Which The Frog has four wheels and a brand new face?

Looks great!

Is it an optical illusion or is one headlight like new and the other faded badly?

Looks good other than that.

👍

@neomr2

Its not an illusion. The left one is new, needed to be replaced from the wreck, but the other is still OEM. OE is beginning to yellow, but still mostly clear. The sunlight in the photo grossly exaggerates it, though. If you look at the fog lights, you see the sun illuminating that side of the car, but they are both glass, not yellowed. So its a little of both, mostly sun glow.

So that's the Bowie look. It's unfortunate. Insurance only replaced bare minimum. Restoring a "Pleasing Aesthetic Balance" isn't part of being made whole, apparently. I bet they liked the price tag on that headlight, lol. Got more pressing financial needs for The Frog right now, but it will probably bug me increasingly as they yellow further.

Mini-poll: who would like to see a glass headlamp housing, weight be damned? My answer: "I would! I will gladly take an extra 2.6 lbs".

On the plus side, the peeling clearcoat and road rash he had on his old face are no longer a "pleasing aesthetic" problem.

Now is the time to replace the other headlight... Get the lenses matching before the current new one fades.

Looks good thou!

Go get PPF immediately!

Nice upgrade!

P.S. On buying a new headlight:  a couple of times a year --- but always after I have not checked my email for awhile --- the online Toyota parts suppliers I use from time to time offer a 20-30% discount on new quick purchases (this is in addition to the 10-20% saving by not using local dealer).  I plan on using one of these "Specials" to replace the headlights on Itsy-Bitsy.

Got my new struts installed this weekend too. Truly remarkable difference. A bit of a chore, but I think I leveled up.

Since my camber alignment was ruined, but I have camber bolts, I just went ahead and set all four corners to maximum negative camber. Gonna drive that for a bit to see how it feels, but will probably get an alignment in the next couple of weeks. Only had time for one quick drive, but it's miles ahead of where it was two days ago, in terms of ride and handling.

Wow... I am surprised I didn't get scolded "friendly adviced" for my brash uber-camber decision.

It doesn't pull to either side, cruising or braking.**  What else would be a concern besides (possibly) mildly increasing tire wear? What happens when the cambers don't match side-to-side, and how big does the difference need to be to "matter".

I need some time to do a chalk test, just out of curiosity. Still quite pleased with the struts. I didn't check all of them, but one of the old struts was completely seized up. Not. Good. I would have expected the opposite from a dead damper: totally loose, flaccid. I've been pounding the crap outta the poor The Frog's skeleton. 😕

Is there a "Po' boy's camber adjustment method"? Seems to me that there are few negative consequences to having as much as 3 or 4 degrees negative camber, which is about all we can get from vanilla crash bolts.

** other than the significant bump steer I already got from putting 205s on the front.

I don't know anything about camber, toe-in or crash bolts - just what I've learned here and on SC. I am just glad you are able to enjoy The Frog once again and to appreciate the S-Drives as they were meant to be enjoyed - spiritedly! 

At least until the rain and snow return to your area and you need to re-mount your all-season balloons 😀 (sorry about that, don't want to dampen you current joy)

Oh yeah, you did mention dedicated snow tires, so never mind the joke.

@nottamiata

Didn’t I tell you suspension is probably  shot.  I know this because you are not the first person that can’t believe the factory suspension is done for, for any kind of performance driving at 40k miles.  It makes the car an accident waiting to happen. 

Now that you have fixed the obvious you are treading  in dangerous territory with messing with camber.   It is not a black-and-white subject and there are consequences especially for the street.  You should read an alignment book and not get some crazy advice from the internets that will land you into trouble. 

When you change the camber blindly it also changes the toe.  If the toe is not correct you can have an accident when taking the car to the limits early. 

Let’s say you correct the toe, then the camber may not be as even on both sides.  If you give the car too much camber you will not have an optimum contact patch and the most obvious result is losing straight line braking.   

It is a very dynamic process where your other mods like your scrub radius will effect how everything works in harmony. 

 The best way to do this is to take a conservative approach and go back to a baseline of a normal factory  alignment and then make subtile changes to see how  it works until you can optimize the handling in your favor.  

I wouldn't rush but if you want to keep trying get one of those lifetime alignments.   

@dev

I knew you'd be right. It all made sense beforehand, got exactly the result you predicted and explained.

It seemed weird, so when I got home I went back and checked the old struts. They are all indeed flaccid and completely ineffective. Scratching my head on how I was able to get one of them to act like it was seized up. Shrug... probably never figure that one out.

Anyway, I didn't have the foresight to make a note of the camber bolt settings before I loosened the first one, and I don't think it would have mattered -- I would have needed an alignment regardless.

I have also noticed that my tramlining problem has vanished.

Posted by: @nottamiata

@dev

I knew you'd be right. It all made sense beforehand, got exactly the result you predicted and explained.

It seemed weird, so when I got home I went back and checked the old struts. They are all indeed flaccid and completely ineffective. Scratching my head on how I was able to get one of them to act like it was seized up. Shrug... probably never figure that one out.

Anyway, I didn't have the foresight to make a note of the camber bolt settings before I loosened the first one, and I don't think it would have mattered -- I would have needed an alignment regardless.

I have also noticed that my tramlining problem has vanished.

 

Intermittent seizing is a possibility. What happens in this case is the rod can be slightly bent from a bad enough hit.   

When I sent my coilovers for a rebuild they found one rod that was out of specification for being bent so it was replaced even though I never felt it. 

Many on the road will often drive on expired suspension and not even know it. When it comes to a performance car you cant take that kind of chance but people often do. 

Once you get your alignment dialed in, the car will be a lot more fun to drive.  The biggest mistake people make is dialing in a track alignment for a street application. 

The steering is pretty darn sensitive now, but the 205s in front did most of that already. Not sure if the camber really added very much more steering sensitivity.

My gut feeling is that most of the added stability at highway speed (it's like a rock now) is coming from the fresh dampers, but I suspect some is due to the aggressive camber. Kicking myself for not taking note of the camber bolts  before the wrenches started turning. Not so much for trying to get it cambered myself since the stance/squat has changed anyway, but just so I had a general idea where the camber was in relation to the bolt positioning. Shrug, will take a look after the alignment. I love popping the wheels off and back on...

And I wish I had done the struts as soon as I got the car. I've really been missing out.

Also, if this is all so high-precision, why is the strut tower drilled with holes that are one size too large for the OE strut mount bolts? There is a lot of play there, I would guess there is about 1mm or a bit more. Made the install a lot easier, but not a terribly high-precision design.

Not to sound like I am bickering, just wondering.