancil: Headlamp Restoration

Chinese New Year is around the corner and as usual is time for me to clean and detail my cars. Recently I read some of headlamp restoration articles and it is a good opportunity for me to work on my Kancil headlamp because while detailing on my Kancil, I noticed that the headlamp is in very bad condition. 

One may ask why not to get a new headlamp where it is only cost around RM250 for a normal glass headlamp and around RM280 for a smoke glass headlamp or best option is to get the original Daihatsu Mira L200s smoke headlamp which cost RM500+-. RM500 for a used headlamp is way out of my mind but the OEM Kancil headlamp is always in my mind. However I talked to myself why not DIY to restore the headlamp since it is so cheap to get an OEM replacement Kancil headlamp even if I screw up later during the restoration process.

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The meaning of Toyota TEQ tag

Been looking for vintage/classic Toyota parts for my next coming project and found out some "Teq" labeled accessories and emblems will always fetch a good price. I wonder why this "Teq" so special and I did some research but the outcome from what I did was totally different compare to what I understand. Thus I planned to share some information over here.

Actually the spelling of Toyoda in the first logo is correct. The other two are technically “wrong”. Toyota was founded by Sakichi Toyoda (born 1867). His name is spelled with a “da”. In 1900, when Japan started to industrialize, Sakichi Toyoda was making looming machines that accomplished the difficult task of weaving thread into cloth. In the early 1900’s it must have been very progressive to write your company’s name in “Roman-ji”. Especially when that company’s name is using your own family name, Toyoda Automatic Loom Works. Roman-ji means using Roman to spell Japanese words.

The second logo which is the "teq" logo is actually written in Japanese Katakana. A lot of Toyota car enthusiasts would like to give it a back story like; “teq” is short for “technology”, which is the Toyota research and development department before it was changed to “TRD” (Toyota Racing Development). So let's study the Katakana version and find out why there it is not called as "teq".

This new logo was more than just a visual graphic change. The name switched from roman letters to Japanese Katakana. When read in Japanese the last letter reads as “ta” not “da”. There are two little lines that turn the voiced “da” sound into an unvoiced “ta” sound (below).  It was decided to remove the 2 marks in the logo, and therefore change it to Toyo”ta”. So this is "teq" logo history and it is not any special performance parts that developed by Toyota.

Technorati Tags: Car,Autos,Motorsport,Blog,Automobile,Auto News,Turbo,Engine,Technorati

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Shoshinsha/ Wakaba mark

Ever see those ricer/import/JDM freaks riding around with a green and yellow sticker? Well here is the meaning of that sticker! Pretty funny that the ricer world has made an entire community with these stickers! They would like to have whatever stickers the Japanese has on their car. JDM (Japanese Domestic Market) BRO! Let's see what is the actual meaning of this green and yellow sticker. "The Shoshinsha mark (初心者マーク?) or Wakaba mark (若葉マーク?), introduced in 1972, is a green and yellow V-shaped symbol that new Japanese drivers must display on their cars for one year. A driver must display this mark on the front and back of the car for one year after they obtain a standard driver's licence. This obligation is only for a standard license, not for motorcycles, large vehicles, special cars, and so on. Drivers who consider themselves beginners may continue to display the sign, even after the period of a year."

OK ricers, it is something similar to the "P" sticker for the beginners. After knowing the actual meaning of this green and yellow sticker do you still want to continue to stick them on your windscreen?

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