Ghost XI

This is what I’ve been working on for some time now. What I have here is a AW11 rear knuckle (hope I have the terms right) – the part that sits between strut and lower ball joint with Toyota RAV4 five lug spindle and Mazda rear brake rotor.

When I got the SW20 coilovers fitted into my AW11, I noticed that it would be somewhat easy to swap SW20 front hubs with brakes and everything into AW11. SW20 and AW11 share the same balljoint and I already had correct coilovers.

I decided to keep things simple and settled for early SW20 brakes, the ones with the same diameter brake rotors as late AW11. Brake rotor thickness goes up from 22mm to 26mm which adds little bit more weight, as do the slightly bigger brake calipers.

Rears were bit more complicated, but in a funny way. Found a mention from the net that a certain Toyota RAV4 front hub shares the same bearing as AW11 rear, which meant that I could replace the AW11 spindle with RAV4 spindle and get the 5×114.3 pcd.

I got the SW20 rear rotors for this setup, but found out that the total height of the brake rotor was too much and the brake caliper bracket didnt line up. Also, I made a slight mistake. The 16mm brake system (which has the 16V-casting mark) has shorter brackets and theyre only possible to fit into AW11 knuckles either by having a really small diameter rotor or building a adapter that moves the whole caliper setup outwards.

Both of the methods were unsatisfactory. I was pretty sure that there would be a brake rotor with same measures as AW11 rear rotor, except the bolt pattern, so I could use the stock AW11 rear brakes.

The Mazda 6 or 626 rear brake rotor from 1999 GF-model turned out to be pretty close. 260mm dia, 40,2mm total height and the needed 10mm rotor thickness. Now I have two EBC USR-series rear rotors for SW20 for sale and need to get two EBC USR-series rear rotors for Mazda.

I think this could work! The lower arm balljoint is same between AW11 and SW20, the coilover clevis would fit without spacers and only thing needed would be inner and outer tie rods from SW20.

Positive things:

5 x 114.3 and big brakes

Negative things:

Ackerman angle changes, steering might get bit heavier

Progress! I got the lathe-made replacements for the camber adjustment cams in front. Now I can use the SW20 camber adjustment bolts in front as well.

My local Toyota parts store delivered four camber adjustment bolts and brand new nuts.

One of my garage neighbors has a lathe. I went to his “shop” and asked if he could make me some bits and pieces. This is the highly detailed technical drawing I made:

These bits are for the front knuckles so I can swap SW20 camber adjusting bolts and make things little more neater.

I went to see his shop and he had a lot of cool stuff, like this thingy:

A Bridgeport!

He had this soviet invention, which I believe is a pressure gauge:

The back of the gauge was phosphorous and most likely light was not the only radiation it was emitting 😀

When I was leaving a bit later, I saw this:

Cool, wheels look like Panasports.