MR2 experts chime in please. I know the AW11 came with the 4A-GE. If one needed another engine, what options would be a direct bolt in with no modifications needed? I'm reading that it would be a similar vintage Corolla or Celica ST, however when I look those up they appear to have come with a 4A-FE and not GE. Then when I read Wiki about the A series, I get even more confused. Help.
If I had an AW11, needed to do a swap, and didn't give a E36 M3 if the car was 112hp, 106hp or 118hp, what are my options for direct bolt in? What cars should I be scouring junkyards for?
Do you just need the block or do you need everything. Basically-does the hypothetical AWII currently have an engine it with all of the associated parts still bolted on?
Look up 7ag swap. NA power or trubo, and increased displacement. Hard to get AGE past these days though. The crazy swaps are 3sgte beams, 1mz, and, if you are insane, 1uzfe.
The only direct bolt in, zero modification move will be another 4age since that's all they came with. Corolla FX16 or another AW11 are your most likely donors.
MrJoshua said:
Do you just need the block or do you need everything. Basically-does the hypothetical AWII currently have an engine it with all of the associated parts still bolted on?
The car has an engine that will start and run, but the crank is cracked. I am not a mechanic, so any work will be farmed out. Hence the search for a direct bolt in.
Will the Corolla motor not bolt in? Is the 4A-FE different enough to create issues?
In reply to SKJSS (formerly Klayfish) :
It might bolt up but the heads are totally different so I'm not sure the EFI will be happy, assuming you can even get the 4age intake on there.
In Toyota speak, the difference between G and F heads is that the G head is the performance version and the F is the economy version.
So for example a 3S-GE or 3S-GTE are the cars with the sporty engines, higher revs etc. The 3S refers to the block, the stuff after the hyphen is the head. The "T" is the turbo.
A 5S-FE would be an economy engine, lower redline.
Back in the day, I had an '86 Toyota Celica GT-S with the 3S-GE (2 liters) engine and a '91 Celica GT-S with a 5S-FE (2.2 liters) engine. You could swap the head from the 3S-GE onto the 5S-FE to create a hybrid 5S-GE that would have 2.2 liters and higher reving engine.
Not sure if this helps at all. The engine you are looking for is probably thin on the ground these days.
The 4AFE will bolt in, not sure how similar the wiring is though. You may also need to reroute some cooling hoses.
Any kind of 4AGE is rare these days and some parts are nearly impossible to get, another possible donor you could find in the US would be an AE92 GTS, but these aren't much more common than AW11s.
A swap that's not silly-hard but worth doing from a performance standpoint is a 2ZZGE. If you use the C60 gearbox this would involve custom engine + trans mounts and heavy modifications to the wiring harness.
I have a 4age crankshaft if you wanted to go the rebuild route instead.
I just checked car-part and to my surprise this place in Tallahassee area shows an 1989 MR2 engine for $750. No details giving. If you can negotiate the price down to $500 it might be worth a slight detour on your FL trips.
I have less trust of this one but towards Anthens, GA this JY shows a 1989 Corolla 1.6L, which it listed as a 4age, which it could be or could not be. Says 173k asking $350
Sanford, FL JY also claims to have an '89 Corolla w/4age w/167k asking $1000
In my experience with "mysteries" like this, I call the yard and ask them to send over some text photos of the part. They usually send out a yard guy to get the pics. It will be easy to tell if the car has a twin-cam head.
Toyota 4ae wiki where you can find pics of various versions.
Searching around the internet it seems that a 4age engine might weigh 278lbs. Now the next question is will it fit in the hatch area of a Prius C for transport? 
Holy crap....just went and shopped 4AGEs. JDM imported 20-valve 4AGEs used to be $650 all day, every day. Now they're all $2500 plus. 4AGEs have gotten expensive.
For the work involved in swapping an engine, I would bank on finding a 4AGE to direct-swap. They're going up in value and it's worth the effort.
Since you're farming out the work, nobody is going to touch swapping in some weird random swap and troubleshooting it, and you don't want them to anyway.
If you want to go on a junkyard treasure hunt, you could actually get a 4AGE in some trims of the 90-92 Geo Prizms. You could probably use the long block from one of those and swap all your stuff onto it. The Prism GSi is uber rare, so it would be a unicorn hunting expedition. This 4AGE apparently was good for 130hp vs the 112 in the AW11.
Geo Prism GSi
Save the AW11!
¯\_(ツ)_/¯ said:
I have a 4age crankshaft if you wanted to go the rebuild route instead.
Oooohhhh....how much do you want for it? Definitely would prefer rebuild if the block is OK. I'm told it is, but need to verify.
John Welsh said:
I just checked car-part and to my surprise this place in Tallahassee area shows an 1989 MR2 engine for $750. No details giving. If you can negotiate the price down to $500 it might be worth a slight detour on your FL trips.
I have less trust of this one but towards Anthens, GA this JY shows a 1989 Corolla 1.6L, which it listed as a 4age, which it could be or could not be. Says 173k asking $350
Sanford, FL JY also claims to have an '89 Corolla w/4age w/167k asking $1000
In my experience with "mysteries" like this, I call the yard and ask them to send over some text photos of the part. They usually send out a yard guy to get the pics. It will be easy to tell if the car has a twin-cam head.
Toyota 4ae wiki where you can find pics of various versions.
Searching around the internet it seems that a 4age engine might weigh 278lbs. Now the next question is will it fit in the hatch area of a Prius C for transport?
If I have to strap the stupid thing to the roof, I'll do it.... 
yep broken crank... and it looks like it had a "rebuild" at one time........
That looks to be a 1st gen crankshaft (1984-1987) - can you get a photo a bit less close so I can verify? If it is a 1st gen crank then it might be a bit tougher to find one - not impossible.
Where are you?
4AGEs are getting a LOT tougher to find, and they are getting more costly. I use to be able to buy a head in 30 min for $100, today It will take a week or two, and the cost has doubled, or more.....
To answer your question... 1985-1987 AE86 Corolla GTS, 1987-1988 AE82 Corolla FX16, and FX16 GTS (trim level is only difference), 1988-1991 AE92 Corolla GTS (88-89 is largeport, 90, 91 is smallport - tougher to fit) 1988 Nova SS (AE82). It was never fitted in a Celica(USA model)
I'm just outside of Atlanta.
I don't have the car here, so I can't get any more photos...that was taken by PO. Yeah, those cars on the list are getting few and far between.
At least I've got a good lead on a crank. 
Looks like a good candidate for a "7A-GE" build - your cylinder head/manifolds/etc on a 7A-FE block. Bumps displacement up to 1.8l.
There were probably 50 7A-FE engines made for every 4A-GE, too.
Pete. (l33t FS) said:
Looks like a good candidate for a "7A-GE" build - your cylinder head/manifolds/etc on a 7A-FE block. Bumps displacement up to 1.8l.
There were probably 50 7A-FE engines made for every 4A-GE, too.
I'll have to look into the complexity of that. Since I can't do the work myself, I'm trying to keep labor costs reasonable. Though maybe at some point it'll be cheaper to get a 7A-FE block and transfer than to buy a complete 4A-GE
SKJSS (formerly Klayfish) said:
Pete. (l33t FS) said:
Looks like a good candidate for a "7A-GE" build - your cylinder head/manifolds/etc on a 7A-FE block. Bumps displacement up to 1.8l.
There were probably 50 7A-FE engines made for every 4A-GE, too.
I'll have to look into the complexity of that. Since I can't do the work myself, I'm trying to keep labor costs reasonable. Though maybe at some point it'll be cheaper to get a 7A-FE block and transfer than to buy a complete 4A-GE
not so easy..... especially if you need to find someone to do the work. Some special parts/machine work goes into making one that is worthwhile. Since you don't know a great deal, and you are not doing this yourself... K.I.S.S.
replacing the crank essentially means a full short block overhaul. Expect to pay at least close to $2000 to R&I, and then overhaul the shortblock.
My own recommendation would be bite the bullet, and get it all properly rebuilt, with OEM parts, gaskets, seals - expect cost to be somewhere over $2000... upto $6000 depending on what you want to build.
SKJSS (formerly Klayfish) said:
¯\_(ツ)_/¯ said:
I have a 4age crankshaft if you wanted to go the rebuild route instead.
Oooohhhh....how much do you want for it? Definitely would prefer rebuild if the block is OK. I'm told it is, but need to verify.
If I remember right the 4age's came with 2 different rod journal sizes so definitely worth verifying they are the same.
Also might be a long shot but when I built an all out n/a 4age I picked up a new crankshaft from O'riellys for somewhere around $200. That was also ~12 years ago so things might have changed since then.
edizzle89 said:
SKJSS (formerly Klayfish) said:
¯\_(ツ)_/¯ said:
I have a 4age crankshaft if you wanted to go the rebuild route instead.
Oooohhhh....how much do you want for it? Definitely would prefer rebuild if the block is OK. I'm told it is, but need to verify.
If I remember right the 4age's came with 2 different rod journal sizes so definitely worth verifying they are the same.
Also might be a long shot but when I built an all out n/a 4age I picked up a new crankshaft from O'riellys for somewhere around $200. That was also ~12 years ago so things might have changed since then.
A few years back when I needed a replacement 4AGE crank, I got what appeared to be one of 2 available in good condition in the Western hemisphere...I've done a few more searches since then just for fun and have turned up a few to choose from on eBay though.
Yeah, I'm starting to get a bit discouraged. I knew the AW11 was thin on the ground but never realized how hard it may be to source a motor. I'll either keep digging or if I totally run out of economical options I'll move it on to another race team who has the mechanical skills to do a swap themselves. This was a no risk deal.
The MR2 has arrived. Now off to find the ever elusive 4AGE. If I do this, I really need to find something that basically bolts right in.
Pics to follow....I'm on my way to the airport now for a holiday weekend getaway.
Just wanted to say good luck with the hunt. I ran into a similar challenge when looking for a spare 4AGE to rebuild. I had the most luck with searching junkyards on car-part.com, but occasionally found candidates on FB marketplace.
edit - looks like the closest motor to ATL right now is in Crawfordville FL at Economy Auto Salvage.
