Ate Six: Resurected From The Sherwood Forrest

 Many think the days of finding a cheap AE86 Toyota Corolla for less than an arm and a leg are long gone, and in popular opinion, and view, they very well are.. You aren't going to find a cheap 86 in any sort of reasonable condition without paying twice what any other car of a similar vintage would be worth, unless you know where to look and if not that, then how too look.. One of these I learned, and one I did...

I could have indeed found a car that got me from point a to point be for  much less than I bought this car for. Not the epitome of a fat budget, but I had $1500 to spend on a car that got me to work and back.

This need was mainly presented because I lost transportation in the beetle when I sucked a valve and no longer could drive it because a rod knock developed and I wanted to save the engine case which in fact is the stock 1300cc case along with the matching numbers pan and body, a potential candidate for a factory original restoration project, but that's a different story.

I indeed got it out of necessity, but also I got it out of a very keen interest in the classic nature of this car, or those very similar to it. not only is is one of the very first cars to make the sport of drifting famous, but it also has a rich road racing history and is featured as the main character in a TV show called Initial D.

Indeed you could say I was looking for an opportunity to get a hold of one of these cars in the future. It just so happened that this opportunity presented itself much sooner than I had expected and I can't say I am disappointed by any means.

I found this car, as I was looking for the above mentioned need of semi reliable transportation. One that I could work on if it broke and fix up in the future. I was also looking at possibly getting a Mazda MX-6 or a lame as a plain peanut butter sandwich, black four door Saturn sedan if this car didn't work out.

I had been eyeing the add for this car for a few days and hadn't pulled the trigger, but when I saw a price drop after countless nights of scrolling though Craigslist I shot the owner a text and went to meet him the week to have a look at it.

 After looking at the car and asking a few questions, doing a on the spot compression check(which I highly recommend). I handed over the cash and signed the title.

This is when my gut dropped, I saw the previous owner sold it to the feller I bought it from for a meager $200. Now I'm sure there was some work put into this car and time and maybe a little money before it was in my hands, but shucks I felt pretty taken. So I told myself he did the job of finding it for me and getting it to a reliable driving state in which I bought it for 1300 bucks. Talk about a profit.

Turns out he found it in the forest covered in pine needles and dead bugs while he was out to purchase a second gen Toyota mr-2. Sounds like someone didn't know what they had, and he took advantage of that, but hey I would have done the same thing if the opportunity presented itself. This is what I mean when I said I knew how to look and not where to look, I used Craigslist which has its good and bad, but in this case I could have known where to look and could have saved that $1300 to put into getting the car. Live and learn.

So a handshake later and a good one at that, I was off, on my way home in my new trueno coupe, with factory cruse control! I don't think I've had a better automotive day in my life than the day i purchased this car, aside from maybe formula drift Seattle... that was a great day also.
 

So what you are seeing now is the very car that I purchased exactly how I purchased it, the unfortunate way of spending a little more than I needed to although $1500 isn't bad for these cars, but after what I've done to it(post coming semi-soon-ish) I could easily turn it around and get double that. Good investment if nothing else.

one thing I did find interesting was doing my best to figure out this 86's story, where it came from, what kind of owners it had, how they treated it and so on. Unfortunately the owner before the guy I bought it from looked like a bit of a goofball, considering he broke the windshield with his fist, stomped on the headlight to make it go down when it was stuck and put an array of interesting stickers on it in various places.

I did some research and found out that Air Zenith is an air lift type company responsible for taking ordinary cars and dumping them on the ground. Their website here. Unfortunately I found that this whip was only equipped with the sticker and not the air bags that the company makes.. shame, but other stickers included board and surf shops and a university parking pass...

Forgive the orientation, but I was very pleased to find this window sticker. as you can see it says Arizona State University, Sun devils is their mascot, fun fact. After seeing this I concurred with the fact that this car spent a large majority of its time in a dryer climate than where I live making it almost completely rust free aside form some small spots from the forest stint.

But all in all I am very pleased with my purchase, with only 182xxx on the clock and only one tare in the seat, it wouldn't be a stretch to call this thing mint..

Of couse this car is far from perfect and needs some time and money dropped into it here and there to restore it to it's former glory or something above that hopefully. But it's really not bad considering some of the examples that have been turned into drift daily's, or neglected for longer than this.

The engine unfortunately is the eight valve carb'd 4AC. In the future I hope to swap this out for something with a pit more ponies. A 20 valve 4AG with itb's or maybe a 3sgte BEAMS sound really nice.. or if i have to a F20C out of a Honda s2000. Yes that is almost blasphemy in the purist Toyota world but it really is a well sorted engine.

Anyways, I do have a post coming about what I've done to the car to make it a bit more presentable and what I plan to do to it with a bit more concrete evidence and planning but for now, I'm just stoked to have one, a reliable mode of transportation, and two one of the cars on my bucket list of need to own.

So live in angst until I post what I've done to the car after owning it for a mere three months.

As always, your fellow car enthusiast and friend.

Joshua Sewell

Instagram: josh_sewell_photo