Echo-Troll Modding Thread (2005 Toyota Echo)

[jamesshaw89]

Great project! I'm going to keep my eye out for some pizza pans while shopping today. I've got an 800 mile all highway trip coming up at the end of the month and your thread is giving me more motivation to get in a couple mods before I go.

Looking forward to your results and next mods!

...subscribed

[echo-francis]

Center Belly Pan DIY Fabrication :

Originally Posted by echo-francis

We have started today the center belly pan.

The Center belly pan is now done, all the underside of the car is finished!

Here are some pictures of this winning thing :
(Driver side, front)

(Driver side, back)

(Junction between the two pans)

(Connection with the Rear Belly Pan)

(This is a view from the front of all the pans.)

[CigaR007]

Already looking forward to the A-B-A testing of that belly pan !

I am interested in that aluminum frame you guys are using for the bellypan support. Looking good !

[HyperMileQC]

Originally Posted by jamesshaw89

Great project! I'm going to keep my eye out for some pizza pans while shopping today. I've got an 800 mile all highway trip coming up at the end of the month and your thread is giving me more motivation to get in a couple mods before I go.

Looking forward to your results and next mods!

...subscribed

Thank you James, when your wheel covers are done, give us a link to your thread so we can all appreciate the work! Good luck.

Originally Posted by CigaR007

Already looking forward to the A-B-A testing of that belly pan !

I am interested in that aluminum frame you guys are using for the bellypan support. Looking good !

Lol, A-B-A test will be done when all the belly pan will be removable only by removing screw. We have to do it on the rear and center pan. After we will probably test it.

the aluminium frame is very strong, the center pan will never fall.

[5.4]

Just a few questions:

Won't you cause your brakes to overheat by covering them?
Won't you cause improper wear and tear on the tires and suspension components, not to mention dangerous braking with over inflated tires?
Won't you cook your engine and transmission covering most of the air vents?
Aren't some mods like deletion of power steering and no DLR lights just dangerous for driving?

And isn't the corrugated plastic a danger to put near the engine considering it has a low melting point and a chance to cause a fire? Or (unless I missed something) are you going to be replacing them with aluminum? Also is duck tape a realistic method to securing these things considering a all the outdoor elements and the cars high speed, plus all the highway code bylaws.

Looking to do some of the mods my self if they really have no negative effects on the car itself.

[HyperMileQC]

Originally Posted by 5.4

Won't you cause your brakes to overheat by covering them?

*The brake pads are getting alot of air from the other side of the wheel, and as hypermilers, we tend to not use the brake pedal, by using the driving without brake technique, so the brake pads are pretty cool all the time. I can assure you.

Originally Posted by 5.4

Won't you cause improper wear and tear on the tires and suspension components

*The wheel covers are like ~3 Lbs with the original hub cap, so they are not really affecting the tire and suspension wear .

Originally Posted by 5.4

Not to mention dangerous braking with over inflated tires?

*45 Psi, over inflated tires? you must be joking. The tire max is 44, so 45 is not too high. Some people here inflate their tire up to 60 Psi, and have no problem.

Here is a really good article about overinflating tires on cleanmpg.com...

Driving Under Pressure (full article) - CleanMPG Forums

Originally Posted by 5.4

Won't you cook your engine and transmission covering most of the air vents?

*The grille block is effectively blocking alot of air from going into the engine bay. But, having a ScanGauge, we can monitor the engine heat, and it stay all the time around 88°C (190°F). So overheating is not a problem, also, living in quebec, winter is pretty cold, and having a grille block is helping us heating faster the engine. In summer it is less blocked...

Originally Posted by 5.4

Aren't some mods like deletion of power steering and no DLR lights just dangerous for driving?

*Power steering deletion is not really dangerous you know... an Echo is pretty light and it is easy to turn the wheels even completely stopped, when engine is off. So, when driving, it will never cause problem. Some older car just doesnt have any power steering at all, and are not more dangerous than others...

*For the Day light, we want to put a switch to deactivate it when not usefull. I know that when its get darker, i need them, i i'm not gonna let them off...

Originally Posted by 5.4

And isn't the corrugated plastic a danger to put near the engine considering it has a low melting point and a chance to cause a fire? Or (unless I missed something) are you going to be replacing them with aluminum?

*Coroplast is flamable, but after 2 months of having a full frontal belly pan, no signs of overheating. also, near the muffler and catalysor, we do not put coroplast, but metal screens. We do not plan to replace the belly pan with aluminium tho...

Originally Posted by 5.4

Also is duck tape a realistic method to securing these things considering a all the outdoor elements and the cars high speed, plus all the highway code bylaws.

*Duct tape is really temporary effectively... This is why the mods are not holded by tape, but with screws and zip tie. Duct tape is only to seal the gaps. We are actually upgrading our mods to have it more permanent.

Originally Posted by 5.4

Looking to do some of the mods my self if they really have no negative effects on the car itself.

*Glad to see you want to maximize your car efficiency. You should take a look to these pages if it is not already done :

100+ Hypermiling Tips

65+ Efficiency Mods

Looking forward to see the modifications

[5.4]

Originally Posted by HyperMileQC

*The brake pads are getting alot of air from the other side of the wheel, and as hypermilers, we tend to not use the brake pedal, by using the driving without brake technique, so the brake pads are pretty cool all the time. I can assure you.

Obviously driving without randomly hitting the gas and brakes on the highway is the way to go, but most of the time the roads are clogged here so its not up to me.
With a large car I'd be hesitant to do this with the higher weight and larger brakes, with a small compact not so much.

Originally Posted by HyperMileQC

*The wheel covers are like ~3 Lbs with the original hub cap, so they are not really affecting the tire and suspension wear .

What I mean with that is that at 35 psi some of the roughness of the roads is absorbed by the tires and not transferred to the suspension components and possibly not causing pre-mature suspension failures.

Originally Posted by HyperMileQC

*45 Psi, over inflated tires? you must be joking. The tire max is 44, so 45 is not too high. Some people here inflate their tire up to 60 Psi, and have no problem.

And some people could inflate them until they explode. But I figured at speed the air expands thats why it wouldn't be ideal the pump up the tires to the limit, especially if you always load up your car.

Originally Posted by HyperMileQC

*The grille block is effectively blocking alot of air from going into the engine bay. But, having a ScanGauge, we can monitor the engine heat, and it stay all the time around 88°C (190°F). So overheating is not a problem, also, living in quebec, winter is pretty cold, and having a grille block is helping us heating faster the engine. In summer it is less blocked...

What about the trans temp, where does that sit before and after blocking?


Thanks.

[MetroMPG]

Originally Posted by 5.4

And some people could inflate them until they explode. But I figured at speed the air expands thats why it wouldn't be ideal the pump up the tires to the limit, especially if you always load up your car.

You don't think the tire engineers took heat pressure rise into consideration when designating max inflation pressure?

What about the trans temp, where does that sit before and after blocking?

The car has a manual transmission. When was the last time you were concerned about cooling a manual in a passenger car?

[user removed]

The front brake pads on my old 94 Civic VX had over 50% of the pad material left at 63,000 miles.

The original brake pads on a 1994 model car in 2010.

5.4 you seem to have a problem understanding, 67% of your fuel energy is wasted as heat energy. Once you lean to drive more efficiently then that 67% drops, in some cases by as much as 50%. Basically this means you now have to re engineer the car to reduce the heat energy radiated away to the exhaust and cooling as well as brake systems.

In fact some members who live in very cold areas could actually drive their cars with only the heater core cooling the engine, even if they blocked off the radiator 100 %.

Plenty of info here and many members who have proven all of this over hundreds of thousands of miles. Stick around and put cash in your wallet, or drive normally and give it to the oil companies. Your choice of course.

regards
Mech

[5.4]

Originally Posted by MetroMPG

The car has a manual transmission. When was the last time you were concerned about cooling a manual in a passenger car?

I was talking about an auto, didn't notice the echo was a manual.

Originally Posted by Old Mechanic

The front brake pads on my old 94 Civic VX had over 50% of the pad material left at 63,000 miles.

The original brake pads on a 1994 model car in 2010.

5.4 you seem to have a problem understanding, 67% of your fuel energy is wasted as heat energy. Once you lean to drive more efficiently then that 67% drops, in some cases by as much as 50%. Basically this means you now have to re engineer the car to reduce the heat energy radiated away to the exhaust and cooling as well as brake systems.

In fact some members who live in very cold areas could actually drive their cars with only the heater core cooling the engine, even if they blocked off the radiator 100 %.

Plenty of info here and many members who have proven all of this over hundreds of thousands of miles. Stick around and put cash in your wallet, or drive normally and give it to the oil companies. Your choice of course.

regards
Mech

Last brake pads lasted me under 30k miles. Drive as calm as you can but you can't get rid of traffic. The only way are endless empty highways (I wish).

I know that some small cars struggle to keep engine heat in winter, but temperatures don't drop down that low here anyways. The concern is the auto transmission, mechs sometimes recommend to add an axillary cooler just to keep them cooler. So my concern is frying the trans unknowingly because the car I have at the moment doesn't have a temp gauge to monitor the trans temp.