Celica Forums General Discussion Exterior Engine swap kind of?

Let's say my warranty ended a while ago and I blew my motor. I didn't but lets just say I did. Could I put the new Lotus' engine in my GTS being that it's slightly higher horespower and if yes would it cost more than are already expensive engine. Maybe also the engineers at Lotus fixed the lift bolts so they won't break, belt tensioner, etc. I heard they improved the throttle response. Just thinking

well i'm not exactly sure, but i suppose you could. seeing as it is the same motor.

but you're right, it probably would be too expensive, and seeing as the engine produces only 10 more horsepower (190 bhp compared with the gts 180 bhp), i'd just stick with the stock engine.

what makes the lotus elise so much faster than the celica is that the elise is stripped down so much (over 800 pounds lighter) and that it is rear wheel drive. not so much because of the 10 horsepower boost (although it helps)

What did lotus change on the engine?

Because the GTS engine (jap and europe spec) already has 192 hp. So what did lotus "tune" to get to 190?

Not sure of lift bolt breaking, because I know only 1 GTS, he never had problems (model 2000). Not much GTS's here.

So you could get a euro spec GTS engine, that will fit for sure. But you will need 95 octane petrol at least.

according to car and driver magazine, it simply said lotus took the 180 horse toyota (actually made by yamaha)powerplant and worked from there.

here is a link to the article: car and driver: 2005 lotus elise [caranddriver.com]

BTW, Lotus' motor is actually the US spec (180HP) motor, it got a different exhaust system and intake manifold (since the elise is a M/R configuration like the MR2) and the cam switchover (lift point) was smoothed out, and torque falloff was boosted a bit. most of the tuning was from the ECU, and the exhaust was extensively tuned, to the point where it's about as efficient as it gets.

You can't use the exhaust on the celica (the motor is in the front, as opposed to the back of the car like the elise) but I'm pretty sure the ECU should swap in just fine, assuming you have a 6-speed tranny

Toyota was extremely interested in how lotus tuned the ECU, so you can expect toyota to adopt this tuning on future 2ZZ powered cars (so, finding a donor motor and ECU will become easier in time)

JDM and euro motors have more HP because the emissions laws aren't quite the same, and they also are tuned to run on higer octane (usually 98 to 102 octane as opposed to 91-93 octane here in the states) You could swap in a foreign engine, but you will either need to run racing fuel, or you'll need to detune it (swap in a domestic ECU, add a domestic cat-pipe) to run on premium pump gas.

since this is all theoretical, let's determine what part of your motor bit the bullet: If it was the block, just get a fresh short block, and reuse the old head, or, if the head is messed up, buy a new head, rebuild the block, and you're all good. it's usually cheaper to rebuild what you have than to get a all new engine anyways. Check your local salvage yard for donor motors if you're strapped. Crate motors are nice, but real expensive (and I'm sure a Lotus-built crate motor will be astronomical, all lotus parts are)

very good insight i'll roll with that.