95 camry 5SFE 5 spd looking to upgrade

1581 Views 5 Replies 5 Participants Last post by RichieRichJP, Sep 8, 2010

b2p1986

Discussion Starter · Sep 8, 2010 (Edited)

Hey guys,

So I am a recent new owner of a 95 red camry coupe in 5 speed. I managed to pull off a great deal up here from a local guy who from what I understand didn't realize what a gem these cars are for the price he was willing to give it too me for ($750 CAD)..and yes you read that price correct! Car has very minor rust, mostly around the spoiler which can be easily fixed and replaced. Car had 228,000km on it (145k miles for those US

). Anyhow I am looking to upgrade it over the winter and get some power out of this thing.

So first thing I want too mention is I have a very close friend who is a toyota mechanic. He happens to have his own shop at home with a hoist, engine lifts, tranny lifts, etc, all the tools and air gun and all as well. So I'm pretty sure we are set from that perspective.

Now from what I have been reading, it's possible to put a 3SGTE engine into this car (twin turbo) and the tranny from my car would fit?? Someone correct me if I am mistaken at all. I was reading somewhere that the S1 tranny that is in my car will bolt right up no problems however need a new clutch to handle the extra power...

Finally, in terms of parts I have found a few places where I can buy the engine, ECU, wiring harness, alternator, a/c, and a bunch of other things. In terms of mounts and what not, what else would be needed???

I am new here so if more info is required please let me know.

Thanks.

PS...the car did overheat on me back on thursday, had it towed to my buddies house who has the shop at home. Anyhow we narrowed it down to my rad fan being broken. I actually tried to manually spin the fan with the engine off and it's pretty seized up. Gonna throw in another one of those fans tomorrow picking it up in the morning and hopefully that fixes the problem...is this a common problem on these cars for the rad fans to go bad? I drive a 96 camry as well, it's the 5SFE engine but with an automatic transmission and haven't had any of that problem, just replaced my rad once in it but that's all.

Any thoughts?

...sorry for the long post

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Luckynumber5

· #2 · Sep 8, 2010

Welcome! and yes a 3sgte will swap into your Camry, but it will require a bit of mechanical fabrication. Its not horribly hard, but its something someone with some knowledge will need to help you out with. The factory Camry 5 speed will bolt up to the 3sgte, no idea about the clutch though. The 3sgte is a twin scroll turbo, not a twin turbo btw.

If the fan seized its likely that the fuse or wire link that powers that fan has blown, if you put a new fan in it and it wont come on be sure to check the fuse boxes.

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bigbird

· #3 · Sep 8, 2010

you may want to pm richierichjp. hes been working on 3s/5sgte for some time and has alot of good information for anyone going after this project.

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b2p1986

Discussion Starter · #4 · Sep 8, 2010

Luckynumber5 said:
Welcome! and yes a 3sgte will swap into your Camry, but it will require a bit of mechanical fabrication. Its not horribly hard, but its something someone with some knowledge will need to help you out with. The factory Camry 5 speed will bolt up to the 3sgte, no idea about the clutch though. The 3sgte is a twin scroll turbo, not a twin turbo btw.

If the fan seized its likely that the fuse or wire link that powers that fan has blown, if you put a new fan in it and it wont come on be sure to check the fuse boxes.

Thanks for the reply buddy. It's funny you mention that because the minute we diagnosed the problem and figured out the fan had seized my buddy turned too me and said exactly that...there's a chance the fan fuse is shot and needs replacing too. That's a very easy fix anyways so nothing to worry about

bigbird said:
you may want to pm richierichjp. hes been working on 3s/5sgte for some time and has alot of good information for anyone going after this project.

Thanks for the info, I will definitely be getting in contact with him shortly...unless he doesn't beat me too it and post in this thread

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SexieWASD

· #5 · Sep 8, 2010

b2p1986 said:
Hey guys,
So I am a recent new owner of a 95 red camry coupe in 5 speed. I managed to pull off a great deal up here from a local guy who from what I understand didn't realize what a gem these cars are for the price he was willing to give it too me for ($750 CAD)..and yes you read that price correct!

That reminds me, If anyone's looking http://maine.craigslist.org/cto/1935470594.html

sorry, back on topic now.

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RichieRichJP

· #6 · Sep 8, 2010 (Edited)

The cheapest and most cost efficient route would be to get a full engine/tranny swap directly from an MR2 including the engine wiring harness as you'll need it to splice into the 5S one.
Get a piggyback ECU also.
Since you're going to be swapping the e153 transmission by doing this, you may get away from the headaches of the whole transmission swap as far as matching the clutch/flywheel to the engine as well as modifying the carrier bearing to accommodate the e153 axles.
Unfortunately the S54 isn't worth shit on MR2OC, but you can easily sell it for higher here because Camry owners don't know better :lol:
Budget at least $4000-5000 to complete the swap if you're not doing the work.
You should be able to find a full 3sgte motor/tranny on MR2OC for under $2000; I've even seen them as low at $1200 w/o the LSD.

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