Well looks like i'll be the first to post I bought the car back in August 2002 for $9000 and was in reasonable nick. It already had some of the stereo in it and was a much better car than my old VL with its problems. Within hours of owning it, i began the debadge from Toyota badges. It came with the towbar, stock rims and basically a very plain car. Gees was it in for a shock It remained as a debadged lexcen for a little while untill such time as a girlfriend at the time, decided that rather than park in a car space, she'd put i up a rock retaining wall... needless to say there was significant damage done. It was a very rough patch for the old girl there... $1200 damage and no insurance for a learner driver... i won't get into politics about it but it was repaired on the cheap. At the time though it was a good chance to re-do the front end to commodore specs so a commodore front bar was bought, and commodore headlights. Thats pretty much how it stayed for a while till mid this year it was in another accident which was unavoidable... and obviously not my fault. Luckily this meant all previous damage could be repaired under insurance from the cab company. And finally, i would have a blue bumper. Since then its had a fair bit of work done, which has seen 3 different colour schemes for the interior and well.... they didn't look very good. Infact the car was the centre of much ridicule. Its now had a full blown cleanup of all the interior, which see's the dash surround as body colour, with all door handles as navy blue, and the centre console also as navy blue. There's been a few gauges added.. some for... well i don't know why but they were. The voltmeter is usefull though. After $275 for the RACQ to tow me from The Esplanade in Surfers to home, i want to keep an eye on what the alternator is doing. Due to a few skids here and there (legal of course) the tyres wore out and i got sick of the old 15's... so some new ROH R/T's were thrown at it, they should really have been 17's but i opted for the smaller 16's. In the last 2 weeks of December 2003 it saw a fair whack of work done.. mainly cleaning up the interior, but the ugly orange side repeated were pissed off in turn for some VT clear jobbies. The intake was taken care of by fitting a genuine cold air intake kit, and removing the mesh from the air flow meter. Its also now sounding a litte nicer with a 2.5" cat back system running through a single Lukey Ultraflow muffler. In that time it also saw the HIDEOUS door moulding removed... painfully. The latest addition to it has been a B&M Electonic Shift Improver... which is a piggy back switch on the loom to the auto gearbox that when set to on, adjusts the pressure of the box and makes the shifts a touch harder... bit nasty when on a wet road as if its being pushed, it will chirp into second. Its cleaned up decently now S for Stock badge on the back Dash surround as body colour New Gauge shots Future mods are to include - - SC14 Supercharger with a fmic - HKS 8psi pulley for SC14 - Malpassi rising rate regulator - Pacemaker extractors - FE2 suspension - Alluminium welded fuel tank sheild - and 2 more gauges for Boost, and for air/fuel mixture Gees that reads a bit like an episode of this is your life... Anyway enjoy. Some original photos have not been recovered yet.

Nice work man. Toiled through the hard times and everyone slaggin on the vehicle (You must admit, it IS a Toyota). Good to see it when it gets blown. Maybe when my ****ta hits the road and I come out for a cruise eh.

will an sc14 fit anywhere along the v6????????? good to see the interior is back to normal but rob , much better.

those shift improver thingo's,cant you adjust them or is it just on/off? i remember reading about them somewhere.

Andy, yeah they do fit... a few fabricated brackets here and there, relocation of the coil packs and a few little welds and its in. on about 4psi it makes around 20% more.... although the blowers gone on hold cos i spent $12000 on a boat yesterday. tweak, the one i have is the B&M one. They're just a switch thats a piggy back for the original plug... you can make your own using a switch of some kind and a few resistors. On the electronic boxes its the current to the auto computer that controls the pressure of the box.

Cars looks neat dude... Good luck on any future mods Some original photos have not been recovered yet.

Cheers mate... haven't done anything to it other than get sand and **** all through it. Haven't had time to do anything... the way it is at the moment is... if it tows the boat to the ramp then she's all good.

My96vs...this is ur life! lol sniff sniff. We all go thru hard times, and in the end we get to where we want...sort of.

hahahaha Man she's not a happy car any more. Poor old girl is tired at 240,000+km on it now and everything is just worn out. There have been ideas made about taking it back to complete lexcen spec and dropping in a Lexus 1UZ V8 motor.... REAL Toyota :P

then get rid of it!! put it too rest!!!! lol, R I P!!!! lol....

haha if only it was that easy... it'd come back to haunt me knowing my luck. Ah well... it runs, it hasn't fallen apart completely yet and it tows my boat so i'm over it. Its pretty much back to stock now with the exception of the exhaust and chip. Interior is back to normal.

Fark i haven't been round here for friggen ages!!!! I sold it in November 2004 for $3300. The gearbox was as good as ****ed and she was losing coolant and so on. So i flogged it off to a bloke who was going to rebuild it for his missus. It lasted a couple of weeks and the box spat it out... thank **** i bought something else.

Blast from the past or what!!! lol So you got a toyota surf???? any good?

Yeah Toyota Surf now... i love the thing, and its unbreakable from my attempts so far.

IFS hiluxes are the gayest thing ever...

Sheesh i can't ****in win with you mob can i? haha Nah i'm over caring... i like the truck, it does everything i want it to, goes where it probably shouldn't go, and is comfy

Done any mods to it? Lift, tyres shocks etc?

See other thread... should be there soon. Its modified yes.

lol my88vl sounds like u bought a nice VS and hammerd it! nice work lol

hahaha ya could say that... bought it, homo'd it up while not realising just how homo it looked, changed it back to original spending twice as much as i did messing it up in the first place, ****ed the gearbox racing it at willowbank then towing a boat loaded with stuff, realised it was time for something a little better and lost $4500 on it in 2 years... Now have a truck i love to death... Current mods - ARB Winch bar IPF Spotties 31x10.5x15 Maxxiss Buckshot muddies Clarion stereo GME UHF & Antenna Hayman Reece towbar Rated recovery points Removed side steps for clearance Engine wise - All intake hose joins replaced for silicone Turbosmart items Turbosmart boost controller (14psi) Blocked EGR Valve Catch Can 2.5" Dump back exhaust K&N Filter Removed air con Custom bash plate for better clearance Pretty nice truck for the money really. Bought for $14,000 and spent probably another $4.