Time to play [Archive]

View Full Version : Time to play

C_Note

12-31-2004, 05:48 PM

The wife managed to finagle me out of the Tahoe, so I'm behind the Sub now. Should be able to play with it without much hassle from her, since she got what she wanted and I'll hold it over her head for as long as I can. Trying to decide what I want to do, but not having much luck finding parts for this model. Any suggestions (I've been to express auto parts, andy's auto, 2k racing, mako auto, and a few others). Its a 97 Impreza Outback Sport (2.2L auto).

I'd definitely like to redo the interior on the door panels and seat centers. It has that horrible splash pattern (blue, green, and pink on grey), you may remember was quite popular in the RAV4s when they were first released.

A tape deck isn't cutting it, so I'll also have to do some audio work.

Will buy new rims this spring when I replace the tires. Its still rolling on stock 15" 5-star hubcaps, and the silver is peeling off so they look like yellow plastic.

I'd like to remove the roof rack (starting to see a little rust bubbling up around the ends of the ribs) and all the badges, pin striping and side bump guards, fill the holes, and repaint it (same green, just solid so its not two-tone). Thats low priority, though, and can wait.

Projector lights - I can't see squat at night without the brights on in this thing. That was one thing my wife complained about.

Lightened flywheel, CAI, and new cat-back (which needs replaced anyway); haven't found any headers.

Its an automatic, and its a grocery getter. It wasn't built to race, and I don't really need it to, but I would like to pep it up as much as I can while maintaining its family-mobile capabilities. Is there anything else I can do to increase performance, or other sites I'm not finding?

ramrod

01-01-2005, 10:53 AM

swap in a wrx engine ?

Davis Silver Sti

01-01-2005, 11:26 AM

Spec'd eibach/Prodrive srpings and struts did wonders for my RS. (at that time I had to get aftermarket stuff directly from the UK) completely changed the handlin of my car. I'd say it was very close in handling compared to my stock STi.

I'm sure Kurt can lead you in the right place for parts and fixin':)

Feedman

01-01-2005, 04:08 PM

Subaru's are outta my leauge when it comes to car upgrades......

good luck though..... 8)

Davis Silver Sti

01-01-2005, 10:03 PM

Subaru's are outta my leauge when it comes to car upgrades......

good luck though..... 8)

Agree.
When I got my RS in 97, there was NO aftermarket stuff avail. Of course there were TONS of stuff for hondas which always made me jealous.

It was only after the WRX came out that there started to be some kind of selection. Its still nowhere even close to the Honda aftermarket stuff (Ford and Chevy are way ahead of us) but at least you can now find numerous vendors and competitive yet still $$ prices.

Seems like if you are trying to get stuff for a STi, tack on an extra 20%. You should see the price guide for "official STi" aftermarket stuff. (pink STi JDM colored coilovers for example are $2800-3000)

Anyways, hope you (c note) find some goodies for your Sube.
cheers,

Feedman

01-02-2005, 01:25 AM

ShortysTRM

01-02-2005, 06:02 PM

Yeah, and it keeps going up with vehicle price. Viper parts are a little more than Vettes, then Porsche, then Lambo/Ferrari, etc.

Kurt_W

01-03-2005, 11:57 AM

Yeah, and it keeps going up with vehicle price. Viper parts are a little more than Vettes, then Porsche, then Lambo/Ferrari, etc.

Of course the price of the parts is proportional to the price of the car. The Corvette is a dime-a-dozen car, the Viper etc are much more uncommon so the makers of the parts have to make more money off each individual part to recoup development costs. Besides, if you can afford a Viper and you want to modify it, chances are pretty good the cost of the parts doesn’t affect your budget much more then a minor pockmark in the road affects a new Caddy. Anyway, back to the topic at hand…

To be honest, from the sounds of what you want to do you might be better off to sell the OBS and get a L wagon if that’s what you want…that way you could get a manual too if you wanted it.

I'd definitely like to redo the interior on the door panels and seat centers. It has that horrible splash pattern (blue, green, and pink on grey), you may remember was quite popular in the RAV4s when they were first released.

Some of the lower level wagons (mostly L’s) had less decorative designed interiors…chances are good you could find one in a junkyard with a decent interior that you could get. Depending on the junkyard that might be much cheaper then having some redo the interior.

A tape deck isn't cutting it, so I'll also have to do some audio work.

Easy enough, conversion harnesses are readily available from Metra and the dash can hold up to a double-din headunit. Wires for a sub and amp are easy to run. With the automatic you have a rubber grommet in the firewall that you can punch to run your power wire and then run it along the tunnel and so on. Front speakers were 6.5” speakers. I don’t know what the rear speakers are in the wagons…if its like my WRX then the rear speakers are in the doors.

Will buy new rims this spring when I replace the tires. Its still rolling on stock 15" 5-star hubcaps, and the silver is peeling off so they look like yellow plastic.

WRX wheels are cheap with good tires (Factory WRX RE92’s are great general purpose and rain tires, they however are poor sport tires so purchase accordingly.) If your crazy, a set of 04 STi wheels would look great as well. Any Subaru 5-lug wheel except SVX and 2005 STi wheels should fit. Otherwise, there are a lot of aftermarket wheels available, just watch the offset. I had 99 Legacy wheels on my LX when I sold it…they were 14”, fit fine and looked great on the dark green car.

I'd like to remove the roof rack (starting to see a little rust bubbling up around the ends of the ribs) and all the badges, pin striping and side bump guards, fill the holes, and repaint it (same green, just solid so its not two-tone). Thats low priority, though, and can wait.

Some low level L wagons didn’t have the roof rack so you should be able to acquire the proper roof gutter lines from on of those at a junkyard. As for the paint, you want to turn a OBS into an L, kinda amusing ;)

Projector lights - I can't see squat at night without the brights on in this thing. That was one thing my wife complained about.

Morrette made projectors for the 98-01 RS which should fit the 97 just fine.

Lightened flywheel, CAI, and new cat-back (which needs replaced anyway); haven't found any headers.

I believe that you can use 2.5 RS parts for all of these. This is of course just a belief, you will have to verify it. Since one can use EJ20, 22 and 25 parts on the EG33, I would suspect you’ll have no problems with using EJ25 parts on a EJ22. I have seen CAI’s on numerous EJ22 Impreza’s so I doubt you’ll have trouble finding one. Exhaust, again, I believe you can use a 2.5 RS exhaust system. I don’t know anything about a header.

Its an automatic, and its a grocery getter. It wasn't built to race, and I don't really need it to, but I would like to pep it up as much as I can while maintaining its family-mobile capabilities. Is there anything else I can do to increase performance, or other sites I'm not finding?

I used to have some information about aftermarket parts for the GC Impreza’s but its at home so I will have to look around there. One thing to remember when dealing with Subarus is they are all very closely related, you can steal parts off of just about any model that shares the same driveline and use it on your own car.

The quickest and easiest way I can think of to really improve the performance (acceleration wise) would be to pull the EJ22 and drop an EJ25 out of a newer car in. I would steer clear of the DOHC versions of the 25 as they were apparently prone to more-then-normal-Subaru leaks…that and the SOHC version produces 165hp just as the DOHC does. This may not be a completely cut-and-dry swap, but it can’t be terribly difficult. Of course, if you were sufficiently inclined, you could drop a EJ20 into the car…I think however that you might be better off just getting a used WRX wagon if that is what you want (if you don’t want to be messing with the car all the time.)

Just some thoughts.

C_Note

01-03-2005, 01:04 PM

I'd love to have one of the WRX wagons, but since I am just beginning to pay for the Tahoe, I'm not sure they'd give me a second loan right away (book on the OBS is 5500, so I'd still need another 10k or so).

Feedman

01-03-2005, 01:17 PM

A++ for effort on the post Kurt..... 8)

C_Note

01-03-2005, 01:25 PM

Well, plus the hot rodder in me would rather do it all myself. Any Joe can go out and buy a newer/better model, but how many of them are going to take the time and effort to fix up an old sluggish 97 Impreza?

It might not necessarilly be fast, but it'll be different. It will also allow me extra cash to pick up another project (I'm thinking Explorer or Blazer with a big block drop; 400-450'ish hp).

ShortysTRM

01-03-2005, 01:31 PM

yeah, good write up. I have been wanting a Suby for a while because I had thought they were reliable...are they? Are they 200,000 mile cars?

It's awesome how everything is interchangeable form one Suby to another. At the Snowshoe Hillclimb, there was a WRX with a 2.5 block and a 2.5 RS with a WRX turbo 2.0 and some various STi parts.

Kurt_W

01-03-2005, 01:55 PM

Well, plus the hot rodder in me would rather do it all myself. Any Joe can go out and buy a newer/better model, but how many of them are going to take the time and effort to fix up an old sluggish 97 Impreza?

I agree. I’m not a fan of the looks of the GDA (02-03) Impreza; I much prefer the looks of my GDB (04+) though mechanically they are almost identical. There were some modifications to the suspension and so on, but most are unnoticeable unless pointed out.

A couple months ago a guy on the SVX World Network posted a link to a friend of his’s car on Ebay. The car was a 97 L wagon that hand had the just about everything possible from a WRX shoved into it. I believe it sold for around $8500, which I though was very reasonable.

My original plan with my old 95 LX was to do a WRX swap…I came very close to buying a wrecked WRX in Houston while I was down there but the logistics of getting the car back to Ohio killed it for me. There are many sleeper Imprezas out there, but it’s a cumulative many, they are generally hard to find because people just don’t talk about them outside the Impreza sites. I’m currently (or should I say always) looking for a 97-01 Impreza wagon to pick up for a later project, but currently I’ve got other things to work on and get rid of first.

yeah, good write up. I have been wanting a Suby for a while because I had thought they were reliable...are they? Are they 200,000 mile cars?

Sure, almost any car will carry you to 200k and beyond, its just a question of how well it holds up to get there. I have seen many Subarus, Hondas and Toyotas at and above the 200k mark…the CRX I auto-x has almost 190k on the chassis. What kills most cars is that the cost of upkeep outweighs the value of the car, the body rots away (particularly up here) or the stigma against driving high-mileage cars provokes the owner into selling the car. In my opinion, mechanical faults are low on the list of concerns lest the car be something rare or exotic. I will however say that I’ve heard more about Subaru’s reaching and going beyond the 300k mark then most other brands.

It's awesome how everything is interchangeable form one Suby to another. At the Snowshoe Hillclimb, there was a WRX with a 2.5 block and a 2.5 RS with a WRX turbo 2.0 and some various STi parts.

Yeah, it nice…with a little research you can put some pretty nice parts on cars that they weren’t supposed to go on even with no modifications to the parts of car…such as putting the STi rear sway bar on the Forester XT wagon. The other point is the manufacturer saves a lot of money by making the parts interchangeable…again with the reduced development costs of extreme mass production.

C_Note

01-03-2005, 04:41 PM

The first Subaru I had was an 82 GL. I T-boned a heavy iron Monte Carlo (he pulled out in front of me on Rt. 7) which pushed my engine through the firewall. Even with my foot resting against the block and all my fluids sitting on Rt. 7, I was able to start it up and drive 1/4 mile to Gary's towing. That was at 175k.

My old man uses them for work cars, mostly, so he isn't concerned about the bodies much. He has taken one to 450k, 2 more to 350k, and several 250+ (as an ironworker, he's always commuting to jobs, so the miles rack up). Most of my paternal family has a Sub or two, having seen how well they've worked for my old man.

I wonder if a WRX engine would bolt into the OBS, or would it even be worth trying, since it would be hindered by the automatic?

Kurt_W

01-04-2005, 04:17 PM

I wonder if a WRX engine would bolt into the OBS, or would it even be worth trying, since it would be hindered by the automatic?

Sure will. The WRX uses a 8 bolt bell housing whereas the older Subarus use a 4 bolt bell housing (4 of the bolts are in the same location on both housings. The WRX is available with an automatic transmission so there is no reason that the WRX engine wouldn't work with your transmission...whether the transmission can hold the power is hard to say. I do however know that WRX auto transmissions are available (I've seen them on EBay and other locations) and they are generally very cheap. It should also be noted that the reason that Subaru used the automatic only in the SVX was at the time they didn't feel they had a manual transmission capable of handling the torque the EG33 H6 engine put out.

Have you looked around these sites?
http://www.nasioc.com/
http://www.i-club.com/
http://www.sti-buki.com/forums/ (almost STi only all the time, but might be interesting if you are really interested in Subaru STi's)
http://www.ravensblade-impreza.com
http://www.subaruparts.com (Tacoma Subaru, Tacoma WA - has a parts lookup for Impreza's - its ok - shipping costs kill any savings you'd get using them however)
http://www.newsubaru.com (Liberty Subaru out of NJ - also has a parts lookup on their site. Prices are comparable to suabruparts.com but shipping costs are very reasonable)

Thats all I can think of at the moment...