Ownership Verified: New car. Now, wiith Added Granola!(1997 Subaru Legacy Outback)

LiveToWin

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Location
Tempe, Arizona, USA
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2012 Lexus IS F
So, I went out and bought a new car. A blue (almost purple) Subaru Outback. Nearly everything on the car has been rebuilt or replaced (with paperwork) in the last 150 miles. Rebuilt engine. New tranny, new drive shaft, new axles, rebuilt wheel bearings, new struts... the list goes on.

It drives surprisingly well considering age, mileage, and the ride height + relatively low power. I do however have the world's loudest passenger car tires right now. Those will be gone once the tread has been worn through.
I put a head unit in it so I have bluetooth and Ipod compatibility to help cover up the tire roar.

Pic dump: (W/ proof pic)
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Yeah, for a car that was made to be thrashed and bashed, that is pretty freakin' tidy.
 
Thanks.

I was shocked at the state of the exterior as well. The interior is in about the same condition as the exterior... After 16 years and 195k miles.
 
I was able to get this for $4500 as well.

Inside is almost as good. Two small cuts (that have been repaired) on the rear seat and the carpeting is a bit dirtier than it should be (that may change with some extensive cleaning).

Also, this car has one of the worst cup holder designs I've ever seen.
 
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Scrolled down, saw exterior of your house, scrolled back up, checked your location, yep.

Nice car. :p
 
It's depressing. I really enjoyed the cold snap. First time I've worn long sleeves in a year. /sigh
 
I was able to get this for $4500 as well.

Inside is almost as good. Two small cuts (that have been repaired) on the rear seat and the carpeting is a bit dirtier than it should be (that may change with some extensive cleaning).

Also, this car has one of the worst cup holder designs I've ever seen.

Welcome to the wonderful world of Subaru. I had an old 98 and ended breaking my cupholders. Such a horrid piece of design.

Id look over at SL-i.net and NastySock (Nasioc) for ideas. Any plans?
 
I would like to get some more power from the engine but it looks to me like most of the options are either prohibitively expensive or tend to ruin the car. Any good mods that you are aware of?

So far, the handling and braking are more than sufficient (all new brakes and suspension ftw), at least from what I can tell in some brief parkinglot/roundabout shenanigans.
 
Well the EJ25 is truthfully a solid motor...once the HG's are done properly. Luckily you have that buttoned up so you can start looking at possibly doing a cold air intake or swapping the 2.5 intake for an older 2.2 intake which doesnt have a throttle box and provides a slight bump (2-3HP).

The power 4-AT mod is also something to look into:

http://www.sl-i.net/FORUM/viewtopic.php?f=39&t=17483&hilit=powermode

If your suspension is new, then you can also do the front and rear sways which for the front you can use the Tribeca sway bar and the rear a WRX sway...but have to cut a bit of material from the spare wheelwell, that doesnt do much anyways.
 
Update: I'm now about halfway through the new/rebuilt engine break-in period.

Someone use to make a throttle body spacer for it, with allegedly good results, but it seems they have fallen off the grid. I'll look into that intake swap though.
 
Well, it seems that the A/C Compressor couldn't handle more than 16 years of service, and it died. A seal went and it threw all of it's oil. New compressor was installed and the system recharged. Ice cold once again. During the same repair, I realized that one of the two radiator fans was out, and that was also replaced. At no point did the temperature gauge go above normal, so I guess that this engine could almost be air cooled, rather than water cooled.
 
200,000 mile update.

Another oil change has been done. A new set of tires (Kumho Solus KR21) is installed and the car has been cleaned fairly thoroughly. The steering wheel and other controls were pretty filthy from the GDPO and it was so caked on I had thought it was leather damage... It wasn't, so I spent several hours removing that gunk. I feel much better now when I'm in the car. The Subie has been washed, waxed, and the exhaust tip has also been cleansed of carbon buildup. It's nowhere near the level of workmanship that has been put into some of the cars on here (Handz's Mustang comes to mind) but I'm pretty pleased. Oh, and I finally set the clock on the radio. That had been bugging me for awhile.

I have also installed my first mod on the car. Side cargo nets. Once I gave up on using a 1/2'' drill bit and just used my rotary tool (because the instructions are full of lies) they went in without issue.

Subaru offers what they call the "Badge of Ownership" and I think most of the stuff you can get on it is rather pointless, but it was free and they had high mileage badges, so I went ahead and ordered it.

Pic dump:

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It's been a good car thus far. There are things about it that I find annoying, but every car, new or used has some design quirks and flaws.
 
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