[pluzz]

Hi All,

I have posted an official welcome in the main intro section of the forum. But just to cap it up - I have bought a 2001 S-Turbo few weeks ago and have been enjoying the car for the last week. It is in a pretty good condition but being a 9 years old has its little gremlins...

I am based in SW London Colliers Wood and have been enjoying a Foz spotting since owning my own car Quite a few cars around but doubt all of them are here.

As much as I would like to mod the car and free its detuned engine I can't afford it at the moment. I bought the car for its practicality, off-roadish capabilities, AWD and the looks (and being a bit of a car nut for the pace). I will be using the car to transport wife and a soon-to-be-born kid between the UK and Poland where I am originally from.

Having had a proper look at the car only after buying it icon_redface I noticed few problems.

The muffler section of the exhaust is quite coroded and will probably need replacing soon. I looked around here to see what poeple do but it seems everyone is installing an aftermarket performance parts. Any idea how much a factory rear box is? And a lontg shot - anyone has one laying around :biggrin: ?

I noticed the clock is not working and a radio doesn't work on an aftermarket unit (CD works fine but no radio - could be the unit's fault).

My car is missing the passenger side headlamp washer so will have a look around for that.

I hope to meet some of you on the roads and possibly at a meet or something. I am a member of another car club and they meet quite regularly. In fact, from the other club's perspective, buying a Subaru was like crossing to the dark side of the force for me :starwars:

Sorry for a long post,

Tomasz

 

[redrum1974]

Hi Tomasz,

Glad to see you are enjoying the new Foz, I bought a 99 S-turbo a few months back to use for work and transporting my kid/bikes etc...

No doubt you will get itchy fingers and start modding the car soon, I used to live in Colliers Wood and am now in Redhill so just down the A217 from you, more than happy to give you a ride in my Foz to get an idea of what you can do on a budget.

Here is a list of mods I have done to date

Solid front and rear whiteline droplinks (£170)
Impreza STI rear anti roll bar (£40 secondhand)
decat centre pipe (£50 secondhand)
Prodrice classic rear box/muffler (£100 + £60 to modify)
Green panel air filter (£40)
Impreza 4 pot front calipers (£120)
Godspeed 335mm front brake kit + DS2500 pads (£575)
Godspeed 264mm rear discs + DS2500 pads (£200)

Have fun,

Tom

 

[stevem]

Clock fix is here...

http://www.subaruforester.org/vbulletin/f77/oh-no-my-clock-doesnt-work-3350/

Wecome. I was local to you but my foz has now emigrated....

 

[pluzz]

Thanks for the welcome!

Here is a list of mods I have done to date

Solid front and rear whiteline droplinks (£170)
Impreza STI rear anti roll bar (£40 secondhand)
decat centre pipe (£50 secondhand)
Prodrice classic rear box/muffler (£100 + £60 to modify)
Green panel air filter (£40)
Impreza 4 pot front calipers (£120)
Godspeed 335mm front brake kit + DS2500 pads (£575)
Godspeed 264mm rear discs + DS2500 pads (£200)

All nice and simple mods but it all adds up to more then half the value of my car :biggrin:

I do like to hold on to my cars so maybe down the line as things go wrong I might consider upgrades. First of all I need to get my head around all the techncialities of the Subaru (turbo, intercoolers, all the pipes under the bonnet, exhaust, etc....) I am at a carb stage :biggrin:

Clock fix is here...

So the clock fault is quite common then? I will try to fix it today. Thanks for the link!!!

Any idea where to get standard rear brake pads in my area? I ordered a kit (disc and pads) from e-bay but didn't look carefully and got the wrong pads :chair:. It would be good to know of a good "member's approved" place for parts.

 

[pluzz]

...more than happy to give you a ride in my Foz to get an idea of what you can do on a budget.

Thanks for the offer Tom! I would really liked that but more to find out if my car drives the same way in terms of little noises, humms and rattles. I will get in touch when I find some free time

 

[stevem]

Eurocarparts carry the discs and pads etc... . Take one in with you to check you get the right pattern though

 

[pluzz]

Just fixed my clock - Thanks for the link Steve!

Eurocarparts have the pads in stock but their card machine was broken today Back with cash tomorrow and a swap over weekend.

(How I love the internet.....)

 

[mdg]

As for the back box, it's made up of three layers of low grade stainless steel and could be as good as new underneath the corroded layer.

 

[Tuned200]

Welcome. Good luck with the fixes. Im sure someone over there has a stock muffler laying around. Over here, we almost give them away.

 

[mdg]

Send 'em all over here in a shipping container please.

 

[The Rookie]

To correct slightly the rear box is 2 layers of low grade stainless (so will surface rust) and an outer wrap of aluminised mild steel which will rot through, pull off the loose and keep on driving.

The Forsester uses what looks like a heating element in the rear side window as the aerial, the amplifier for this needs to be powered, your non original stereo may not be connected right to ground the relay.

Clock fix is easy!

Upping the boost is easy, my gheto tweak costs about a fiver, pm me an email addy and I can send you a 'how to'.

Simon

 

[pluzz]

I have fixed the radio problem. The antenna cable must have been cut at some point and then someone just taped the two ends together. Really bad job! I have a pic but am not allowed to post urls yet. I have used old ethernet network ends to connect the two cables. I think it is a clean and nice solution

Other radio connections were a complete mess too. Speakers mixed up. Noise cancellation cable as a ground! I am really surprised it all worked.

I have the main console apart as I am looking for the button illumination bulbs. I will have a look around the forum to see where to get them.

 

[Alan MaC]

Good Luck with the £60 a month Club!!!



regards




AM

 

[don1952]

I have the main console apart as I am looking for the button illumination bulbs. I will have a look around the forum to see where to get them.

http://www.subaruforester.org/vbulletin/f75/dash-bulbs-70380/

 

[pluzz]

Dash Bulbs

Thanks. Found this just after your post. Trip to Maplin tomorrow then.

 

[sheffscoob]

welcome to the forum! enjoy the car.

clock fix for me on the weekend (if I get time!)

mike

 

[pluzz]

Thanks for all your tips and help.

Dashboard lights changed, apart from a fog light. I am yet to figure out how to get to this set of buttons.

This weekend (weather permitted) I will swap rear discs and pads.

Thanks,

 

[sheffscoob]

Well don mate. Easy business!

Let us all know how it goes with the brakes. This is a job on mine that is 6-9 months off..

Have fun mate!

 

[pluzz]

I finally found some time (and a good weather :woohoo for the brakes. Inspection revealed that I didn't really needed the change but since the previous owner changed the pads and rotors in front few miles back I decided to do the back too.

It took me about 2h to do one side and only about 30min for the other side. It helps to know what you're doing :biggrin:. I have worked on brakes in the past but have never seen anything like Subaru design. Quite interesting.

I have to re-adjust the hand brake now but I am not sure how to tell when the pads touch the rotor since rotating the wheels is so hard (hand brake down and in neutral). I tried to follow the service book for adjusting the brake and it says to tighten with the adjusting screw until the pads rest on the rotor and then drop down 3-4 clicks. Any pointers?

(I still need few more posts before I am allowed to post pictures )

Next thing on my list is a very irritating wind noise from drivers side window at over 40mph. I looked at the weather strip and all seems fine. No creases, cuts, etc.... very annoying considering I will be taking nearly 3000 miles trip mid April.

Then I would like to change speakers and a unit as the current one is very basic and poor. After that I would like to install a boost gauge but no rush with that...

 

[pluzz]

One more thing. I have previously mentioned the radio reception issue. This has been half-solved as I can now search for radio signals but the reception is pretty poor (only getting all the BBC stations through "seek"). I checked the antenna for bad connections as per service manual but found nothing wrong with it. Any ideas please? or a check I could perform?