Hi all. Got a 77gt and a shoestring budget

[Smilemon]

Hey everyone.
I guess I should introduce myself before I start asking for help. I've got an account on classic-celica so a few of you might know me. I'm from Fairbanks, Alaska. I'm going to graduate high school in 10 days. I have a 1977 Celica Gt Coupe. It's red and rusty but it only cost me 100 dollars. I've been working on it since last summer and I've made a lot of progress. I had a trashed engine, no carb or starter, and a broken driveshaft. I tore the engine apart and got an estimate. 1600 for the machining and parts alone

I got pretty depressed and searched Craigslist. I found a 1983 Celica, with an uglier trashed body but a running 22r. The guy wanted 550, but sold it to me for 450 when he saw I was in high school. It came with a nearly brand new 38 weber and a perfect driveshaft. In essence the engine was free.

Its been almost a year since I bought the car and I've had lots of fun and tough times getting it running. This weekend I finally got it on the highway and put a good 50 mile on it. It's an absolute blast to drive and I'm really happy that I got it running. I had almost no mechanical skill before I started and now I'm comfortable doing pretty much everything.

Today I recarpeted my floor. It was pretty tough. I've never done carpet before. I used rubber mat as underlay and cheap walmart carpet. It cost about 100 bucks to do the entire thing. That includes welding new floor pans in.

I was going to drive to school in it tomorrow but my front left caliper went out and I lost all my fluid. I'm going to have to rebuild it tomorrow. Really sucks but I'd rather be safe than use my E-brake to stop.

Car on the left is a 1966 Series IIa Land Rover in case you're wondering

[ChristobalRocks]

Welcome to the board and congrats on getting 50 miles under your belt!

[cheela]

awesome! hopefully mine will go 50 miles someday too. hahaahah

[75CelicaGT]

Grats on the New Project....fellow shoestring budgeter


Pete

[Smilemon]

So. I've been reading more and more posts on this site and it seems like a lot of the "hopeless" Celicas are pretty similar to mine. I see people giving up because of rust and trashed engines. It makes me to see people parting out cars that are in better condition that mine. Before you start parting out a Celica, ask me to see my project pictures.

[ChristobalRocks]

There are guys here who have turned Swiss cheese cars into real beauties, but that takes serious dedication and body/metal working skills, so it doesn't happen often. Don't let that discourage you though! If you make an honest effort and post pictures of your progress, I'm sure you'll find helpful people here who are willing to let you have a few parts here and there to get your ride up to snuff.

In my case, I bought a parts car because I'm not doing the work myself and it would be WAY too expensive to have my builder reproduce all of the parts from nothing. Bolting on replacements was much more cost effective for me. But if I was doing the work myself, you can bet that I'd try to fix both cars myself, my project car AND my parts car. I hate to think of even one of these cars going to the crusher. So even though it will cost me more, I'm going to ask my builder to try and salvage as much as he can from the parts car before it gets junked. Or maybe I'll find another guy here that wants to buy whatever is left after my project gets finished. It will really depend on how much it costs me to finish my project. Ideally, I'd like to keep all of the salvaged parts myself for another project.

[Smilemon]

I guess I'm being a bit of a hypocrite seeing as I parted out a 1983 Celica to get my 77 running, but I considered the 77 to be a much more beautiful car. The 83 was running and driving, but it was just a very ugly vehicle.

The good news is I just graduated high school and I have some money to work with now. I'm going to redo my heater this week and hopefully get my seats covered soon.

[adamyee]

Man, you rock! Good luck to you mang, I remember being in highschool(it was only a couple years ago) and I was not this ambitious! The way you're headed, you will get many more miles with that car =).