89 gt-s coupe

[ghost91rolla]

im thinking about buying a 89 corolla gts and wanted to know what can i do ive seen the tureno conversions they look great but engine wise what can i do to have it be a faster car and how much would i need to spend .. ?

it also has a starting problem on occasion wont start from what i have been told its done that maybe 3 -4 in the last 3 yrs.

its a 5spd
and the guys said it was a "redtop" factory engine did that year come w/ that engine .! or is he wrong .. ?

[SCT]

Also have option of the Levin front end. Supercharged 4AGZE versions had the hood scoop for the intercooler.

For motor stuff, Engine swaps for the AE92 Corolla

As for your starter, could be battery? Or just an intermittent starter problem. Flat spots...

Guys right, GTS came with redtop 16V.

[ghost91rolla]

Hmm levin forgot about tht any one have a pic of the levin front end on a gts or sr5 ? Yea the starter maybe missing teeth any one know the specs on the red top ?

[Blof-fan]

Please stop calling it a red top.
It might have red lettering on the camcovers, but that doesn't always mean it is the smallport engine people believe it to be.

If I remember coorectly, the 4A-GE Smallport engines came available from 1990 onward.
So if this is the original engine, it will probably NOT be the 4A-GE smallport.
Easy way to indentify the engine is by looking if it is equiped with the T-VIS system, since that was only used on the Bigport engines

[ghost91rolla]

Yea sorry he said it was a red cover .. No red letters bit ok thanx for the info .. I didn't know that now I know what to look for when I see the car in a month or two...

[toyotaspeed90]

look around a little longer and find a 90-91... even spend an extra couple hundred on it.... much better decision.

[Donald]

Originally Posted by toyotaspeed90

look around a little longer and find a 90-91... Even spend an extra couple hundred on it.... Much better decision.

+1

[REN69]

ALL ae92s came with redtops if you want to call them that... they're just either redtop bigport (88-89) or redtop smallport (90-91), you're better off calling them bigport and smallport 4AGE's as that's really the right way to tell them appart.

why would he want a 90? the smallports are crap, I drove the 89 with no problems for years, the 90 with the smallport and every smallport I've seen burn oil like crazy.

[toyotaspeed90]

pretty much all 4ag's burn oil...

technically the smallport should be better about it than the bigports.... the smallport has the oil drain back because the heads pool up with oil... part of the pooling problem was fixed because the burning oil passes through the "pcv" system.....

to actually run a bigport safely you should overfill the oil... but that will quickly kill the cat (if you have one).....

smallport = win because it's better power and economy

90+.... because it's newer

[rdyzz]

my smallport has over 220,000miles and everytime i checked the dipstick for 3 months there was no noticeable amount of oil loss. to bad the same can't be said about my 5efe with 100,000miles even after i changed every seal on it i still am wondering what happens to that 1/2 quart of oil every 1,000 miles.

my buddies largeport burnt so much oil everytime he accelerated he left a cloud of burnt oil behind.

[Createdtoburn]

I actually own a 89 GTS with the big port engine, and just recently picked up a 90 GTS with the small port. The only real noticeable difference in the engines by looking at them is that the big port says T-VIS on the air intake manifold, and the spark plug wires stick out and are showing, while the small port doesnt say anything on the air intake manifold, and the spark plug wires have a black cover going over them for a cleaner look.

As far as internals go it's a much bigger difference. The small port not only has redesigned ports (smaller) but also has oil squirters under the pistons which help make the engine even more reliable, and a stronger crank shaft I think? They did some other crap I can't think of, but it overall makes like 15-20hp more stock then the big port does. Not a huge difference, but just enough.

[toyotaspeed90]

it's at least a 20hp difference...... which when you're talking about a bigport that puts down about a whopping 90whp you're talking about more than 20% of the power it makes....

if you're talking about a 400hp car, 20hp isn't that much of a noticeable difference.

crank is the same as the late bigport

rods are stronger and the compression is higher. If you get a 90 start with 91 octane gas and move backwards only if it doesn't ping at all... if at any point it pings bump up to the next level of gas. The smallport motors are (factory) 10.3:1