GoldStar

I've always wanted to do a Prius electric power steering setup, planning to do it when I get around to the rack conversion. The Prius units provide the power assist in the steering column, and from what I understand, we have enough space under the dash to make it work. Requires some fabrication obviously, but I do remember a couple of guys in the Facebook groups who have done it successfully.

Gonna try to get some night shots the next time I bring it to work since I get out so late. I'm using a heat gun to loosen up the adhesive, then using a plastic interior trim tool to work the outer lens off of the assembly similar to this video. For reassembly, I'm using butyl sealant tape like this to re-seal: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08398DP4Q?psc=1 It might look too thick, but you can stretch to thin it out kinda like playdoh. I still ended up getting it too thick in some areas, but with some further persuasion with the heat gun, I was able to get all of the little locking tabs back where they were. The aluminum finish on the passenger taillight there ended up having a bit of a matte texture to it, so I was expecting the white gloss to be much brighter. It does seem to diffuse the light much more evenly, at least. I'll see how it looks in the night.

Some time back, an accident took out the passenger side of a very clean set of taillight assemblies I got from Steve. Soon after I ended up respraying the insides of my very rusty original passenger taillight with a metallic aluminum spray. Today I got around to respraying my original driver taillight, but this time I used a white gloss paint to see if it made a difference. Thought I'd post the results here. For the record, I don't recommend doing this to a clean unopened set of assemblies, as I believe they perform better. However, if you have a rusty set, either of these paints seem like good options to breathe some new life into them. These were the paints I used; metallic aluminum and white gloss, both by Rustoleum: Here's a couple of pics of the white gloss driver prior to reassembly: And here's a comparison before I installed the driver today. Driver taillight in this picture is an original very clean unopened assembly, and the passenger has been resprayed with the metallic aluminum paint: And here's the driver with the white gloss paint, passenger unchanged: Honestly, the camera picked up more of a difference than I see in person. The driver seems to glint a bit more due to the gloss, but otherwise they look the same to me. One doesn't seem any more brighter than the other. I'll have to check again when it gets dark. For anyone curious, I'm using butyl rubber tape to reseal my assemblies: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08398DP4Q?psc=1

I've been using Imgur for years, got a guide here:

To update this, I ended up pulling mine apart, cleaning up as much rust as I could (there was a lot), and resprayed with aluminum paint. Does look noticeably more dull, but does the job for now. Plan is to do the driver's side with a gloss white to see how it comes out. If I like it I'll re-do the passenger.

Forgot to update this, I got a driver seat form EzmanCSM. Very cool dude to work with

For the record, I think they just started offering these a couple of weeks ago

That's where I got mine. Mikie even had his shop weld them up to the pre-cut spindles I sent him

Thought I'd post this here, NDD Motorsports is making subframes (front and rear) for our cars, as well as control arms: https://ndd-motorsports.mybigcommerce.com/ndd-parts/conquest-starion/ Haven't personally done business with them yet, but if they're willing to make custom subframes for this aging platform, they're good in my book.

A little off topic at this point, but check out Sylvania 1157R LEDs, they work fantastic for me (with my no-load hazard and turn signal flashers)

That's why I went with LEDs all around. Now I just have the cooling fans making me guess whether my alternator just crapped out or not

I was able to recreate it by very lightly accelerating/decelerating while cruising prior to this, or by doing what you described (usually accidentally). I believe this was due to me not putting enough lube on the splines when I first pulled the torque tube. Could be the same for you if yours has never been pulled; that grease doesn't last forever. Check page 3-32 here: http://www.starquestgarage.com/manuals/service/conquest/1988/88_conquest_service_manual_-_group_03_-_rear_axle.pdf For the record, the splines are not a very tight fit. I believe there's play in there by design, hence the grease to prevent metal striking metal. If you're going to have someone pull yours, that would also be the best time to replace the bearing. Kev's got the details here, it's not hard at all:

Chad's still making intakes I believe, but I've only seen him in the Facebook groups. EDIT Motocam's selling his intakes now (among many other cool things): https://www.motocam360.com/products/starquest/product/119-sq-mpi-intake-manifold-fuel-rail

The repair manual said to fill the cup, so I did: I've put some more miles on it since I did this, and it seems to have nearly eliminated the clunk. It does still happen sometimes, but as I learn how to actually operate a manual, and get used to this lightened flywheel, I anticipate I won't hear it anymore. This, and topping of the diff fluid, didn't make a difference with the whining I'm hearing though. I presume after 160k+ miles of unknown abuse it's time for the differential to be rebuilt.

I got a set of the Holleys, just aligned them recently. They work great, but did need a negative switched relay kit. It's really nice to turn on the lights and not see the volt meter move

I read the Anco 4805 3/16in pins work, apparently they're in the "Anco Windshield Wiper Blade To Arm Adapter Kit 4815". I'm personally using wiper refills provided by one of the POs, NAPA 60-1914 and Trico 44-190. The Trico refills are the only ones I've used so far, they seem to work fine.

KSports are also an option, equal in quality to the D2's I believe. I have a set and they're great

I've heard and seen some build quality issues with them, not sure if Isaiah's got that sorted yet. As far as installation, "easy" is relative. All coilovers for these cars require cutting up a set of front spindles and welding the coilover sleeves to them like so: Steve usually has a set of front spindles pre-cut for sale: https://starquestparts.net/ . The rears are bolt-in.

Huh, didn't think that cup was welded on. Not claiming to have any metalworking experience, but I thought the whole thing would have been manufactured as one piece. To me, it just looked to me like this car had seen too many 5k RPM clutch drops in it's life. I guess we'll really see how much of a problem it is when I get this MPI swap done and dialed in.

The ETACS acts more like a modern body control module. It controls your windows, wipers, door locks, etc. Shouldn't affect the engine. Check out page 258 (270 of the PDF) of the electrical service manual here: http://www.starquestgarage.com/manuals/service/conquest/1988/88_conquest_service_nav.html I'd still look into relocating rather than deleting.

I brake cleaned the TT splines so I could get a better look at the wear. I've actually pulled this not too long ago just to grease it, but I didn't put any grease in the TT pocket. I will definitely be doing that this time around. Today I put a new bearing in the tube, and was just about to reinstall the torque shaft when I noticed these "stretch marks". Is this normal?

Alright, so my Quest has been making some rear end noises for some time now, and it's about time I took care of it. To preface, by axles are the 4-bolts, so I think the axles, differential, and torque tube are original to my 87. One of the noises a clunk I get sometimes when getting on/off the clutch, or when alternating between light accell/decell when cruising. Got it in the air and this is what I found, definitely seems to be related to the torque tube: https://i.imgur.com/X1DWBoW.mp4 So I pulled the torque tube and had a look, below are a couple of pictures. I am seeing some wear on the splines, but I'm not sure it's enough to cause the play I'm seeing/hearing. Does this look like normal wear?: The other noise I'm hearing is a whining/groaning during decel, but only in 4th and, to a much lesser extent, 5th. It does go away abruptly once I slow down enough or if I accelerate at all. Kinda sounds like a transmission with straight-cut gears, but mine's not a race car yet, and this noise seems a bit too situational to be the transmission. Considering it's loudest in 4th, my hunch is the differential. While I had the torque tube off, I checked for play at the differential flange, and I am able to feel a little bit of play in the diff, but not near enough to get on camera. For the moment I was planning to top off the diff fluid to see if that helped, but is a little bit of play expected in a healthy differential?

99% sure this is your light controller. IIRC only 86-87's have them, but I may be mistaken. It's this black box next to the blower motor: Try tapping it to see if your backlighting comes on.

Alright, I figured out how to make this work with my LEDs. Long story short; per the diagram, I replaced the white w/green stripe wire coming out of the resistor with a short to ground, and all seems to be functional again. Here's how I did it: In case the picture doesn't show, the B-12 resistor is behind the kick panel next to the dead pedal, taped to the wire harness. It's a simple 2-pin connector, Green wire on one pin and a white/green stripe wire on the other. The kick panel is held in place by 2 screws going through the relay cluster. And this is me connecting the green wire from it's connector to the resistor, but simply shorting the other pin of the resistor to ground. Explanation: I spent a lot of time figuring out how this works. Below is what I found, I don't believe the repair manual goes over any of this: On key-forward, the ABS computer puts about 5 volts to the circuit highlighted. The manual doesn't illustrate this, but somewhere on this WG wire, it splices into the WG wire connecting the hazard switch and the turn signal switch illustrated on page 8-188 of the electrical diagram, the stop light circuit. Splicing here means the only path to ground is through the brake light bulbs. This allows the control unit to see if any of the brake light bulbs are functioning. If they are, there should be very little voltage available at the control unit. If ALL of the brake light bulbs are out, there would be no path to ground, thus all 5 volts will be available at the computer, indicating a "malfunction" in the brake light circuit. Keyword here is ALL; if just one bulb is functional, that completes the circuit, and all of the provided voltage would be used by this bulb. I verified one incandescent bulb is enough to convince the ABS computer the circuit is good in my testing. This becomes a problem with the modern LED replacements I added. Obviously, LEDs require WAY less power to operate, but if we put unrestricted battery voltage to bare LEDs, they would burn out very quickly. So, to make these replacements as drop-in as they can be, manufacturers have built-in resistors with these LEDs. These added resistors dramatically drop the flow of current through the circuit to protect the LEDs. In our (and I presume many other older) cars, this has the consequence of dramatically increasing the available voltage at the ABS computer, making it think the circuit is "open". This is my fix logically illustrated. Instead of this circuit going through the bulbs, I instead just shorted it to ground AFTER the resistor. This drops the available voltage at the ABS computer roughly as it would with an incandescent, so it thinks everything is good. Once I did this, I verified my anti-lock light stayed off, and I test drove my Quest afterwards. The system seems to be working, as I could not lock up the rears for the life of me, but I'll be double checking this the next time I get it in the air.

Not sure about a megasquirt, but MotoCam360 just recently took over Scotty's work from DIYAutoTune: https://www.motocam360.com/products/starquest/product/121-mc360-stand-alone-ecu