This is a purely recreational Autos topic, The Toyota Celica GT-Four,
The site was started by a real enthusiast of the four-wheeled and I don’t know why he dropped the domain back in 2007.
Some blog comments on this site by Chris, from 2003 thru 2007:
(March 13, 2007) Newest round of mods are in! These include an ST205 intercooler, ST205 throttle body (thanks to Conrad at ACE Engineering (“Conrad_turbo”), 540cc/min injectors, an Apexi Power FC standalone EMS, an upgraded heat exchanger, ST205 intake cam, and a new 3″ straight intake with NO AFM!
(October 1, 2006) I have noticed that it has now been 3 years since “the swap”. The engine has run very strong and I have been extremely satisfied with the ST185 engine. The site has not been updated in a long while, I know. I am now playing with a partial site re-design that will make updates a lot easier for me. Stay tuned. I will be working on the mods page as well. I have a tonne of suspension upgrades that I have not written about. Also, I have recently installed ST205 cams, and ST205 throttle body, ST205 intercooler, a large heat exchanger, and an Apexi Power FC. I have not driven the car with these new mods, but I do hope to have it going very soon!
(May 9, 2005)My car is now up and running for the new year. Over the winter I have done a few modifications, including polyurethane filled engine mounts and rear diff mount, a Wolfkatz side feed fuel rail, cleaned and balanced injectors, a Perfect Power SMT-6 piggyback fuel/timing controller, and some interior work with my gauges. You can read about everything on the Mods Page. I hope to run a low 13 or high 12 second 1/4 mile this year, so keep your fingers crossed for me!
(September 23, 2004)Summer is over. I went to a few meets and events this year and had a lot of fun. With a few new mods I had the opportunity to dyno my car on a 4wd mustang dyno, and reached 236awhp and 252 ft-lbs. More recently (and with a few more mods) I raced the quarter mile and managed a 13.627 at 98.79mph. I even broke 100mph on a couple runs. I suspect with the perfect run I could make at least a 13.5, maybe even better. I am trying to keep the site as up to date as possible. Keep an eye out for updates on the mods page, the performance results page, and the world race page. I have a few things planned for the winter as well, so stay tuned!
(April 12, 2004) I have now moved the web site to a new address, www.gtfour.ca . I like the name quite a bit better than the old one. Still lots of updates to make to the site though. The car is still running great, although the stock plugs were causing me some trouble. Right now, I am working on installing some NGK 6097 spark plugs. These are one step colder than the stock plugs. As well as that, I am installing an Aquamist water injection kit, and fixing 2 small oil leaks. After that I will raise the boost slightly. Should be great. Also check out my Street Dyno graph on the mods page. At stock boost I was able to make roughly 249hp! (roughly 203 to the wheels) I am definitely happy with the results.
(October 5, 2003) Today we fired up the car for the first time. It went very smoothly. All of the interior functions seem to be operating perfectly, as well as the engine itself. I have an air leak that I need to find, but other than that it is running very well. Still waiting on the exhaust. Got to drive it around the block….ahh what a good feeling! I’m so happy. I can finally see the project coming together, and it has been well worth the wait. Here’s a video of the car actually running! CLICK HERE. It’s loud with an open exhaust!
(September 15, 2003) I have now rewired the engine bay fuse box to adapt the ST165 engine bay harness to the ST185 fuse box, and I also rewired several sections of the main engine harness to work with the ST165 systems. It is getting very close. By the time my HKS cat back exhaust arrives it should be ready to be started up! Fingers are crossed for two weeks until start up. There’s a tonne of pics in the pictures section, the newest ones are on page 2 of “The Swap”.
(July 13, 2003) It’s been about a month now since I picked up my JDM ST185 front clip. Since then I’ve pulled both engines, installed a TTE metal head gasket and ARP head studs on the new engine, stripped down and got rid of the front clip, as well as partially disassembled the st165 engine. I am now waiting to install a bunch of new parts (both OEM and aftermarket). It is looking like the project will extend into August, so keep posted for updates! You can view pictures of the swap here.
(June 15, 2003) I picked up my ST185 front clip today! It looks to be in great shape. Not only that but I got to sit in an ST205 as well as a ’96 MR2 turbo. What a day. The project has begun.
Original Website owners history:
Taken Away So QuicklyAfter a very long search, I finally bought my GT-Four in August of 2001, with 187,000km’s on the clock. I paid cdn$6300 for it, which I thought to be reasonable given the high market price of these cars. A mere three months later, something went terribly wrong and all of the oil rapidly drained out of the car, while I was driving. Almost immediately, a severe rod knock developed from the engine. Just like that, engine #1 was toast.
The Rebuild
I did some research and called around to numerous places to find someone willing to fix my car. Toyota was virtually unwilling to touch it, and the rest of the places had never seen a 4WD Turbo Celica before. My local shop had recommended me to buy a JDM engine for a reasonable price, and looking back on it, I should have gone for it. However, I found a shop in Edmonton, which is 300km’s north where I live in Calgary, however this one specialized in working on the 3S-GTE engine (Silverstone Motorsports). The owner of the shop owns an ’88 gt4 as well, which he claimed to have 350hp. So I figured this is the place for me. From there, the Silverstone rebuild had begun.
I picked the car up in January of 2002, with a fresh rebuild and a bunch of extras. I had ceramic coated pistons, a port/polished head, upgraded clutch, lightened flywheel, a new boost gauge, cat back exhaust, plus a bunch of other things done. Needless to say, the bill added up quickly and the final price was cdn$6500 for the rebuild.
Time for Maintenance
After the rebuild, I needed to complete a few maintenance issues, such as the radiator/fan/fan motor/hoses, brakes, switches, etc. and soon enough the turbo started to leak oil pretty good. So I sent it off to California to have it rebuilt by Performance Techniques. They also upgraded the compressor wheel at the time (this is now June 2002).
I found my original exhaust manifold to be severely cracked while the freshly rebuilt/upgraded CT26 was still out of the car, so I called up a Toyota specific junkyard in Edmonton. They happened to have one and sold it to me, however I did not know that this one was also cracked! Since I had it sent directly to a friend to port and polish it, and it was better than my original by far, I used this newer manifold.
Problems Persist
Now that the turbo was fresh, and the engine was very nicely broken in, I began to finally enjoy driving my car. I went on a road trip to the mountains and racked in a few miles. Shortly after I returned from the trip, I began to notice some blue smoke coming from the exhaust. It wasn’t much, but some. The problem got worse…fast. I made a trip to Edmonton to see the engine builder at Silverstone.
He suggested that the turbo was probably poorly rebuilt, and that just to be sure I should install a PCV catch can. When I got home, I gave it a few tries, but I couldn’t get the car to run right with it installed so I left it for a bit and parked the car in my garage.
Engine #2 is Toast
Since I was anticipating a faulty turbo, I let the car sit for a while as I saved up money for a new turbo, a CT20B from an ST205 celica. However finally in December of 2002, I gave the car a compression check just to be sure. Well, the results were not good. I was making 50psi less in cylinder #2. This is 13,000km’s after the rebuild. I called up the builder and I found that my warranty was only good for the first 10,000km’s. Just my luck.
He offered a “cheap” rebuild for a mere cdn$2500. Definitely not a spectacular deal, not to mention I’d still have an engine that blew for no real reason. Do I know why? Not a clue, there are too many possibilities here. The general opinion of several mechanics was that I had a cracked piston. So, I have given up on the ST165 engine.
Downtime
So the weeks and months pass by, as I make an attempt to save up enough money to get the car rolling again. The new plan is to have the engine swapped with a JDM ST185 engine, along with my CT20b turbo. I have begun to gather various parts that will be required for me to complete this swap. It is now June of 2003, 8 months after I parked the car last year. Some pics of the GT4 parked in my garage.
This is the end of my sob story history of my GT-Four. From this point on I will be making updates to the top of this page as my car makes progress. I hope that wasn’t too boring, but trust me, it is definitely the “short” version!
I gather, that the website has a new owner?![Hector]( "Hector")
It appears so. This site was Chris Dittrick’s and it disappeared in 2009, and is only recently coming back. Who knows why?![Betty]( "Betty")
Some Engine/Mechanical details of the GT4.
Engine / Mechanical
JDM ST185 engine / transmission / ECU
JDM ST205 CT20b Turbocharger
JDM ST185 RC Water to Air Intercooler
ERL Aquamist Water Injection System 1s
NGK 6097 Copper Spark Plugs (0.028″ gap)
Wolfkatz Side Feed Fuel Rail
Cleaned and flow tested OEM injectors
Walbro 255 lph High Flow Fuel Pump
Aeromotive Adjustable Fuel Pressure Regulator @ 3.3 bar (45psi)
TTE 1.4mm Metal Head Gasket
ARP Head Studs
2.5″ ‘Passion’ Downpipe
3″ Aussie Exhuast Mid Pipe
3″ Mandrel Bent Custom Cat Back Exhaust
Bailey Motorsports DV30 Blow-Off Valve (recirculating)
Clutchmasters Stage 3 Clutch
Fidanza Lightweight Aluminum Flywheel
Straight Pipe Cold Air Intake
Ball and Spring Manual Boost Controller @ 12psi
Greddy PCV Oil Catch Can
Disabled Turbo VSV
Silicon Vacuum Hose Dress Up
Optima Red Top Sealed Battery (in hatch)
twosrus Valve Cover Bolts
Urethane Reinforced Engine Mounts (winter 04)
Urethane Reinforced Rear Differential Mount (winter 04)
Engine Control and Instrumentation
Perfect Power SMT-6 Fuel / Ignition Control System
J&S Ultrasafeguard Knock Response System
60mm Greddy Electronic Fuel Pressure Guage (A-pillar)
52mm Greddy Electronic Oil Pressure Guage (A-pillar)
52mm Greddy Electronic Exhaust Gas Temp Gauge (A-pillar)
52mm Greddy Boost Pressure Gauge (Inside Gauge Cluster)
52mm J&S Knock Retard and Narrowband A/F Display (Inside Gauge Cluster)
Injector Duty Cycle Monitor / Narrow Band A/F LED display
Lo-Tek Triple Guage PodNon – Engine
15″ 2002 Celica GT wheels
JDM smoke/clear corner lenses
JDM “GT-Four” front emblem
JDM “GT-Four” decals*
“GT FOUR” license plate
TRD Leather Shift Knob
Alpine 9807 MP3/WMA/CD Player
Sony 10 Disk CD Changer
Quinn Alarm SystemFuture Mods
New Alpine White Paint (Please donate!!)
IC Heat Exchanger Upgrade (Winter 04)
Custom Cold Air Box (coming soon)
TWM Performance Short Shifter
Uprated Springs/Struts (Some time in the future)
SS Braided Brake Lines, Upgraded brake rotorsPast Mods
52mm Autometer EGT guage
Custom in-cluster Blitz Boost Guage
Celica GTS Volt gauge
Click the links below to know more about classic cars, as well as popular car shows, and interesting stories that a couple individuals would like to share with you.
