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Minor updates test fitted the headlight covers, awaiting last of the parts to land then off to panel & paint.....Finally

well i decided to bite the bullet and install a computer in my wrx, system so far consists of a Viewsonic VOT132 (quadcore 1.6Ghz Atom with an Nvidia 9400 on-board graphics). I ran some decent gauge wire from one of my amps under the passenger seat (permanent power to the battery via 4 gauge cable) and routed that to the trunk with a cigaretter lighter socket wired to the end of that to provide power. on the +12 side i inserted a car horn relay (good for 30 amps but should only be drawing 5 or 6 max) with an RF triggering system (just a garage door remote really) so that i can apply power to the carputer and have it turn on remotely for admin purposes. Power is provided via a 150 watt car laptop adapter from jaycar as the puter runs off 19v DC. Screen will be an in-dash motorised touch screen fed with a vga signal, just ebayed it yesterday so will hopefully turn up next week. Have already routed a couple of usb's up to the glove compartment as well as an audio cable to go the aux in on the headunit. Costs so far: Computer: 570 (with no OS) Screen: 1100 Jaycar power supply: 90 remote turn on thingy: 50 Level of unnessecerity: priceless

CVT ! Has Subaru lost all their marbles ? 🤣 https://www.evo.co.uk/subaru/wrx-sti/207524/new-subaru-wrx-s210-sti-the-most-focused-sti-has-a-cvt-gearbox

Found more rust, again tiny. The rails have been rubbing and made little 2mm circle of missing paint. Got bored/brave and cleared up all the rusted stone chips around the car. So scratched rust and treated, primed all ready for painting. Tested roof sound deadening and it’s just quieter to notice, but not a big improvement. Though other than rain noise I think will be back when factory headliner goes back in since it is far more reflective than the foam. The heat insulation on the other hand is obvious. With a window cracked it doesn’t increase in temp anymore. The outside is too hot to hold your hand on but inside is warm but not hot. The downside is when parked in underground where it’s cold, the car is still same hot temp when you get back. Even when roof was cold the car stays insulated. I did figure out the roof rib bracing gets to about the same temperature as the roof skin. Roof ribs now has thermal tape of fibreglass and alloy like exhaust wrap but super thin. At 100kph the roof skin cools down from 70-80 degrees to more like 40 degrees. So didn’t need AC running on motorway. All this is still without the headliner which should add more insulation.

Controversial opinion: If you want a "dead" car, buy an Audi.

A friend put sound deadening on the fuel tank and said it helped a lot.. could be another place to think about.

Well I’ve not driven the car yet but just in the car park the reflected sounds have dropped noticeably while installing it. tapping of the treated vs untreated was obvious, not dead like the tar/rubber mat but no ring. Very surprised now much different given it’s so thin and light. If the heat is reduced as well then will be wishing I did it years ago 😒

Very little trim comes out and it’s all bolted near top so can’t move due to airbags etc so not likely to rattle. lights are also screwed in to roof so no new rattles for those either. paranoid bit is bending the headliner when getting it out.

God I'd love to put sound deadening on the roof, but im far too paranoid that I'll create more interior rattles when removing trim an trying to put it back

In the last week or two I have Found the source of my knocking sound. It was the infamous Bilstein knock from severe stiction on the seal/bushings. It sounded awful when doing tight turns. I did the stop-gap fix of lifting the car up slightly and greasing the tubes. It took quite a lot of manipulation of the car on a hot day to diagnose it, I was thinking a sway bar bush was stuffed. Done a 2300km road trip up to Auckland and back. First one in 3 years where there hasn't been some sort of minor issue. I removed the excess grease from the shocks when I got back. It'll be interesting to see how long it takes the knocking to return. My upcoming projects are to get the roof repainted (clear coat is crazing and deteriorating), change the accessory belts/pulley (car has just ticked over 160k km) and to fit a dash carpet as my dash is beyond stuffed. My goal is another 5 years from the car then it will be time to work toward getting something else.

Well not today (and sure as hell not in one day), but playing catchup: Does replacing all driveline/transmission/engine bushings/mounts with Group N STI, delicious pink pillow-ball STI lateral links and trailing arms, Ohlins Road & Track coilovers count?

Wellity wellity wellity....since I can never let anything go, I've finally achieved my ultimate goal now that technology has caught up with my vision. Probably not a thing for people these days with Android head-units being a dime a dozen, but here's what the breakdown of what a modern carputer is for me now and why I've gone this way (mainly just enjoying a project and being a cheap bastard): - Raspberry Pi 5 running Lineage OS 21 (Android 15), overclocked to 2900Mhz - Raspberry Pi active cooler - Raspberry Pi NVME Hat with 512GB drive - USB/HDMI 7" touchscreen, silicone sealed into factory double-din spot - USB GPS receiver - USB DAC with optical output to DSP - Power control is via a bit of dedicated hardware (probably detailed earlier in the thread) which provides power on/off control with ignition sensing, also tells the Pi to cleanly shutdown via USB - A nifty gadget I found that provides USB signal pass-through from source to sink, whilst also injecting fast-charge USB-C power to my phone So, what this lets me do is basically have the full-blown unrestricted Android experience in my car with the main benefits: - Offline maps and navigation via google maps - Playback of any and all media up to the limits of the storage capacity via VLC, BS Player, Plex, etc (choose your favourite), and maintaining great quality to the sound system via a fully digital/optical signal path directly into my DSP - Android Auto via the "Headunit Reloaded" app (wireless function is buggy as hell but wired is solid, and with the gadget I mentioned above, I get fast-charging anyways). There is also a standalone function, so Android Auto without a phone if you wanted to. - Anything else is just limited by my imagination, but main focus was fully offline and standalone media playback and mapping functions Few learnings/additional tweaks: - Since I've been collecting music videos etc for years, my collection contains a wide range of resolutions/codecs, not all of which are guaranteed to be supported on low-powered platforms (especially modern 4K60 AV1 files). I run a service on my server that detects file additions to my media libraries (relevent to the carputer) and copies/converts these to 1080p30 HEVC/H265 which the Pi5 can process on GPU, these then get transferred to a "Carputer media" folder that gets automatically synced over wifi to the carputer (installed a WAP in the garage to facilitate this). - Audio files just get synced directly in the same way So yeah, pretty much it really...

Two additional orders 1 cup holder foam from amayama the 3 foam inserts for the cup holder and tray same as legacy and a few other models. Just as the current ones are mostly just grit and the rectangle in the middle where the tape holds what’s left down. When they arrive I’ll put them on an A4 sheet of paper and scan them with the measurements and centre points of the radius. Then have an admin host them here. That way you can just print them at home on paper and cut them out from foam, leather or whatever material. Plus you can pick coloured material if you wanted. 2 lighters sockets replaced with USB Bits for inside the console box to tidy up the sockets etc. I have a USB lead for the iPhone/iPod link to the stereo that pokes through the AUX panel. Which is a 5x2.5cm cutout with a diagonal corner that’s Subaru used since the late 90’s. There is little option to replace this due to the size, so it’ll be covered over with this dual usb A and dual usb c with PD. https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005008187065950.html That will connect to the cigarette lighter power wiring. The PD power delivery part will be helpful for charging a laptop a little at 20-30watts. They say 60watts but I suspect that’s only if you have 24v input. The model I ordered has voltage display as well. The console box lighter socket will be removed since the power draw from the above will be near the factory rating of the old lighter. The hole will be filled by and usb to usb cable for the stereo. https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005007137472845.html Since lighter sockets are pretty useless the one in front of the gear shift is being replaced as well. With a usb A and usb c with PD and QC3 for phones. https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005006823887384.html it also has a button to press to show current voltage on a multi colour segment display more like old air fuel ratio meter. It should be only illuminated after first button press, but it’s low down out of eyeliner for night driving anyway. Final USB is usb A female to usb c female panel. That will mount near glove box and connect to ecu tuning cable. That way it’s tidy and I don’t need to buy a new ecu to usb c plug if that is ever an option. Will print a label for cover that says ecu and tuck it away slightly out of view. https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005006704300239.html Last one in the list.

Car all back in one piece. The roof rail clips all worked fine, but they really do need the 2 little tabs to prevent any movement. The tabs were missing from all but 1 clip when I took them off. I found a couple in among the plant matter under the rails, but seems they get brittle and fall off.