WOW!! I wish I had known about this forum years ago!
Ok, so this is my beast. Its a 1984 4spd 1.3 Ke70. Thats a Corolla btw! :P
I bought it about 6 years ago for $500 with 96k on the clock. I'm pretty sure the car sat in someones driveway for most of its life as although the paint was somewhat chalky the interior and general condition of the car where A1.
The first thing I did to the car was searching through wreckers for a centre console. Found it, bought it, Sweet. Hub caps were also put on the car. Big rwkw there! :S I also managed to source the additional shelf that sits below the glovebox as mine did not come with one.
I'm an automotive photographer so I ride shotgun in some pretty hi po cars and this turned to be my downfall. One day I was taken for a drive in a garages tuned S13 drift car. I was inspired and like I'm sure a lot of you guys would do I decided to drift it. Not on dirt, not on wet tarmac but daylight dry road. In short my clutch was fried. That problem fixed it lead to the next. A whiney diff :)
I bought a diff. Took mine out and then when putting the new reco one in I noticed it didnt fit! I had been sold the Corona diff :( I put my old one in and lived with it.
I have had a few small accidents in it which worked very much in my favour. I was after some panels (preferrably cream to save on painting) and at the exact same time a mate of mine blew a hole in the side of his KE70's block. I was able to purchase the car of him for $150 and even though the car had a massive hole in the side of the engine (you could see pistons!) once the engine was topped with oil and before it drained we were able to DRIVE it across town (a good 8k) to my place. A testament to the KE70! :D
Once home I began swapping the straightest panels onto my car. Fortunately his car was the same colour as mine and had faded at a similiar rate. His car also came with the cloth interior, seats and the 'non povo' door trims (the ones with the arm rests) and as mine was the base model these were swapped over. I also attempted my second diff swap but this diff turned out to be much worse that my original.
Topped up with oil again and with a hole on the side of the engine the car was DRIVEN to the wreckers!
Since then I was lucky to buy some Cheviot rims of a friends KE70 (There was a stage when all my mates had one! lol) and had them resprayed in black (165 on the front 175 on the rears). I also pinched his sway bar as again, my car did not come with one. Looking at the photos though I can't imagine it's helping much tho! Haha
Thats pretty much it and nothing more will be done to it. This car will soon move aside for my Supra but I intend to keep this car as long as I can for daily use. It's just so damn good! :D
Hope you have enjoyed this story. :D