HOLY CRAP! my car's in a coma...

HOLY CRAP! my car's in a coma...

we were all driving home last friday night after the weekly Grupo Toyota meet... it was a rare occassion that all of us were actually driving within the speed limit and for some reason we weren't the devils that we usually are on the highway...

but then no matter how careful you are, there are just some very stupid drivers out there... out of nowhere a Ford Escape suddenly cuts in front of me... i was doing around 80kph, he was doing around 40-50kph... it had been raining the whole day so the road was wet and muddy hence my brakes locked and i skidded and slammed into him causing him to hit the jeepney in front of him... my friend Vlad's ae101 was behind me at about the same speed and his tires didn't grip either but he was able to steer a little to the left. it wasn't enough though, his right front corner hit my left rear corner causing my car to half-spin to the right before slamming into the cement barrier of the bridge we were on... thankfully all the damage was done to the cars and not to the drivers and passengers...


yep, that's my engine bay. not only did the valve cover come off but the cylinder head broke into pieces too...


that's a piece of the cylinder head that i picked up and plan to weld onto the side of whatever new engine gets installed...


that's where my friend Vlad hit me...



Vlad's AE101


how the Ford and the jeepney met


like a phoenix she will rise to burn up the streets again...





the toyota dealership and service center i brought her to says that she CAN be rebuilt. it actually only looks bad because the hood is all f'd up and the crumple zones did what they were supposed to do... but the chassis is intact and so is the engine block. so it's just a matter of replacing the body panels and a few parts of the engine bay frame, getting a new cylinder head and a new radiator... might have it painted a new color while i'm at it...

bottomline... she's not dead. she's in a coma. will update you guys on the rebuilding...

Bucket 'o suck. I hope you get her running. I feel for your friend Vlad.

damn, sorry to hear that bro. basta ayos lang kayo, okey lang. pwede pa naman ayusin ang kotse di ba? ingat tol.

Wow man, that sucks. Jeepney? Heh, as soon as I saw that, I figured out where you were. Some of the drivers there are crazy in general.

oh by the way, the airbag DID NOT deploy!!!

wow, heavy pre!
glad you're ok. which hwy. were you travelling on?

southbound south super hiway... we were on top of the alabang viaduct on our way to the filinvest exit...

sorry to hear that, hope u get her back up.

Lol. Ok, all the drivers. I think it's scarriest in the mountain passes where the road is barely wide enough for two cars, especially if you have to share the road with all the trucks hauling the season's harvest.

i like the deep blue of the new 2005 camry, the honda crv or the deep blue of nsx. dunno the exact name of the color, alam ko lang deep blue sya!

on one of your pictures, you have a japanese plate on the front. orig ba yan pre? where did you buy that from?

it's amazing that people in P.I. can revive just about any badly damaged car. i'm pretty sure if live in N.A., your car would be declared "totalled" by the insurance.

ok it looks like i can start rebuilding as early as next week... just finalizing all the repair cost estimates with the toyota service center and the insurance paperwork (they're paying for everything! woot!)

while i'm at it... the body's getting a fresh coat of paint that's a few shades darker than the previous electric blue... and i'm working on getting a good deal on a real carbon-fiber hood...

more or less this is what it's gonna look like when i'm done (photochopped)... haven't decided on the rims yet though... i'm definitely keeping the rims but painting them a different color... what color do you guys think i should paint them? i was thinking maybe guyn metal gray but any suggestion would be most welcome...

ay nako..haha gotta love the Philippines. Hope your car wakes up from her coma.

what color are you planning for your car? i think gun metal will pretty much go with any color you choose.

it will still have to be blue so probably just a darker shade... midnight blue perhaps? i don't want to change the color entirely... it'd be too much of a hassle to have it re-registered to report the color change and all that...

yep that's an original jap plate. bought it in one of the local autoparts stores. those plates are smuggled in from japan. i think they're sold by the kilo in the junkyards in japan. cost me around P500 ($10).

yeah it is pretty amazing how people here can revive cars that are in even worse shape than mine while cars with much less damage can be deemed totalled there in the states. i think it has a lot to do with the availability of cheap surplus parts, cheap labor, and the fact that the economy here is too bad to consider having to buy a new car. oh and filipinos have always been sentimental about everything, including their cars. i mean, i love that car. she has a name. no amount of damage would ever get me to consider her irreparaible. she's ALWAYS repairable. i promised myself i'd let my grandkids drive her some day. hahahaha!

holy sh****8!!!!!!!!!!!!

yo jam, no worries bro... it'll be fixed... eh, you're frequent here at vvti, nice one bro...

well, i've finally gotten around to uploading the photos of the rebuild progress into my imageshack account...

here they are in chronological order...

stripped...


rear body frame re-alignment...


the interior was stripped and put into storage to avoid damage from welding sparks...



that's me! installing new headlights...


and this is what she looks like as of last week...



so far everything is going smooth and we're on schedule. we think she'll be ready to hit the streets again by mid to late november...

hey jam, angela is in good progress... keep us posted here and at GT okies...

HEs from Philippines !!!!..................ahhhh i hate em drivers over there..theyre all crazy!!!

NIce man keepon going.....Good work....

Wow.. how much is it costing you to get it rebuilt? Would it not have been better to pick up another one with a straight chassis? But i guess this babe has sentimental value.

Mm.. flakes eh, that will be an interesting touch. What engine is going in? Sorry didn't know what you had before.

yeah the budget i have to rebuild it could have just as easily gotten me a second hand car. but you're right, the car DOES have a lot of sentimental value. literally blood, sweat and tears went into making it look and run the way that it did before the accident so i decided to just rebuild it.

besides, the difference in height between my car and the ford was enough so that the chassis was undamaged. the damage was mostly to the body panels and some on the body frame and engine.

painting started this morning. she's getting generous coats of anzahl cyanine blue mixed with firemist gold metal flakes in varying sizes. i know, it's gonna look so gay but i'm confident the simple body kit and the lowered stance will compensate enough. hahahahahahaha! it should be ready for track testing in 3 weeks... nothing fancy, just a few slow laps, a few laps with sudden bursts of speed, and a few all-out laps... just to break the engine in.

i'll keep you guys posted!

naaahh, not all drivers in the philippines are crazy. actually, pinoy's are really great drivers. this i can vouch for. hehehehhee, you guys should see it when it is rush hour in the city. literally, you stick out your arm and you CAN touch the other cars around you. lolz...

the engine will still be the same one i had before... only with a new cylinder head because that part got smashed to pieces.

it's a 2E -- carbureted, 1300cc, 12valve SOHC. don't be fooled by it's size. hahaha! toyota did a good job into squeezing out all the torque this baby can put out even in stock form. lot's of power in the low-mid rpm's. perfect for auto-cross and sprints!

Coming from Baguio City Going to Tarlac is Hell I wrecked 2 cars doing that shit Thank God no toyotas

just a few updates... as of now the engine has gone through major surgery (mostly to the ports and to the combustion chamber hehehehehe!) and is ready for re-assmebly.

we're just waiting for the paint to settle and dry before buffing it out. the paint looks fantastic specially in direct sunlight.

also got a new set of rims...

rally sparco tarmac. but the ones i got are 4 holes, 15". this pic is of the 5 holes, 17" version.

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yep i do but there's nothing in it yet. hahahaha! still trying to find time to work on it. maybe when the rebuilding is done, i'll post the full AUTObiography.