boon

I'd be ever so slightly tempted to let them keep at it while getting the nearest po-car to come and investigate. That's cos I'm small and white. If I was big and brown I would totally effect a citizen's arrest and restrain them by keeping their fingers firmly restrained between the door and the car.

That sucks. Seriously looks like a good old 'take back the car' job to me.

Stuck a real-time scan tool on it and took it for a drive, AFM was seeing hardly any air so leaning it out or something along those lines. Swapped in a new AFM and now it's great, and doesn't over-boost. God knows why.

Subaru cure-all - it was the AFM...

The aforementioned boost gauge. And a couple of non-engine related mods. That's it as far as I know.

My cousin just bought a V7 STi The stupid thing keeps going into limp mode (7psi boost limit) His boost gauge says his peak boost was 23.6psi - would this be enough to trip limp mode? Why would it be boost-spiking this high? It's almost completely factory. Cheers for any input!

Replaced the bottom half of my air filter box, some munter had broken all the clips off the old one. (Plus now I will claim it has a Spec C filter box for added JDM cred ;D)

Look forward to hearing this one... I'd like to think I'm pretty clued up on the whole audio thing and I don't see how a stiffening cap will degrade SQ...

OK - here's the test about whether some money-waste may have just occured. Turn your car off and give it some beans, see if the lights dim. If they do, your battery is poked, get a new one. If they don't, then what's happening is the dimming you're seeing is the drop from 14.4v (charge voltage from your alternator) to ~12.5v (loaded voltage of a normal battery). Your alternator is probably only a 90A jobbie. It takes probably 40 odd amps just to run your car so there's 50A for other stuff. So as soon as your audio pulls >50A (which happens quite quickly really) your voltage will drop from 14.4 to 12.5. A cap will help slightly but the only true solution is a high-output alternator which costs $$$ out here and who knows if anyone makes one for a subey.

I don't have one myself but we've installed a bunch of them. They go good in 1 cube with a 4" aeroport. Or you can get the 8" "Loaded enclosure" which is really quite nice, well built and carpeted, good grill and terminals so you can just rip it out whenever you need to.

Should be one badass car once it's done. The whole compliance thing can be a massive pain in the ass, a lot of it makes no sense, just like a lot of other restrictions/requirements. (For example you can tint a RAV4 to 0% if it's 4wd but if it's 2wd only 35%...)

Vacuum or boost leak somewhere? Probably vacuum. I know if I pull a vacuum hose off my car it runs like a bag of shit.

Not that I've noticed from mine...

Toss the Soundstream sub out the window and pick up a DD1508. Tiny but pack more punch than 99% of subs you'll ever hear.

Look for some second hand JDM-as-feck ones on trademe. As long as they're in good enough condition you'll get much better struts for much less money. I got some Cusco Zero2s for my old GF8 for like $600 Cert is usually ~$400.

Was it running fine until recently or only when you put the external on? Check that you've got the vacuum/boost lines on the wastegate the right way around, if you get them backwards it will just run spring pressure.

Gimme a yell if you need a hand since I've had mine all in pieces twice recently! You'll need a really good 14mm ratchet spanner and a long ass 3/8" extension with a good quality swivel joint. Plus a boatload of that non-flammable 5-56 and it might help if you have some spare studs/bolts for the turbo-downpipe join since they seem to like to bend/ruin them. Oh and I had to cut the mid-pipe bolts out of mine, welded shut by rust. Actually they're a gigantic pain in the ass, especially getting the heat shield off so you can get at the downpipe. Wrap your new one then throw the heat shield as far as you can into the nearest blackberry bush.

Mine's pretty quiet. As far as Subies around town with aftermarket exhausts I would say it's one of the quietest. Still a good throb though and plenty of nice Subaru sounds when you give it the beans.

1 here as well.

My Zerosports midpipe bolted up to the factory downpipe and the Rage one (after a cut and twist, the Rage guy reckoned the flange had been welded on wrong) no worries... which to me says that the factory mid pipe should bolt up to a correctly built Rage one?

Please enter, so we can watch you get your ass handed to you by a Civic

I've got a Rage 3" Siamese into 2.5" ZeroSports World Leaguer midpipe and rear section. DP bolted up to the Zerosports midpipe...ish. They had welded the flange on at the wrong angle so we had to do a quick cut-twist-weld job on it. Even the Subaru cone gasket from the old mid-pipe fitted, amazingly enough. Nice note, not too loud, good rumble especially when coming off the throttle.

Bought it a new alarm to replace the poorly installed one...

My left headlight has gone kinda dim and yellow all of a sudden. They're HIDs. Right one is still fine. What's it likely to be? Bulb? Ballast? ??? Should I just get a pair of bulbs from tardme? Wouldn't mind some whiter headlights anyway.

IMO yes. If a thief is familiar with AVS alarms it will make your car a more attractive target. Likewise even more so if they've knocked over a few cars from that guy and know stuff like where he puts the brain, where he does his cuts etc etc blah blah. Bet you've got a blue blinky LED too