Hello all. This isn't my first post, but it is my first as an official Toyota owner. Yesterday I picked a 1997 Camry LE 4-cyl. It has 170k miles on it and seems to be in great condition for it's age.

Last night my wife wet-vac'd the interior while I tended to some routine maintenance.

1. I changed the oil. There was a sticker on the door for wal-mart oil change center that dated back to 2006. It said it was valvoline oil. The car had a valvoline filter on it, so I am guessing it probably was still using valvoline oil. I changed this and installed Mobil 1 10W-30 along with a Mobil 1 filter. The oil that came out was pretty black, but used oil typically is. What very little one could see through the filler hole didn't look great but it wasn't black soot either. I figure the mobil will clean everything out nice, provided it just doesn't start leaking now

2. I did the spark plugs and wires. The #4 wire pulled apart so I was quite glad I already had new wires to put on it. I got BWD wires from O'Reilly. I really like MSD wires, but they don't list any for this application. I would have gone with stockers but these were available immediately and they have a lifetime warranty. I put NGK irridium plugs in it. I have to say I am impressed with the ignition system. It had non platinum autolite plugs in it and they were worn so bad that every one of them gapped at .060 or better! I'm guessing these were put in around the it's 100k mile mark and were never touched since.

3. I replaced the air filter. Nothing much to say here, it was dirty but I have seen worse. I put a regular purolator in it because they don't list a pure 1 and I can't afford a K&N right now.

4. I have a new transmission filter for it but haven't installed it yet. It was dark by the time I got everything else done last night and it's been raining all day and looks like it's gonna rain forever. I have Mobil 1 full synthetic transmission fluid to put back in it whenever I do get around to this.

5. I swapped out the stereo. The car had an aftermarket kenwood cd player that worked fine. Trouble was it was silver and didn't look great. It didn't look bad, just didn't look great. I had an older Kenwood that I really liked better. It is a black MP3 player model. It wouldn't look right because of the trim rings, but it dawned on me that it would work perfectly in my truck. So I put my old black kenwood MP3 player in my truck. I took my newer dark gray kenwood mp3 player out of my truck and put it in the toyota, and took out the silver one. All told it took about 10 minutes, including setting the clock and reprogramming the stations. Since they were all the same brand I didn't have to re-wire anything, all the plugs were the same.

The car has almost new tires on it and seems to run like a dream, better now that I did the tune up! I am hoping that with a little bit of care it'll last at least another 170k. When the rain lets up I'll get it all cleaned up and snap some pictures.

 

Here are some pictures of the plugs I removed.





There was a gasket on #4, it just stayed and I had to retrieve it with a magnet. #4 was also the one that the wire pulled apart on when I removed it. This makes me think that it may not have been firing that cylinder very reliably at all.

 

Great job!

The trans holds a little over 6 quarts with about 2/3 of this inside the torque converter. Changing the trans pan oil will get about 1/3 of it.

Bad plugs wire can cause all kinds of problems. Your MPG should jump up!

Look forward to your photo's.

 

Well since I got it yesterday I won't really have anything to reference it to on the mileage for a "before". The trip A is showing 500 some odd miles I'm guessing she didn't reset it when she filled it up last. Trip B was 5000 or so. I reset trip B for the oil change. I'll use trip A for gas. I keep very close watch on my gas mileage for all of my vehicles.

I'll be curious to see what this one gets. My wife is only gonna drive it a couple miles to work every day, but it's more highway than town really so it should do very well.

 

Typically 25-27 MPG overall is normal.

For extended hwy driving mileage can be 30+ MPG.

 

I am also gonna change the coolant. The reservoir is a little on the low side and the coolant in it doesn't look terribly great so it's probably been neglected too. When I get some weather that is anything other than rain I'll look into that.