KE25 SR The 1st Stage

Back when I was a little lad at 18yrs (i never grew anymore either haha) I installed an ae86 4age into my ke25. I was a wee bit naive when setting up correct engine positioning in reguards to engine/diff angles and so the driveshaft universals copped a beating.. very noisy at 180km/h. The goal was to sit the engine as low and as horizonal as possible which looked real cool, but created extra headache's for engine clearance on the firewall and sway bar. The driveshaft was on the piss too. Now the plan is to remake the mounts to tilt the engine rearwards and get the engine crank centerline hopefully around 1/2-1deg above diff pinion shaft centerline.

engine bay with 2k	front removed	unbolted & lifted	car dropped and rolled away
engine is out!	hit brake master cyl	grrr! not expected
blocked in position	tight mount space!	shortened/tacked	the other side
positioned view	align g-box, trim tunnel, eek did i do that?	blocked underneath notice low sump!	gbox brace removed to clear steering
exhaust clearance on std manifold	MAP sensor fitted	clutch & brake master cyl's	made plate to strengthen firewall
re-route water pipes top is ke25, lower is ae82 fxgt	R/H home made engine mount -rx7 rubber	alternator a bit close to engine mount	sway bar clearance on crank pulley. early ke2 sway bar have less clearance

OK, basically I have started off with a tidy, standard 1975 KE25 SR coupe corolla. It had a 3k-hb 1200cc, pushrod, twin-carb engine with 4-2-1 exhaust as standard. After arriving home from buying it, smoke was puffing out the exhaust. not good! seemed to only smoke when hot. I checked everything I could. Like pressure test, intake vacuum etc. 220psi over 4 cyl! rings seem fine. valve operation seems fine. so I concluded it was probably the valve seals worn, but don't know exactly.
I drove like that for at least a month. over that time I had replaced the worn ignition parts, (points, leads etc), done the timing and changed all lubricants, cleaned & tuned the carbs and general maintenance stuff.
Rather that fix the valve seals I decided to replace the engine temporarily and get it reconditioned as it'd done 200+ km's. a 2K was found for $60 and swapped in.
The 3k-b never got rebuilt! after driving the gutless 2K for months I had such an appetite for power I didn't want another 'K' series again. I had been dreamin of a 4age.

So a bit of researching and planning and I had a basis for an engine transplant. thanx to club4ag and Lachlans site for the info I needed. An opportunity for the swap came when I was given the option of having my collarbone straightened after breaking it earlier in the year. That gave me 4 weeks to complete the swap before returning to work. The collarbone operation was on 4th December '00. The first 1.1/2 weeks afterwards I was physically incapacitated so had no progress. I had my father help with labour after that. See the KE35 page for pic of what we did on the 13th dec 2000. (removed the 4age from the KE35).

Quick Summary: (1st Stage) I am running the rwd 'blue top' 16v version of 4age. It is still injected which required a wire loom and high pressure fuel delivery. had to change my brake master cylinder to the single type because the twin would have hit the intake manifold. Also many other mods had to be done to fit the engine in. I made some engine mounts and relocated the g-box cross member rearward to suit. The clutch was converted to hydraulic. Brakes are standard. I've installed the diff from a '68? RT40 corona. apparently this is a D series 6.25" diff but a T series 6.7" diff head will fit it also. the mounts are 10mm wider on each side so the springs needed jacking out a bit. there were no shock mounts on this diff either. The drive shaft is also from the RT40 which was shortened and a 22spline yoke (to fit the T50 5speed) was grafted on. The radiator is standard with the hoses re-routed to suit. has never overheated yet. The 2-1/4" exhaust was taken off the ke35 and needed a few tweaks to fit in the ke25. I had a new front section for the exhaust made because of the space restrictions next to the g-box. The front springs have been cut 1-1/4 coils which lowered it a bit and is still captive. The front shocks didn't work very well so I drained and refilled with hydraulic oil. Rear shocks were replaced with good ones a friend gave me. Mags are 13"x7 Cheviot Hotwires with 180-60-13 tyres. I have installed some nice Kenwood stereo gear. Have installed MoMo steering wheel and Razo pedals.

Yes, I agree this is ROUGH! but I needed to get it on the road in a hurry. I planned to eventually tidy things up and certify it before the 'warrant of fitness' ran out... I didn't do much to it since then and the warrant ran out in May '01. The plan now is... to restore it, with even more power, make it handle sweetly and look the 'hardcore oldskool' style, then get the certification I so muchly need. So that was where I'm up to (June 2001). currently the ke25 is in storage until I'm satisfied with the KE70 drifter build up.

I have run a 15.7 sec 1/4mile at Meremere Dragstrip running the 4age and stripped interior. My car got pictured in 'nz performance car' magazine =). going off trap speed and traction issues I believe it could have done a 15.3 if the engine was running correctly and traction improved. (to back that up, my ke70/2tgeu did a 2.2sec 60 footer with axle tramping) where as the ke25 is 2.6sec. in comparison my old 18.6sec kp62 starlet does 2.6 60footers hmm). I'd hope to at least be in the 12sec bracket when I've finished!

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