Kelvinators 2009 Toyota Yaris RS (TS) 1.8

Kelvinators 2009 Toyota Yaris RS (TS) 1.8

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KelvinatorNZ

Original Poster:

709 posts

85 months

Tuesday 21st March 2023
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It seems my obsession with small hatchbacks continues. After a brief fling with a [S]warbling[/S] droning Swede, I returned to what seemed to suit me most.

Having sold my C30, I was in the market for a new toy.

I had my eye on a few things, including a 9N3 Polo GTI (drove well, but had uncomfortable seats and felt basic), a couple of Corollas (one Run X with the 2ZZ-GE, and one Auris with the 2ZR-FAE, both 6spd manual) and even the exact same Pug 207 GTI I almost bought a few years ago (Drove average, leaking oil, dubious service history, the dash trims had been badly painted, and the seller was a knob).

I decided I wanted something comfortable, small, reliable and punchy. I didn't want something I had to constantly rev hard to get it going (like the 2ZZ) or something that felt heavy and underpowered (like the Auris). It had to be tidy, and parts were available.

Looking around, I had been interested in a Yaris that was listed nearby. It was an NZ New RS spec, but it wasn't until I started to pay more attention to what that actually meant, that I more or less became obsessed with the car.

Long story short, After much back and forth with the seller, my wife and I did a couple of hour round trip and bought the Yaris.


So, what is the deal with the car?

Well, these aren't that rare to see around, but what you don't realise is that most are Japanese imports, which feature a 1.5L 1NZ-FE engine coupled to a 5 speed gearbox (or an auto). This engine makes a whopping 107bhp and 140nm of torque.

The Yaris RS? Well, that's where Toyota followed one of the best formulas; big engine, small car. The Yaris is powered by the 1.8L, dual VVT-I, 2ZR-FE, which makes 132hp and 173nm of torque, at a similar RPM as the smaller engine. Although it's not a horsepower monster (it's only 8hp or so more than a stock ZC31S Swift Sport), that big thick lump of torque makes all the difference. This thing pulls up hills like they aren't there, and give it a bootful in the mid-range and the speedo climbs with surprising vigour.


This engine, and the 6 speed manual gearbox, is lifted straight from the equivalent Toyota Corolla, and is similar to the engine in the Auris I drove (that was the 2ZR-FAE, which is the same engine but with Valvematic instead of VVTI, so it made a smidge more power). In the bigger brother, it feels underpowered, but in the Yaris, which weighs a shade over 1100kg, it feels great.

The whole car is a weird one really. The Yaris RS is based on the facelift European spec Yaris TSport, which means it differs in a few ways from the JDM spec Vitz.

According to a post I found on Facebook, there were 100 of the limited edition RS brought into NZ by Toyota and only for the 2009 model year, so they are very rare.

Starting with the basic RS spec; Not specific to the Yaris, the RS is fitted with sporty bumpers front and rear, side skirts and a chrome tailpipe, to give it a more aggressive look. There is also a small spoiler on the tailgate, and mesh grilles up front.

The Yaris rides on factory 17" alloys, wrapped in wide 205/45 tyres and sits slightly lower on factory KYB lowering springs and shocks. Behind the wheels are four wheel disk brakes, with big 275mm rotors up front (the same size as the "big brakes" I fitted to the Corolla)


The Euro influences can be a bit weird in places. One feature I like is that the indicator stalk is on the left (as opposed to being on the right on JDM cars), and the car is fitted with keyless entry and push button start (true keyless entry too, it somehow senses the presence of your hand as it nears the exterior handle, without pressing a button, and unlocks the doors).

Yet, the weird features are things like the Yaris having electric windows in the front, but good old hand-crank wind up windows in the rear, and despite being a "high spec" car, it has manual heater controls instead of digital climate control.


Another Euro spec feature that doesn't seem to appear on the JDM models is the split, sliding and reclining rear seat.

The seat is split 60/40, like usual, but the two sides are on rails, and by using one of the two levers on the backrest, the whole seat slides forward. This is one half fully back, and the other fully forward.


The other lever either folds the seat forward, down flat or can be used to recline the backrest.

Inside is the usual hard wearing Toyota Yaris stuff, with a couple of exceptions. The RS gains a leather shift boot, perforated leather 3-spoke steering wheel and shift knob, and privacy tint rear windows (with the fronts on this car also being tinted from new).

Beyond that, its all standard Yaris practicality; with plenty of storage spaces, including a top glovebox in front of the driver, and two passenger side gloveboxes, along with various cubbies here and there


The cabin is airy, and feels big, without you feeling lost in it. Leg room for a small car is quite good, front and rear, and the RS is fitted with more airbags than you can shake a stick at (two fronts, a driver's knee airbag, and front and rear curtain airbags; five more than our Honda Fit has).


The seats, although not the pinnacle in sporty bolstering, are comfortable and hold you in well enough for some spirited driving. I believe these are specific to the RS and are slightly more bolstered than normal. The fabric, although dirty in mine, is hard wearing and after 200+ thousand KM, has little to no signs of wear.

There is stability and traction control, which seem to give you quite a bit of leeway before kicking in and pulling the fun back in line. I haven't yet looked for a button to turn it off, not that I'll bother anyway.

Unlike the lower spec models (which had basic digital readouts or just an analogue speedo), the RS features a big, center-mounted analogue speedo and rev counter, illuminated in orange.


In the RH corner of the cluster is the digital fuel gauge and a basic trip computer which can give readouts for instant and average consumption, range to empty, average speed and dual trip counters (the trip computer replaces the ODO reading when changed).


My particular example isn't a show car, its done 213,000km, with the previous owner having done a lot of hot running during their long commute each day, so there are a couple of issues, both cosmetically and mechanically, but overall for the price I paid for it, I'm really enjoying it so far.

The classic Toyota Super Pink is starting to show its head, with the "Cherry" red paint starting to fade, and on the door handles and rear spoiler the clearcoat is peeling. The front is also covered with stone chips from our A+ condition roads.

Mechanically it's pretty sound, having been regularly serviced, but the gearbox is showing its age, with a slow synchro on second when cold, and a whine at a couple of different road speeds. A gearbox oil change has helped the whine, but it's still there and at 50kph it can be quite vocal.

I don't know the plan for it, probably not much to be honest. It'll need some new tyres soon, so I will find some good mid-range ones to go on, and then I will just drive the pants off it. I could throw money at it, hand over fist (lowering further, new shocks, smaller/lighter wheels etc etc), but it wouldn't be worth it in the long run, I'm better off enjoying it as it is and spending the money on gas and trackdays.


Northbrook

1,543 posts

78 months

Tuesday 21st March 2023
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Looks nice!

Jhonno

6,063 posts

156 months

Tuesday 21st March 2023
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Sounds like a cool little hot hatch!

KelvinatorNZ

Original Poster:

709 posts

85 months

Tuesday 21st March 2023
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Jhonno said:
Sounds like a cool little hot hatch!
More a warm hatch than anything, it's certainly not "fast", but still a heck of a lot of fun riding that wave of torque out of corners.

TwoStrokeNut

1,686 posts

256 months

Tuesday 21st March 2023
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I loved the SD1 and TVR, but I'm struggling with this one!

I think I'm emotionally scared after many miserable miles driving my folks around in their 1.3 Yaris of a similar age!

The Bearded Tit

275 posts

47 months

Tuesday 21st March 2023
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My Grandfather's partner owns one of these, with the pov-spec 1.3. She's had it for 6 years, and in that time, I'm fairly certain it's not been serviced once, and it's been completely abused, thrown around, bumped into things, and used as a cross between a farm vehicle and a taxi. Outside of an E.M light flashing intermittently, it simply won't die.

I have massive respect for these cars, and with some decent alloys, those bumpers and some vibrant red paint, it looks fantastic.

KelvinatorNZ

Original Poster:

709 posts

85 months

Wednesday 22nd March 2023
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Nothing stays untouched in my fleet for long, so the Yaris got some work done the day after picking it up.


The plan was to change the gearbox oil and see if it would help the noises the gearbox has been making.


As half my axle stands, and both my ramps, are still stuck under the Marina, I shuffled the Quickjacks out and under the car.


The joys of working on small cars, they leave heaps of space in the garage to get around.


The underside looks pretty tidy. There is a small oil leak down the back of the engine, but otherwise nothing to report. I did note that the oil filter housing wasn't fully tightened (I serviced hundreds of Toyotas as a lube tech, so familiar with how it should look), but not leaking, so snugged that up. Kudos to the previous female owner for doing the last oil change herself, but the mechanic father that was watching over her shoulder should have picked that up.


Now, I have serviced dozens of gearboxes, including a wide range of Toyota boxes, but don't recall having ever come across an EC67 gearbox, so had some trouble working out how to service it.


The drain plug was obvious, its the one on the bottom of the box


But the fill plug, which on most Toyota gearboxes is on the front LH side of the box, was nowhere to be found.

Fill hole seen here on Corolla C5x gearbox
I did find a plug on the very LH end of the box, hard up against the covers, which to me looked like it was too low to fill the box with 2.3L of oil, but according to Haynes that might be the fill/level plug, so keep that in mind.


Before I found that, after much stumbling through Youtube on the world's slowest computer, with all the videos showing the fill plug on the front, I finally found someone with the same EC6x gearbox.


https://youtu.be/lDWHXT7xwwo




Following his guide, I too decided to use the fill plug on the top of the gearbox, so out came the air filter housing


The fill plug is here, and it's a 19mm head. An offset ring spanner is good for this job as there is limited space until you contact the battery tray above it.


With the fill plug removed, I drained the old fluid. It was as thin as water, jet black and stank. I drained 2.5L, which indicates the box was overfilled by 200ml. Thankfully no signs of metal, and no chunks.


Based on how tight and untouched the drain plug was, and how worn out the oil was, I suspect it was WAY overdue for a change, and likely contributed to the gearbox condition. The previous owner thought it might have been done when she got the car, but wasn't sure. She had the car since 68,000km and now it's on 213,000km...


New washers on the plugs, of course


Using my small "tom thumb" pump bottle I pumped exactly 2.3L of new fluid into the gearbox. Annoyingly the fill hole is too small for the hoses that come with the bags of Nulon fluid, and too close to the battery tray to use a funnel, but the pump bottle was a perfect fit.


Once the gearbox was all buttoned back up, I moved on to a couple of other jobs in the same vicinity. With the intake piping out I noticed the throttle body was quite dirty, so I gave that a quick clean.


I removed the MAF from the airbox as that needed a clean too


I gently cleaned it with contact cleaner and the corner of a rag and then refitted it to the airbox.


A sneaky, albeit dirty, K&N panel filter was found lurking in the airbox. I gave it a shake out and refitted, but it'd benefit from a proper clean and oil later.


These engines are pretty darn ugly without their beauty covers fitted. It's like manufacturers are banking on chucking plastic over it and put no effort into making engines look good anymore


That was the extent of the servicing today. I had a quick look around and it's very tidy underneath, with no real concerns. It'll need new rear tyres, which I knew about, and the front pads are a bit low, so that'll be a good excuse to get some fast road pads soon.


The previous owner changed the oil about 3000km so, so I'll do it again in a couple of thousand KM, and she recently did the spark plugs, but they're easy to get to so I might pop them out at some point and check them.


Driving the car to work the next day shows some improvement. The whine at 100kph was almost gone, but the 50kph while was still there, maybe a little lessened. The slow synchro on 2nd when cold was still slow, but it's fine when warm. No miracle fix, but I didn't expect it to be, I just wanted to be sure it actually had oil in it.


Cleaning the MAF and throttle body did result in a smoother idle, and slightly better throttle response with less hang when coming off the throttle. I have a throttle controller on the way from Japan to see what difference it makes, as it was night and day on the Swift. We'll see.

MattsCar

1,771 posts

120 months

Wednesday 22nd March 2023
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They are called the Yaris 1.8 SR here in the UK.

Although, here they had a 5 Speed box coupled to that engine.

You mention Euro influences, but unlike the rest of the Yaris range, which was built in France, these, and i am assuming your model, were built in Japan and the quality is better.

You also get a standard analogue dash, whereas the French cars were digital.

I had one. It was a great little thing.

There are some short comings in the handling department and while it felt good to drive, upgrading to a Clio 200, made these obvious. However, if you compare the running costs and reliability of the Toyota to the Clio, as an overall ownership experience, the Yaris was a better bet. It was also VERY good on fuel as the engine was designed to go in to a number of run of the mill cars, some Scions in the US etc, but as you say the Yaris weighs very little, so further reaps the benefits of economy.

I "upgraded" mine. A Vogtland lowering kit with shocks and dampers for about £300 made a difference and a K&N induction kit and exhaust, which Amazon were literally giving away, made it sound great.

There is an active Yaris SR FB group in the UK which is worth joining.

KelvinatorNZ

Original Poster:

709 posts

85 months

Wednesday 22nd March 2023
quotequote all
MattsCar said:
They are called the Yaris 1.8 SR here in the UK.

Although, here they had a 5 Speed box coupled to that engine.

You mention Euro influences, but unlike the rest of the Yaris range, which was built in France, these, and i am assuming your model, were built in Japan and the quality is better.

You also get a standard analogue dash, whereas the French cars were digital.

I had one. It was a great little thing.

There are some short comings in the handling department and while it felt good to drive, upgrading to a Clio 200, made these obvious. However, if you compare the running costs and reliability of the Toyota to the Clio, as an overall ownership experience, the Yaris was a better bet. It was also VERY good on fuel as the engine was designed to go in to a number of run of the mill cars, some Scions in the US etc, but as you say the Yaris weighs very little, so further reaps the benefits of economy.

I "upgraded" mine. A Vogtland lowering kit with shocks and dampers for about £300 made a difference and a K&N induction kit and exhaust, which Amazon were literally giving away, made it sound great.

There is an active Yaris SR FB group in the UK which is worth joining.
You're correct, although being a facelift technically it's a TS in the UK, not the SR which all appear to be pre-facelift.

It is Japan built, but to UK spec (the biggest giveaway is the UK style 17 digit VIN, which JDM cars don't use, and the LH indicator stalk).

Any chance you'd have a photo of yours on the Vogtland springs? I have considered some myself as I had them in my Corolla, but wasn't sure how low they are in the Yaris.

I feel like adding a spicy rear muffler would give it some more placebo horsepower, as it did on my Swift, but I haven't come across any locally so far, but will keep an eye out.

So far, according to the dash, I'm averaging what would equate to about 30mpg on my commute, including regular full throttle, high RPM and start-stop traffic.

I'll go digging for the facebook group, thanks for the heads up

MattsCar

1,771 posts

120 months

Wednesday 22nd March 2023
quotequote all
TS was never a model designation in the UK, they were all 1.8 SR. Although they were TS in the rest of Europe.

I have some pics...










C70R

17,596 posts

119 months

Wednesday 22nd March 2023
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I love your threads, and look forward to the titivation of this little oddity. However, I fear a bit of journalistic licence at play when you describe "riding on a wave of torque" with 170NM (or 103lbft in old money). hehe