ugh! i HATE liars!
#1
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do not buy anything from Jim at Turbo toys in tampa, fl!!!!!!!
well, when i bought my gs300, i got a really smokin deal. i knew something was up with it for it to be so cheap with how nice it looked. jim claimed his shop had done all work that was done to the car for the past 8 years. they are known in the supra comunity to buy cars that are totalled and fix them and sell them. i was assured that this gs was not a put together car, but one from a local customer. he said the customer said it would just randomly stall and not start back up. the timing belt was due to be changed, front seals were leaking, valve cover gaskets were leaking, bad trans mount, front seal on the comressor is bad(i verified this already) etc.. so i figured it was just alot of maint that he didnt want to pay for. car had 258k miles on it. so i felt comfortable buying it as jim was known to be a standup guy.
after i bought it, i bought the front seals, timing belt, valve cover gaskets, motor mounts and trans mount, cap, rotor, wires, plugs, pcv valve, coolant temp sensor, ac compressor seal kit, all the ac orings and shrader valves, new drier, freon, etc...oil pump, oil, filter, etc... figure with that many miles id change the oil pump to be safe. new brake pads for front and rear, checked the water pump, looked new after i pulled it so reinstalled it, etc.. put a k&n cone filter i had on it, replaced the plastic intake pipe with an aluminum one, got an apexi catback for it, installed the new tires from my old lexus that i totalled last year, etc..
got the pan off. not the original motor, it had been off before. ok, i was fine with that, though kinda pissed jim didnt tell me it had been replaced. i likely wouldnt have changed the oil pump had i known and saved $100.
i got everything done and it ran great but idled a lil funny. i had a spare tps, took the old one off. the idle circuit was cutting out during the continuity test. replacement was rock solid. put it in and adjusted it. car still idled funny. listened and i had a vac leak. when i did the tune up i ripped a vac line. changed it. idles perfect now and has more power then it did before(prolly from the properly working and adjusted tps). when its wet out, you barely hit the gas and the tires would spin. all good, or so i thought.
saturday, i was driving in 85 deg heat and got stuck in bumper to bumper spring break beach traffic while running an errand. damn thing started to get hot. turned the heat on and it came right back down. i figured, ok, maybe a bag or something got sucked up on the front. stopped and nope. nothing. open the hood and what do i see? copper glitter all over from the overflow tube. they filled the damn engine with the copper block seal. when i drained the coolant doing all the maintenence, i didnt see a spec of this crap anywhere. i am PISSED! so i filled it with water, checked the oil, it was still full and clean. when i got home it was just starting to run a lil warm again. i never let it get to the red. closest it got was like 2 full bars lower then red.
yesterday i pulled the head and stripped it down. once its surfaced i can lap all the valves and reassemble it. the valves have no carbon on them at all, and the seats are perfect like it just had a valve job. all shiney, same on the valves. when pulling the head bolts, some were too tight, and others wernt tight at all. im guessing the morons changed the hg at some point and reused the stock bolts or something. idk. at least no coolant got in the oil. the gasket set and new head bolts should be here this week. i ordered them sat.
if jim had told me up front, i would of just pulled the damn engine to start with and resealed EVERYTHING!!!!!!!. i even told the jim i still wanted it even if i needed to buy a new engine, but to tell me everything up front to start with so i could buy what was needed accordingly. instead of telling me, he lied and it almost screwed up my vacation as i go in 2 weeks, and will be taking my gs on a 1k mile + road trip to visit family etc...
in short, jim is a liar and should be avoided!
well, when i bought my gs300, i got a really smokin deal. i knew something was up with it for it to be so cheap with how nice it looked. jim claimed his shop had done all work that was done to the car for the past 8 years. they are known in the supra comunity to buy cars that are totalled and fix them and sell them. i was assured that this gs was not a put together car, but one from a local customer. he said the customer said it would just randomly stall and not start back up. the timing belt was due to be changed, front seals were leaking, valve cover gaskets were leaking, bad trans mount, front seal on the comressor is bad(i verified this already) etc.. so i figured it was just alot of maint that he didnt want to pay for. car had 258k miles on it. so i felt comfortable buying it as jim was known to be a standup guy.
after i bought it, i bought the front seals, timing belt, valve cover gaskets, motor mounts and trans mount, cap, rotor, wires, plugs, pcv valve, coolant temp sensor, ac compressor seal kit, all the ac orings and shrader valves, new drier, freon, etc...oil pump, oil, filter, etc... figure with that many miles id change the oil pump to be safe. new brake pads for front and rear, checked the water pump, looked new after i pulled it so reinstalled it, etc.. put a k&n cone filter i had on it, replaced the plastic intake pipe with an aluminum one, got an apexi catback for it, installed the new tires from my old lexus that i totalled last year, etc..
got the pan off. not the original motor, it had been off before. ok, i was fine with that, though kinda pissed jim didnt tell me it had been replaced. i likely wouldnt have changed the oil pump had i known and saved $100.
i got everything done and it ran great but idled a lil funny. i had a spare tps, took the old one off. the idle circuit was cutting out during the continuity test. replacement was rock solid. put it in and adjusted it. car still idled funny. listened and i had a vac leak. when i did the tune up i ripped a vac line. changed it. idles perfect now and has more power then it did before(prolly from the properly working and adjusted tps). when its wet out, you barely hit the gas and the tires would spin. all good, or so i thought.
saturday, i was driving in 85 deg heat and got stuck in bumper to bumper spring break beach traffic while running an errand. damn thing started to get hot. turned the heat on and it came right back down. i figured, ok, maybe a bag or something got sucked up on the front. stopped and nope. nothing. open the hood and what do i see? copper glitter all over from the overflow tube. they filled the damn engine with the copper block seal. when i drained the coolant doing all the maintenence, i didnt see a spec of this crap anywhere. i am PISSED! so i filled it with water, checked the oil, it was still full and clean. when i got home it was just starting to run a lil warm again. i never let it get to the red. closest it got was like 2 full bars lower then red.
yesterday i pulled the head and stripped it down. once its surfaced i can lap all the valves and reassemble it. the valves have no carbon on them at all, and the seats are perfect like it just had a valve job. all shiney, same on the valves. when pulling the head bolts, some were too tight, and others wernt tight at all. im guessing the morons changed the hg at some point and reused the stock bolts or something. idk. at least no coolant got in the oil. the gasket set and new head bolts should be here this week. i ordered them sat.
if jim had told me up front, i would of just pulled the damn engine to start with and resealed EVERYTHING!!!!!!!. i even told the jim i still wanted it even if i needed to buy a new engine, but to tell me everything up front to start with so i could buy what was needed accordingly. instead of telling me, he lied and it almost screwed up my vacation as i go in 2 weeks, and will be taking my gs on a 1k mile + road trip to visit family etc...
in short, jim is a liar and should be avoided!
#4
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well, i bought it knowing it needed work. the fact that it needed work wasnt my concern, or why i am mad. the problem is, even after i paid,i told him to tell me everything he knew that was wrong. i had a new engine lined up already just in case it needed it. had i known of this bhg i would have pulled the motor to fix it instead of changing the oil pump and whatnot with it in the car. would of saved myself alot of PITA work by pulling the engine and the rear main and front trans seal would be new right now. after this bhg repair is done, i still need to drop the trans at some point to change those 2 seals. i plan to do those later after my friend gets a transmission jack that will work with the car on his lift.
#5
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Damn bro that sucks, at least you can fix it yourself.. Imagine if you had to pay a shop to do the work. But with a motor that has 250k and dropping all this time and money you could just do a gte swap.
#6
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Damn bro that sucks, at least you can fix it yourself.. Imagine if you had to pay a shop to do the work. But with a motor that has 250k why not spend a little more and do a gte swap?
#7
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it isnt the original motor. and actually, i have a gte aristo swap sitting in the garage right now, been in there since before i bought this car, but that is going to replace the 7mgte i swapped into my 84 supra back in 2001. ive got 3 mk2 supras. this gs is just my dd. and if the motor had low compression, i would of just replaced it right off the bat. but it ran good, good compression, just needed seals, timing belt, etc... and when i changed the oil pump to be safe(in case it did have 260k on it), i found that it has been replaced or rebuilt. either way it isnt a 260k mile motor.
here is my gte. i started it up on the floor the day after i bought it to make sure it was a good motor.
http://www.cardomain.com/ride/204269...-supra/page-26
here is my gte. i started it up on the floor the day after i bought it to make sure it was a good motor.
http://www.cardomain.com/ride/204269...-supra/page-26
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#8
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Wow that would suck man. If its to good to be true......most likely it is. Wish you wouldve just walked away to begin with but i see your point and how he has a rep through the Supra community.
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for the price of the car, it was worth buying even if it needed a motor. i just would of liked to of known up front. thats all. i dont mind doing the work. i knew it needed work up front and was fine with it. i just wanted to know ALL the work it needed. im still less then $3k into this car even after adding this bhg repair to all the other things ive already done. and the local market here they go for ~$5k in this shape without the exhaust and intake etc.. and still usually need some minor maint.
btw, picked the head up on my lunch break. ill start cleaning all the water jackets out thoroughly tonight and tomarrow when i get home ill lap all the valves and assemble the head so i can reinstall it saturday.
btw, picked the head up on my lunch break. ill start cleaning all the water jackets out thoroughly tonight and tomarrow when i get home ill lap all the valves and assemble the head so i can reinstall it saturday.
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well, got it fixed. runs like a champ now. had some issues along the way due to my parts supplier giving me the wrong stuff. also got my ac fixed. now i need to get my heat working again. it appears the heater control valve is locked up. prolly jammed with block seal. need to take the hoses off and clean it out. the cable doesnt move the arm on the valve at all between full cold and full hot in car settings. and the heat worked the previous weekend as thats how i got the temps back down when it would start over heating. one thing after another.
anyway, it idled for close to 2hrs last night while i was charging the ac and it never got above normal temp. i ended up using the compressor from my gte swap as i found out the seal kit i bought to rebuild the stock compressor was the wrong one after i pulled it apart. put 140cc of oil in it, bolted it on with new orings, changed the drier, shrader valves, etc... vacuumed it for 30min, then left it for 15min. still had full vacuum. put 30oz of freon in it and it gets ICE cold!
didnt finish till like 10:30 last night so no pic of it finished. it was already dark. ill try to take one today and post it with the others of the head off etc... didnt take as many pics as i had planned. just was too focused on getting it done. drove it the 40 miles to work this morning and it ran perfect the whole way.
anyway, it idled for close to 2hrs last night while i was charging the ac and it never got above normal temp. i ended up using the compressor from my gte swap as i found out the seal kit i bought to rebuild the stock compressor was the wrong one after i pulled it apart. put 140cc of oil in it, bolted it on with new orings, changed the drier, shrader valves, etc... vacuumed it for 30min, then left it for 15min. still had full vacuum. put 30oz of freon in it and it gets ICE cold!
didnt finish till like 10:30 last night so no pic of it finished. it was already dark. ill try to take one today and post it with the others of the head off etc... didnt take as many pics as i had planned. just was too focused on getting it done. drove it the 40 miles to work this morning and it ran perfect the whole way.
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