Pics of my Luxury Toyota

Next up, in August, I finally got around to finishing my custom LED tail lights. I instantly loved the car again with these installed... gosh I hate the stock tails lol

Inside is painted flat primer black (except for the reflectors), all of the LEDs have been replaced/upgraded for consistent brightness and longevity, and I added some red LED strips to use as DRL/rear fog light.

Completed LED Tail Lights by gold94corolla, on Flickr

Had to rewire the tail light harness to get the tail lights operating safely. The red wire runs to the "rear light" switch by the steering wheel.

PWM Installed by gold94corolla, on Flickr


Flip the switch, and these light up:

DRL Lights by gold94corolla, on Flickr


turn on the head lights, and they light up the same configuration as before, but better

Running Lights by gold94corolla, on Flickr

with the DRL on as well

Running & DRL Lights by gold94corolla, on Flickr


Brake lights are much brighter now

Brake Lights by gold94corolla, on Flickr


Black finish inside matches the tires perfectly, just what I was going for

IMG_6566-2 by gold94corolla, on Flickr

More quick pics







IMG_6570-2 by gold94corolla, on Flickr

IMG_6571-2 by gold94corolla, on Flickr

IMG_6572-2 by gold94corolla, on Flickr

IMG_6573-2 by gold94corolla, on Flickr


DRL on

LED Tails Lit by gold94corolla, on Flickr

LED Tails Close by gold94corolla, on Flickr

Rear DRL On by gold94corolla, on Flickr

DRL + head lights

LEDs On Close by gold94corolla, on Flickr

LEDs On Side by gold94corolla, on Flickr

Another road trip!

Spent a weekend driving down to Atlanta for TheRetrofitSource's open house. I didn't get any pics while I was there though lol.

Took the usual route through South Carolina. Left my house at about 3:15 am, got here at 11 am.

In South Carolina out in the middle of nowhere, I love it here so much. (all of the driving/scenery pics are unedited)















Then it was downpouring rain.






Stopped at the church to visit my grandmother's grave and put another solar light on it, the one I put there last year still works!









This dog is tied to the tree literally every single time I've ever been here (it's a long rope though)... even in the rain, poor thing




Then got to TRS at about 4:45 (took a quick nap at 1:30). Had a great time there! Ended up driving 3 hours north afterwards, and by the time I got to the place I wanted to sleep for the night, it was after 1am, and literally every place was either full or closed. WTF? So I slept in the car lol.... saved a bit of money, and it wasn't so bad actually.

Left at 7am for the Blue Ridge Parkway. It was still rainy, so the Parkway was enshrouded with clouds for the longest time, could barely see anything lol.







Some heavily-edited pics.... without editing, you can't see the car the fog was so thick





Two less- edited pics





More edited pics.








No spectacular views this time, just clouds. Like literally clouds, not just fog, but clouds lol.















A break in the clouds gave a little bit of a view







It finally cleared up towards the end though, so I was able to get a good sunset pic.



Got home after dark to make for a nice weekend.

Earlier this month, I finally did the work to convert the JDM mirrors from RHD to LHD. It was just a matter of swapping the bases... I got lucky, and everything lined up perfectly!

USA Mirrors Disassembled by gold94corolla, on Flickr

LHD Conversion Complete by gold94corolla, on Flickr

Then the mirrors installed easily... just a matter of bolting them on.

Completed Mirrors 1 by gold94corolla, on Flickr

Completed Mirrors 2 by gold94corolla, on Flickr

I LOVE how they look. The signals are perfectly level in the mirrors, no weird angle to them. And the covers don't look too big or anything. Certainly looks better than the weird lights I had drilled into the old mirrors lol.

Next up was a TON of wiring. First, I had to cut off the old power mirror switch and solder on the new harness. Same thing with the mirror harnesses. With the harnesses swapped, the new mirror switch and mirrors plugged into the stock harness.

Next was to get the signals and folding operational. Because the USA mirrors have 2 functions that the JDM mirrors do not have (heated surface and autodimming), that gave me 4 extra wires in the harness to use for the signal and folding. So, I didn't have to run any extra wires through the door harnesses. I did have to run wires from one side of the car to the other under the dash though. 2 wires for the power folding on the passenger side, and 1 wire for the signal. Both signal wires come out of the door harness, and then to the driver's kick panel, where they solder to the wires going to the instrument cluster turn signal indicator arrows.

The folding is all self contained though, so the driver's side folded without any extra wiring. The passenger side just had to be connected to the switch in order to operate.

Push the button in, and the mirrors fold up!

Driver's Mirror Folded by gold94corolla, on Flickr

Passenger's Mirror Folded by gold94corolla, on Flickr

And the signals work! They are visible from all angles.

LED Light Front by gold94corolla, on Flickr

LED Light Front Angle by gold94corolla, on Flickr

LED Light Side by gold94corolla, on Flickr

LED Light Rear Angle by gold94corolla, on Flickr

LED Light Rear by gold94corolla, on Flickr


And here are some pics of the wiring lol...... you can just ignore these, or you can try and decipher them to understand how much work this was.

JDM Switch Wiring by gold94corolla, on Flickr

Driver Door Wires by gold94corolla, on Flickr

Passenger Door Wires by gold94corolla, on Flickr

Driver Kick Panel Wires by gold94corolla, on Flickr

Passenger Kick Panel Wires by gold94corolla, on Flickr




I made a video of the car. You can see the tail lights and mirrors lighting up. You can hear the new exhaust. At the end, you can see how the mirrors fold. Not good quality, but here it is:






And one last mod. While I had the door wiring exposed, I cut this wire to the driver's window switches.

Alarm Improvement Mod by gold94corolla, on Flickr

That was to improve the stock alarm. Before, if the alarm was armed, it would disarm if you manually unlocked it from the inside. So, if I left the windows open or someone broke the window, they could just reach in and turn off the alarm. Well, not anymore lol.



And this thread is finally caught up lol.

Yeah man, I love these mirrors every day. The signal looks and functions perfectly. I fold in the mirrors at work, because it's rear-in parking, and the spaces are so narrow, and so the extra clearance is great. And the blue mirror surface works perfectly to reduce headlight glare. And the mirrors have a wide angle to them, so I have no blind spots to the sides anymore. 100% worth it!

No.... YOU are so sexy

He loves my car, or loves the IS?

Well right now, I'm trying to decide between these for winter wheels. I've always loved the Work Meisters, but there's no way I'm using those as winters lol.

Looking at either Rota D2 in gunmetal

Rota D2 Wheel|Rota Rim|Rota Racing Wheels



or XXR 527 in Chromium black

XXR 527 Wheels - Concave multi-spoke rims new 2014 colors



The XXR's fitment will line up better to what I already have, they'd be 8.75" front and back, with 35mm front and 20mm rear offsets. The Rotas will be a little more sunken, with 8" and 9" at 35 and 30 mm offset.

I might be able to get a winter tire package with the XXRs (might), I'm definitely gonna have to put tires on the Rotas myself.

XXR are cheaper

But I like the look of the Rotas more.... just not the fitment so much. But it's winter, does it matter? lol. Keeping the 18" diameter. Keeping wide tires. If it snows too much, I'll stay in bed. I just need something other than a summer tire in the winter.

Which wheels? Remember, I've still got those "LMs" sitting here for you

Yeah that's what I thought. Maybe if they were gunmetal, we could just trade lol

XXR 522 right?

well no powdercoating for me lol. Why do you have 6 of them?

I was originally leaning towards the Rotas, but might go with the XXRs after all.

lol
Added: Oct 7, 2014 1:05 AM
bought 2 more of the wheels you hate

Yeah well I always thought that they looked too small on the car anyway

lol I guess that those were your favorite pics of the bunch

Finished dying my interior door panels and upper tray carpet back to black. It didn't come out perfectly black, as the dye I used was more of a restorer than a color changer. Oh well, at least they look a LOT better.





Best thing is that, while the fabric is nice and dark again, it's still just as soft as before! Not like spray painting it, no stiffness at all.

Though the upper tray carpet did turn out black... it had faded to a blue color:

Well the door panels are still purple... just darker colored. Oh well, so much for that lol.

Door Fabric is Still Purple by gold94corolla, on Flickr

In other news, I got my set of new painted fenders!

Fenders Take 2 (And More Paint) by gold94corolla, on Flickr

My replacement doors came in

Finally..... Doors! by gold94corolla, on Flickr

Here they are, along with the original 2 new fenders that didn't match at all lol.

New Parts by gold94corolla, on Flickr

Doors have been sanded, filled, sanded, primed, sanded, and washed. Ready for paint!

Doors Primed & Ready For Paint by gold94corolla, on Flickr

I cut a piece out of the original fender (you can see the hole up there) and sent it to the fender painters so that they would actually get it right this time. The 2nd set arrived, and these actually match (close enough anyway) lol.

New Fenders Paint Matched by gold94corolla, on Flickr

I think he was talking about the 2 rims I was looking at, not yours lol (good you sold them though, now you can buy mine)