[GC8 STI Value]

That guy's a dreamer.

 

To be fair, so is @Niran and what he's selling is way tidier. But who knows, maybe someone spectacularly optimistic will pay asking.

 

People mistaking immaculate, completely original, 25000km cars for their daily-driven, somewhat modified, obviously "used" 120000km+ cars.

[What have people done with blown engines?]

 

 

19 hours ago, Bugeye01WRX said:

 

Oh 1,500 is allgood for an engine and I assume STI engine as well?

 

So if I bought for example a used EJ205 engine if mine blew, how much would I be looking at roughly in that case to get it on the road again including replacing all the oil pump, seals and cooler.

 

 

Haha that sounds like they are both good points. Thanks a lot for all the info tho I definitely feel like I understand the options more!

 

Thanks everyone for the replies! I definitely feel like I understand the options much better!!

 

Can an EJ207 be dropped into WRX easily?

 

$1500 is for a long motor that the seller thought was toast. Which is about the value of the things that bolt onto a dead long motor.

 

Used low-ish Kms EJ205 long motor, let's say $2k. Gaskets, seals, odds and ends that you would want to refresh, coolant, oil, probably $1k, 1.5k if you want to do the cambelt.

Can you do all the labour yourself? If not, engine out, refresh replacement motor, engine back in, probably $2k+. So you're looking at $5k to revive it.

 

If you went to a 207... shortblock or long motor? If I remember right the shortblocks are a couple of grand, then all the misc you would have to do, at least a couple more grand, then labour, a few more, then you would presumably need a retune as your compression is probably different, I'd say $10k all done and you would have probably the same performance as you do currently.

 

EJ207 long motor, let's say $4-5k for the motor and bits hanging off it, $1k refreshing it, $2k labour, $1k tune (or maybe you could swap in an STI ECU?) - $8-10k and you would get EJ207 performance. But you would be better off selling yours before it blows up and buying an STI.

[What have people done with blown engines?]

Part the car out, or buy a $2k wrecker motor and cross your fingers. 

 

Converting to anything STI is going to be a very expensive journey.

[Anyone done poly mounts?]

It's a stock-ish WRX. Don't ruin it with racecar spec stuff.

[Body Integrated Unit beeping continuously after alarm removal in Subaru Impreza]

Get an electrical wiring diagram for the car as a start.

 

Is it a continuous beep or a beep beep beep beep?

 

[Body Integrated Unit beeping continuously after alarm removal in Subaru Impreza]

To be honest it sounds like you've made a mess of the alarm removal.

 

First place I'd be looking is the door sensing. It sounds like the car thinks the driver's door is open.

[Subaru SSM]

I feel like a '98 may be too old for FreeSSM.

 

re. the cable, I used a VAGCOM cable with an obd2 connector with my '05 Legacy and it worked well.

 

In terms of which connectors need plugging in to put it in diagnostic mode... ugh it seems to vary hugely even with supposedly identical cars... different markets, trim levels... first get confidence in your reading equipment, then you just have to experiment until you get the output you expect.

[What sort of rotors to get for a V7 STI]

The genuine price for the Brembos, last time I looked, was pretty vomit.

 

I'm running Znoelli slotted cross-drilled rotors cos that's what the last owner put on the car. So it's fair to say I've had epic mileage from them. They stop good enough but make an annoying buzzing sound if you're driving alongside a wall such as the median divider on the motorway.

 

(They look pretty racecar too)

 

EDIT: Just had a look, Brembo front rotors >$1000/piece, no thanks.

[Equal length headers on v7 sti]

I had Prova equal lengths on mine. Good header with a stock turbo, honestly I thought they sounded decent too. Had a tendency to crack once I went to a big turbo.

 

Gains were, as described, likely minimal on paper but the car felt nice to drive.

 

I've gone to Legacy Twin Scrolls + up-pipe on the latest attempt at making the car better, had to change sump, dipstick and dipstick guide tube, and the pickup.

[Worth upgrading turbo inlet pipe?]

The best out there is the AVO one. Deletes the little elbow that goes the airbox as well.

 

It has ports on it for every single connection though so if you're deleting stuff it may not be useful.

 

Every "Samco" one I've seen has been a fake pile of s***, be careful if you go that way.

 

If you just go pipe... have someone weld one up for you. Keep in mind it has to do a little shimmy back to the left (looking at the motor from the front of the car) to line up.

[Worth upgrading turbo inlet pipe?]

There's about 2 on the market that aren't pieces of complete s***.

 

The non-brand ones are utter garbage and will collapse if you pull too much vacuum through them.

[Rear wheel bearing removal]

Everything up to November '00 uses the snap-ring setup. I'm not 100% sure about seals on either side of the bearing as there are no less than 3 seal-looking things on the parts diagram.

[1st gear on a hill? Is it possible to lug or nah?]

Lugging matters if you do it for like.... kilometres.... every day. Not once, up a driveway.

 

It would just stall. There's not even enough force to make the engine keep going around, let along damage anything.

[Aftermarket intercoolers]

From talking to some people who spend too much time around dyno bays, often the no-name stuff is no better than stock. s****y fin density in the cores, or s***house welding and poor fit/finish let them down badly.

 

It's not a cheap car - my 2c is if you're going to do it, save up the pennies and get a PW.

[BE5 rev D only showing 0.5 bar boost]

0.5 bar is wastegate pressure if I remember right, so either it's plumbed wrong (possibly a restrictor pill missing), or there's a faulty solenoid, or it's in limp mode.

[Throttle Body Coolant Bypass Mod]

On 22/05/2021 at 5:08 PM, Loren said:

The manifold is never very hot to touch though... so can't be that much heat going into them.

 

Have you already got spacers? After a decent drive mine would be too hot to comfortably touch.

[Throttle Body Coolant Bypass Mod]

Yep, did it ages ago, can't say if it makes much difference unless you also have phenolic spaces because your manifold just acts as a giant heatsink for the heads.

 

Can't remember exactly what was required, I think I just used a cheap plastic irrigation joiner from Bunnings?

[How restrictive is the sti genome muffler?]

6 hours ago, Andy_Mac said:

 

What would be an acceptable loss for a not so restrictive set up though?

Surely just about any setup would perform a lot better with the axle back section removed, maybe not so bad on a relatively straight through single exit V7 setup but the overly convoluted later setups must surely add noticeable restriction even when pushed up a size. 

 

Not sure really. I went to an obnoxiously loud 3" (not a straight pipe mind you, it has a muffler and resonator) and it made more power again, but we changed a couple of other things. Would it have made >230kw with the old exhaust and those things changed? Not sure. What I'm getting at is that a smaller (or at least, constricted design) exhaust is definitely a significant restriction at those power levels, whereas a freeflowing 3" didn't seem to be.

4 hours ago, Subru said:

Another question,

The exhaust from the donor car has the o2 sensor in the 'post cat' area of the downpipe (if there was a cat) but on my car the o2 sensor is at the very top of the downpipe. Will it matter if I move the o2 sensor from top of downpipe to underneath the car without screwing with the tune? I doubt it matters but wanna be sure.

Neither exhaust has a cat.

 

 

Nope, no difference. Make sure the loom is long enough. On a V7 the O2 sensor should be at the bottom, if it's at the top you probably have a GC/GF downpipe shoehorned in.

[How restrictive is the sti genome muffler?]

18 hours ago, Loren said:

 

So you couldn't make more than 230kw... and you swapped  the rear muffler only, and then you were able to make more than 230kw? 

 

Yes, exactly that, literally without removing the car from the dyno. Ran the car up and it made like... 236 or something, tuner was like "I suspect your exhaust", unbolted it at the mid-pipe and did a pull and it made 250-something.

[VF26 (VF27 CHRA) Turbo smoking]

Smoke coming from the turbo itself, wut?

 

Sealant on the compressor plate isn't going to make it smoke.

 

1.5mm is on the larger side for a ball bearing turbo, I believe the standard ones are 1mm? But also unlikely to actually be an issue.

 

Did you re-use the copper washers on the oil and coolant feed banjos, and if so, did you re-anneal them?

 

 

[How restrictive is the sti genome muffler?]

I'm gonna be a pest and say it's probably too restrictive for 250wkw, from memory those Genomes aren't big mufflers, like.... 2.25" or something. I had a 2.5" Zerosports on mine and it became a limitation over about 230wkw.

[Heat wrap]

Tried a whole lot of them, the no-name stuff is a waste of time, goes to s*** inside 12 months, flakes to bits and falls off.

 

The best of what I've tried is the Lava Rock stuff from Pro Wholesale, goes on nice, doesn't make you itch quite as much as all the straight fibreglass ones, and seems to have lasted at least somewhat well.

 

But the true best is OEM heatshields.

[GCG Bolt on turbos]

18 hours ago, ginganinja said:

I understand that but given at 220-230kw and 23psi the VF22 is basically a hairdryer i was thinking something like a GCG GTX2867R at less boost will make a bit more power or similar but be more efficient doing it and keep things a bit colder as @Gripless was referring to. I just don't think there is much point in going too big but I could be wrong.

 

 

Your engine doesn't really care if the turbo is a hairdryer. As long as it's not knocking, power is power is power. The air gets really really hot as soon as the spark plug goes off anyway.

 

I had 231kw from a VF34 for years, no problems, and that was with a topmount, on a stock V7 longblock.

 

I don't know if I fully understand your goals... you only want less than 250wkw, and you want it to be... deliberately laggy... so it doesn't feel like a big lazy V8? Sounds like a TD06 is the turbo for you, ancient pieces of s*** that they are.

 

There doesn't seem to be much point in going to a probably quite expensive Garrett GTX-based turbo when you could achieve everything you want to with a Kinugawa TD06.

 

[GCG Bolt on turbos]

Going to an aftermarket turbo for about 10kw more than a tapped-out VF22 will manage... seems counter intuitive. My 2c anyway.

[Is this check engine light an error?]

It will have a stored code. Find out how to extract it. Might be some combination of plugs under the ECU and then it will either flash some random code at you, or display it in the trip counter or something.