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'97 Celica ST - 3SGTE Swap with 5-speed Conversion! Sleek and beautiful, the 6th generation Celica is a car to be lusted over... the only sad part of it is, Toyota decided not to import the mighty GT4 version of it into the States! What a shame... but wait! While you may not be able to buy a GT4, you can at least have the legendary 3SGTE under your hood! This 1997 Celica entered the Phoenix Garage with a 115hp 1.8 liter engine attached to an automatic transmission... hardly a tribute to it's rally inspired big brother. Well we can't have that! The front bumper is removed
to keep it from getting damaged and to allow room to work in a nice
front mount intercooler
 The AWD tranny is seperated
from the engine
 The turbo is removed, clocked
to a new position, and a bracket was fabricated to hold the wastegate
  The engine is disconnected...
 And pulled out!  MUAHAHAHAHA!!!
 The car is converted to 5-speed...  Wiring the harness, three pictures, and a couple days work:   The wiring was finished up, and a new timing belt, rear main seal, and some other items were replaced on the engine. Here the engine is all put back together and the wiring is done, just about ready to drop in:  The engine is carefully placed...  And is now in it's new home!  We didn't get the correct mounts shipped to us, so with some welding and cutting we made our own. Then it was time to start mocking up the intercooler and piping.   Getting the engine to start took us a little longer than usual, thanks to the engine importer sending us the wrong ECU. Once that was discovered, the harness was repinned for the other ECU and it started right up. Here's a closeup of the completed intercooler piping and the 3" downpipe.  Then after taking care of some final issues, the car was finished up and has been released, a very different car from what it was when it got to Phoenix Tuning...     A complete discussion of this swap can be found here |
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