|
Shocks are good for about 60,000 miles on our 93-97 Corollas. Anything beyond that and you're pretty much relying on the springs to do most of the damping work. I don't know about spring replacement--I have about 113K on mine, but haven't been able to afford installing the replacements yet--but it's worth looking at. If you go aftermarket, I would recommend the Eibach Pro-Kit springs, simply because they're what TRD rebranded and used for the Corollas, and according to everything I've read they don't alter the suspension geometry, which means you can avoid a camber kit. If you go this route, you'll probably want to get KYB or Tokyko (spelling?) shocks (highly recommended on these and other forums), or get Eibach shocks to match the springs. You may or may not need shorter-tube shocks, I'm not sure if the simple 1 to 1.5 inch drop of the Eibachs is extreme enough to /need/ shorter shocks... It has also been suggested that if you run lowering springs and performance shocks, you probably will want adjustable shocks if you want to preserve the relatively comfy ride and just see the performance benefits during cornering.
As for the motor mounts, you can pretty easily tell if you've got trouble. When you sit at a light in Drive, engine warmed up, does the car shake and shudder, something that's cured by either gently pressing the gas or shifting to neutral?
If it does, get somebody to sit in the car, engine running, while you pop the hood and look at the engine. Have them shift from neutral to drive, and see if the engine SLAMS against the transmission mounts. It'll be startling and very noticable...you're looking for about a couple inches of travel. If it does, then get a broomstick, try to wedge it behind the engine with the engine at idle, and brace it hard. Then have your assistance shift it to drive and see if that dampens the vibration and movement. If this fixes the vibration/excessive movement problem, then yes, your motor mounts need replaced. Unfortunately, the one you need to replace first is the one that sits between the engine and the transmission, and that's a little tricky to get out. Replacing that will put a lot of wear on the others, to the point where it may be the best use of your time and money to replace all of them at once.
Alternatively, you might want to look into urethane motor mounts. The OEM mounts are ridiculously expensive (several hundreds, EACH), but you could do urethane for a fraction of the cost, if you can get the originals out to begin with or find a company that sells them for the 4A/7A motor.
Once that's taken care of, any repairs you make to the flex pipe should stick. =)
Hope this helps.
Last edited by Piloter; 10-15-2005 at 03:29 PM.
|
Linear Mode
