@TPRmotorsports, thanks for the advice on the "whacking." My engine started making that noise a while back, and I have all but gone into "save up for a rebuild" mode since then. I'll have to go into the garage once i'm off crutches and check that out!

@JKwade, thanks for starting this thread! I'm glad someone's motivated/situated enough to treat a mango right!

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1973 TE-27 Corolla

Anytime, as mentioned before, please feel free to contact me for any help info anything I can be of any help to.

Thanks guys, n let's keep these old school imports alive.

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Carlos
803.334.8674

Back from the dead!

So after the usual array of delays associated with project cars which set me back...some months, I have finally made some progress on the TE27. The engine has been rebuilt and reassembled, and is once again resting cradled in the chassis. I could go into more detail, but frankly that is the better part of the story! I will upload some pictures once I have it cleaned up a bit.

However, before that point there are some lovely electrical gremlins to work out. After dicking around with the Griffin radiator I purchased from BRD, I have decided to sell it and the E-fan I bought for the car. I am sick of trying to get it and the associated plumbing to fit correctly. However, after refitting the original fan and radiator, it seems that I crossed some wires at some point with the aftermarket setup. When jumping the car, even with the ignition switched off and they key out, the the car has power. The tach fires up, and the brake light is on on the dash. Lovely. Furthermore, when I try to start the car, the solenoid just clicks. I haven't messed with it much since discovering all this (yesterday), as I really don't enjoy chasing down electrical problems. The obvious solution is to make a long overdue, long winded post to my favorite forum!

The wiring under the hood isn't pretty, and there are some places were the PO hacked it up pretty badly. Thankfully with a car of this age, there aren't that many wires to deal with. Unfortunately, you often have to deal with the sort of crap I now find myself confronted with. If anyone has dealt with this problem before, I welcome any input as usual. Otherwise, I will eventually update when I have solved it myself!

The starter issue is usually bad connections in ur factory harness. What I do and has always resolved the starter clicking issue(assuming ur battery is not dead J) is I run a wire straight from the ignition switch on the column to the starter solenoid, the issues is that if u find the wire on the ignition switch and trace it all the way to the starter solenoid u will find out that there are several connections from when it starts to where it stops, those connections are bad quality and not even remotely sealed by no means so they corrode, so the signal drops at every connection and by the time it makes it to the starter solenoid the signal so week that’s why it sounds like u got a dead battery when the battery is actually fully charged. I have even noticed that on my cars that convent been repaired and strat having the clicking issue u can sometimes get it to work by making sure there is zero load on the battery, for example and maybe not everyone picks up on these patterns but I have, I have noticed that I would get the clicking if I had my foot on the brakes but it would work if my foot was off the brakes, then the light finally turned on in my head(no punn intended lol) when I put my foot on the brakes it would draw power from the battery worsening the existing low power signal to solenoid issue with several bad connections on the solenoid wire. Same thing goes for starting the car with the door open and the dome light is on, or starting the car with the park lights on or starting the car with the radio on etc etc etc, I think u get the point.

You should be able to easily trace the wire from the solenoid back to the ignition switch on the column, it’s a thicker black wire with a white stripe(if I recall correctly but verify that), I usually cut the wire about 3”-4” from the ignition switch and run a new but connected wire to the solenoid where I put a new covered spade connector.

Like I said, if u have already done the basics as far as making sure the battery is charged , the battery terminals and lugs have been cleaned, u got good grounds, and u have a good starter, and u still have the clicking issue, then this is the fix for you.

Good luck and please let me know if u need any further explanation or more details.

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Carlos
803.334.8674