Break Down Story Number 19.

Toyota will not start. Continuing on from Break Down Story Number 17.

Since the Toyota Celica GT4 last broke down I had replaced the coil and leads. I was not confident that I had fixed it but it was going fine which makes it hard to work out what was wrong. I had the fuel pump replaced as well which made it go better and I started to think I had fixed it, but no.

I was at a MG car club Newcastle event doing some filming and after filming the last car leave I packed up and tried to start the GT4 but it just turned over and over just like all the previous times. After playing around under the bonnet with no success I decided to call the NRMA but I needed to know where I was, I was in a park just north of Morisset but I knew that would not be enough for the NRMA. So I walked to the far end of the park to read the entrance sign hoping it would give me a name for the park, it did. When I got back I decided to give it one more go before ringing the NRMA and you guessed it, it started. I drove it home and it just kept on starting over the next weeks but I knew there was still something wrong and it was only a matter of time.

I decided to buy a new distributor cap and rotor button but when they arrived the dizzy cap looked different, it was mostly the same but the leads would not fit because this cap was for a latter model. No one could get me the correct one and no one could supply the leads to fit the latter model.

While I was thinking about it, that’s right it did it again, this time at Eastern Creek Raceway. I was there to film a Super Sprint and when I tried to leave the GT4 decided it would rather stay. After giving it time to think about it and after a few friends tried a few things I call the NRMA. They arrived in about a half an hour and had it running in fifteen minutes. It was a relay in the ignition system and the NRMA mechanic had an old second hand one out of a Corolla or similar.

The NRMA mechanic was of the opinion that the relay was common in a number of Toyotas from the nineties so I tried a few wreckers in the hope of having a back up while I tried to find a new one but wreckers don’t keep cars that old any more.

It starts and runs fine but I have been here before so I have ordered a new relay from Toyota as well as an EFI relay just to be sure but they are going to take seven weeks to come from Japan. I have ordered a relay on e-bay that looks to be the right one but it is listed for the ST205 GT4 not the ST185 GT4 but it was cheap and I will get it inside a week. I have found the correct Dizzy cap on the internet out of England which I have ordered, after taking out a new mortgage. And just to be on the safe side I have ordered an ignition module, it want hurt.

So ends another exciting Break Down Story.