Performance/reliability parts for the TC

[Guest Thegreatandpowerfulr]

Hello all. I have been looking into getting into the ownership of a TC. How has your TC engines held up? What would be some improvements to get three reliability higher?

[Hemi Dude]

3 hours ago, Thegreatandpowerfulr said:

Hello all. I have been looking into getting into the ownership of a TC. How has your TC engines held up? What would be some improvements to get three reliability higher?

I am one of the technical advisors for the TC America Club. I have owned my 1989 TC since March of 1995. It is the 2.2L single overhead cam engine. It has somewhere around 280 thousand miles on the original engine.

I have replaced the head gasket one time, soon after buying the car. At that time I also replaced the timing belt. I replaced the timing belt again last year. I have also replaced the connecting rod bearings  some time ago.

All the work stated above was done purely as preventive maintenance. The engine has had no mechanical trouble in any way.  I have also replaced the automatic transaxle with a 5 speed manual trans.

If you click on the links under my name below, you can read further.

Edited July 24, 2017 by Hemi Dude
correct spelling. (see edit history)

[Guest Thegreatandpowerfulr]

I had actually read that article, it is nice to see you here! Would you recommend swapping the transmission or finding one of the rarer manuals? Was it worth the extra effort?

[Hemi Dude]

7 hours ago, Thegreatandpowerfulr said:

I had actually read that article, it is nice to see you here! Would you recommend swapping the transmission or finding one of the rarer manuals? Was it worth the extra effort?

As you no doubt have read, I also had one of the 'rare' ones with the Cosworth head and the Getrag 5 speed. It was certainly somewhat quicker than my 8 valve car, but not that much that it would make me keep it over the red TC. What I like about the 8 valve car over the 16 valve one is that parts are MUCH simpler to find for the generic engine. Also, working in the 16V engine is much more difficult or should I say time consuming.

The car you buy will depend on what you want out of the car. The 8 valve engine with the automatic is not anything to brag on. I replaced the automatic with a 5 speed manual trans for the reason given in that Allpar article.

How could I not recommend the 5 speed over the automatic? The 5 speed is what makes my TC "FUN"  to drive, especially in the mountains where you need to do some shifting in order to maintain "FUN" speed.

I don't race my cars so that is not why I favor the 5 speed, I do DRIVE them hard enough to gain the benefits of the 5 speed. Fuel mileage certainly is greatly improved as well.

To answer your final question, ABSOLUTELY!            Did you read the brake conversion that is linked on the main page?