The name Hornbeam comes from a small, sturdy tree that can be found near swamps. A perfect name for a Tercel that thinks like a Jeep.

My friend and I were driving down a back road one afternoon in late summer. In someone's yard, we saw about a dozen cars. We had to stop. The owner of these cars was in the yard planting a tree. We asked if any of the cars were for sale. He told us everything is always for sale, and proceeded to give us a tour of his collection.

The two cars that caught our eyes were an old Subaru and a 1986 Toyota Tercel Wagon SR5 4WD. The Subaru was in pretty bad shape, so we lost interest in it and looked at the Tercel. It had about 114,700 miles on it, and didn't have too much rust. Then he showed us the driver's side. Both doors and the pillar were in the car, not on where they should be. He told us that he was about to buy the car from someone, but they decided to donate it to their local fire department to practice using the Jaws of Life. So, he went to the fire department and got the car from them.

He told us we could have the car for $25, and he promised us it ran. We didn't know if it actually ran, half the doors were missing, the rear window was broken, and it had no title, so we told him we would think about it. And we left, not planning to think about it or ever come back. Until we realized that even if it doesn't run, we could tow it to a junkyard and actually make a profit. We went back with $25 to buy it.

After moving the pile of wood blocking it in, we tried to tow it out with my friend's 1987 Toyota Tercel. It wouldn't move. So the guy selling it to us offered to pull it out with his hearse, which he told us he plans to be buried in. Yes, buried in. That beast dragged the doorless Tercel out without any effort. We also discovered why it was hard to move. One of the front brakes was seized. At least it unseized while the hearse was pulling it.

We towed it to my house with my friend's 1987 Tercel. After adding a couple of wires to bypass the broken off ignition switch, we poured some gas into the carburetor. Doing this a few times finally produced a few pops out of the cut off exhaust pipe. Soon it was idling perfectly. Within hours of getting it home, we were driving it around in a field.

We needed to put the doors back on. A branch or two in the face was enough to convince us. The front driver's side door was so bent we had to replace it. The pillar was too difficult to weld back on, so we just welded the driver's side back door to the body. A gate latch was enough to hold the front door closed.

The tires Hornbeam came with were not suited for off-roading. Three Toyos and a Cooper. My friend's 1987 Tercel had a set of four BF Goodrich Trailmaker Plus snow tires. Switching the wheels and tires was an easy decision. Going from almost bald 175/70 13 tires to almost new 155/80 13 snow tires makes off-roading in a Tercel much easier.

We towed Hornbeam to the Bog and Grog that fall to show the big trucks what a Tercel could do. The Bog and Grog is an event that happens about three times a year in New York. People get drunk and drive their big American trucks through mud pits. To stand out even further we turned the rear wiper into a waving orange flag. We even surprised ourselves when we drove halfway through the biggest mud pit, only to stop when the exhaust choked in the mud. When we were leaving, we washed Hornbeam with the fire hose that everyone is supposed to use before going back out on the road. A fire hose is very powerful. We blew out all of the fins on the radiator.

A Tercel radiator is pathetically small. Since we needed another one after the fire hose incident, we decided to get a bigger one. After searching a junkyard, we chose a Hyundai Excel radiator because it was pretty big and aluminum. So besides the increased cooling capability, we would reduce some weight. Around that time we also took out the emission equipment, power steering and air conditioning.

A while ago, Hornbeam donated its 3A-C engine to Creamy after it spent a while in an automatic 4WD 1987 Tercel Wagon my friend had.

Hornbeam's original engine is slowly working its way back where it belongs, in Hornbeam. We are also installing a manual steering rack in place of the dry power rack.

More work is being done on Hornbeam:

• Transmission seals are being replaced
• Mud has been cleaned off the underbody
• The fuel tank is gone (smaller tank is going up front)
• Denso/Suzuki EFI (1991 Suzuki Swift) installation will be attempted
• The engine will be going back in too!

The adapter to mate the Suzuki throttle body to the Toyota manifold is done.
More pictures.

I thought we might have some trouble getting a speed signal to the ECU, but a VSS (Vehicle Speed Sensor) from an early 90s Corolla worked great in the stock speedometer. I don't expect to see any change in power, but having fuel injection should make Hornbeam start and run much better in cold weather.

The following is done:

• The engine and transmission are back in.
• The wiring harness for the Suzuki ECU has been reworked for the Tercel engine compartment.
• We need a fuel tank and a longer throttle cable.

The fuel tank is done, it will be in the spare tire well. A picture of the tank.
Yes that's the Suzuki sending unit and pump in a $12 boat fuel tank, it fits. Even better, both cars use the same sender so the stock fuel gauge will accurately display the remaining fuel in the tank. More of the wiring has been done. The "engine" fuse, previously used for the long gone emissions equipment, is now used for the EFI. We also had to tap into the radio memory fuse, the ECU needs a constant 12 volts in addition to the switched 12 volts from the "engine" fuse.

The combination of the Suzuki throttle body, adapter plate and air cleaner are taller than the stock Toyota equipment. This is a problem since the stock air cleaner barely clears the hood. So we are raising the raised center portion of the hood a little higher to clear the Suzuki air cleaner. Plus it adds an aggressive look!

It runs! Actually, it runs great! We flipped the ignition on and off a few times until the fuel return line was full of gas. Then we pushed the start button. It cranked over and fired right up. We had forgotten to cap off a few vacuum ports, so the idle was pretty high. With those taken care of, it had a pretty good idle. It was a little rough, but we were able to smooth it out by advancing the ignition timing. Right now there is no vacuum advance hooked up, so the timing is probably not ideal yet.

It drives great. No bogging, stumbling, etc. It will pull up steep hills in 1st gear at low rpm, pretty much idles up them in EL! 500 rpm in 1st gear isn't too low, it just goes when you step on it. Power doesn't seem drastically different, maybe with some more tuning we can try and get some acceleration numbers. But power wasn't really the goal anyway. Easier starting and better drivability was most of the inspiration. Just seeing if we could do it was part of it too. It actually seemed easy. Almost too easy.

We don't have a check engine light for some reason, I connected it to the seat belt light, but it's not working. So I don't know if the Suzuki ECU is throwing any codes or not. Also the fuel gauge hasn't moved. Other than little stuff like that, it just worked out fantastic.

We are considering making a kit to install the Suzuki EFI system. It would most likely include only the wiring harness and throttle body adapter plate. If you're interested, keep watching the site. I'll add more info when (if?) more info is available.