Oh nice. I'll look into some grippy rubber. I really had to nail it round the 90 degree bend to have it step out.

So car started today. Could b the alternator or just lots of ****ty conditions and mega short trips of late.

Will grab some plugs today. But prob gonna try the copper ones. Might do iridiums. Next time :)

Can't wait to get some for the front now... (but damn this car is making me broke atm lol)
Short trips wont do batteries any good. Can't rely on the alternator to charge it properly. If you tend to do lots of short trips, overnight charge every month or so will keep your battery healthier + charged.

Yeah they have a tendency to do that.:p I'm doing my own servicing so that helps lots. I haven't paid for labour yet on the mr2 :)

I've had to pay labour but for stuff I REALLY could not be ****ed doing like alternator and stuff I can't do like welding exhausts,A/C regas, body work etc..
 
Changing oil + filter, coolant, brakes,plugs etc are a piece of piss though.
 
Probably saved thousands if I had to pay someone to do all the 'mods' to it though eg. IC upgrade. also saved by re-doing window tinting myself too :)
 
I've easily spent what Ive paid for buying the car on it in 2 years...just fixing **** up + mods. A good 8k or so.
 

Oh agreed. Not sure I'd do alternator myself either. Anything that stops the car working after today would be bad.

And yeah stuff payin for simple stuff, ic was a bitch of a job. Lol.

I do need to get a grease gun and start lubeing the grease points though.

Depending how the engine goes, I may pay for the seals to be done. I need to sort out my ac too.

If you include my seats I've easily spent another $5k on the car. But I tend to buy mods that can be returned to stock if needed ;) hence I'm keeping my old seats. Then I have the option of putting them in the next car or sellin them. - helps take the sting out I modding ;)

Speaking of selling. Hopefully the supra and my old road bike + electric bike get picked up today! :)

What grease points? AFAIK there aren't any universal joints to grease.
Oh yeah i forgot I did the sump 'gasket' too which was an absolute nightmare because of a sized bolt on my midpipe/Cat...but thats another story, damn motor still leaks oil from somewhere!! not looking forward to the 'Hose from Hell' either.
 
 
 
 

oh that's awesome :) I thought there were things on the mr2 requireing a grease gun :) saves money.  
 
ok so my weird electrical issue has continued.  I was able to start the car after charging the battery, and drive around - did about 30k with a few starts.  I noticed the clock dimming again.  This time it got MUCH worse, I almost didn't make it home, everything on the car started progressively shutting down. windscreen wipers were sooo slow, boost controller reset etc.  
 
Pulled in at home turned the car off, pottered around doing other stuff, checked the battery voltage - 12.14v, and then tried starting the car - which started again! 
 
I have NO idea WTF is going on! The only things I touched in the engine bay are the intercooler pipes, pulled out two sparkplugs to check them, and changed oil, and removed moved the air filter and changed to a pod. I'm going to have to check it all, to make sure it's not a ground leak :(
 
I REALLY hope that It has nothing to do with the DC fan I Installed - I didn't use a relay to install it - just patched it into the stock loom... I hope I haven't blown my fan ecu :/  
 
It could be that the alternator gave out?
 
i used a oil filter puller, and the little rubber thing fell below the oil filter into the depths of hell.. I wonder if that melted onto something?
 
I love my car, but hate things like this :( (yes I understand it's the bane of modifying cars).
 
I'm still thinking of selling the ECU - I'm about 70% leaning towards that. If I do I'll change my BOV over to a plumb back on too to stop the hesitation when the bov goes off...
 
edit: for those of you who decide to go to a pod gauge. Supercheap has the AFM adaptors for $10 in plastic, instead of $25 in metal at autobarn!
 

test your battery voltage at about 2000 rpm with a multimeter, it should be about 14.2-14.4 V constant. If its not then your alternator is probably shagged.
OR
you have an earthing problem. Old SW20s are notoriously known for bad earths, my car was being earthed by the throttle cable FFS!! get it checked out.

the throttle cable!!??!?! what the how does that work? I would have thought no power would be used around that?
 
ahh awesome - thanks for that - will do :) 
 
I honestly don't think it's the alt... I'd put money on it being an earthing issue;)
I wonder if that broken temp sensor could be earthing....
installing the intercooler pipes, had to run the throttle cable between them, and move a lot of stuff, ditto the conversion to pod filter... 
 
any tips for finding earthing issues?
 
 
 

First thing I would do is cheek the battery with a muilt meter while  the car is running.
Also cheek the fuses in the engine bay, one of them stops the Alt from charging (maybe the 7.5 one)