Author Topic: Arcturus' 2010 FXT / Le Brake Job  (Read 9032 times)

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Offline Arcturus

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Arcturus' 2010 FXT / Le Brake Job
« on: April 21, 2014, 09:54:08 pm »


When I was looking for a newer and larger replacement for my 2002 WRX Wagon back in November I came to the realization that the 2014 Forester XT was simply too ugly to contemplate seriously and eventually settled on a nice, fully loaded 2010. The vehicle had recently passed the 100k threshold and was traded in for a base Mitsubishi Lancer, which strikes me as a questionable life decision, but one from which I continue to benefit daily.



The sport mesh grille was an immediate necessity and I then spent the rest of the winter researching upgrades and acquiring parts. Thankfully Edmonton’s beginning to threaten the prospect of non-winter and the warehouse I live in can eventually return to a residential apartment as I transfer parts from random open spaces to the vehicle itself.

My plans aren’t too ambitious as this is my daily driver, but I’m hoping to address some annoyances while making some cosmetic improvements and modest power gains. Compared to my upgraded WRX, the Forester is a little sloppy, vague, and braking can be an adventure; and that simply won’t do.

Onwards we go!


Installed Parts:

-  Subaru Front Bumper Under Spoiler
-  Subaru Sport Mesh Grille
-  STi License Plate (+40WHP)
-  Enkei TSP6 wheels (18”x8.5”)
-  Bridgestone Potenza RE760 Tires (245/45/18)
-  Whiteline Steering Rack Bushings
-  STi 19mm Rear Sway Bar
-  Kartboy Rear Endlinks
-  Swift Sport Lowering Springs
-  Rokblokz Mud Flaps
-  StopTech Brake Pads
-  Technafit Braided Steel Brake Lines
-  Invidia Catless Downpipe
-  STi Exhaust Mid-Pipe (sedan take-off)
-  Cobb Turbo Heat Shield
-  Stage2 Tune performed (Airboy)

Waiting to be Installed:

-  Powerflex Subframe Bushings

Future Work:

-  GrimmSpeed Master Cylinder Brace
-  Centric Brake Rotors
-  Stereo Head Unit
-  Speakers (front)
2010 Subaru Forester XT (Sold)
2002 Subaru Impreza WRX Wagon (Sold)

Offline Arcturus

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Re: Arcturus' FXT / Humble Beginnings
« Reply #1 on: April 21, 2014, 09:55:04 pm »
Looking forward to getting these bolted on...



but need to get the suspension sorted first. Need to find a place that isn't quoting a 6+ hour job on swapping the springs (prior to an alignment) when DIYers with jack stands and rental compressors can do it in 3.  :-\
2010 Subaru Forester XT (Sold)
2002 Subaru Impreza WRX Wagon (Sold)

Offline EricFXT

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Re: Arcturus' FXT / Humble Beginnings
« Reply #2 on: April 22, 2014, 12:55:11 am »
Nice looking foz! Are you only planning to do the Sti mid pipe and keep the stock axle back?

As for plans regarding the car, I'm going to start saving for when the engine blows up.


Offline Jessica

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Re: Arcturus' FXT / Humble Beginnings
« Reply #3 on: April 22, 2014, 07:43:32 am »
Ooooh!

Offline lynx440

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Re: Arcturus' FXT / Humble Beginnings
« Reply #4 on: April 22, 2014, 07:53:48 am »
Subscribed  :D

Offline chico_kj_23

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Re: Arcturus' FXT / Humble Beginnings
« Reply #5 on: April 22, 2014, 07:57:52 am »
Great colour and a nice collection of parts so far!

I really wish they brought these to Canada with the manual transmission.

Offline Asstuna

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Re: Arcturus' FXT / Humble Beginnings
« Reply #6 on: April 22, 2014, 09:33:14 am »
I like the effect of the sports mesh grille. It's a vast improvement over the stock appearance. Once those darker summers go on it's going to look pretty awesome. I assume the anti-chrome will include headlight bezel?

Offline Arcturus

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Re: Arcturus' FXT / Humble Beginnings
« Reply #7 on: April 22, 2014, 10:17:18 am »
Nice looking foz! Are you only planning to do the Sti mid pipe and keep the stock axle back?

Thanks. I have the full cat back in hand, but have read numerous reports about drone issues when mixing the Sti mufflers with the SH Forester. It's tempting, given that these are in nicer shape than my stock mufflers, but it could end up being a lot more trouble than it's worth.

I assume the anti-chrome will include headlight bezel?

I was thinking fog light surrounds and door handles. I'm not sure I'm bold enough to toss my headlights in the oven.
2010 Subaru Forester XT (Sold)
2002 Subaru Impreza WRX Wagon (Sold)

Offline Jessica

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Re: Arcturus' FXT / Humble Beginnings
« Reply #8 on: April 22, 2014, 10:27:08 am »
I don't know if this will help at all, but I just installed the Magnaflow catback exhaust into my SH. If you're worried about drone, we could always go for a spin in mine before you make your decision. When I went for a drive with the guy who gave the exhaust to me, he mentioned that it was actually quieter in the forester than his STi.

Offline Arcturus

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Re: Arcturus' FXT / Humble Beginnings
« Reply #9 on: April 23, 2014, 12:52:44 pm »
Thanks for the offer. I'll probably wait and see how the downpipe/midpipe combo works before I plot any further moves.
2010 Subaru Forester XT (Sold)
2002 Subaru Impreza WRX Wagon (Sold)

Offline Arcturus

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Re: Arcturus' FXT / Humble Beginnings
« Reply #10 on: April 27, 2014, 06:46:08 pm »
Took advantage of the weather to unleash a collection of new cleaning products on the car. Not sure how I made it this far in life without tire gloss.  8)



Big week ahead! Front bumper under spoiler and RSB go on tomorrow, and then steering bushings, springs and mudflaps on Tuesday. I want to get a feel for some of the suspension changes before switching the rims/tires up, and hopefully I can get that done later in the week.
2010 Subaru Forester XT (Sold)
2002 Subaru Impreza WRX Wagon (Sold)

Offline Arcturus

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Re: Arcturus' FXT / Humble Beginnings
« Reply #11 on: April 28, 2014, 12:37:00 pm »
The front under spoiler is now on! Really helps to improve the side profile of the vehicle.



Unfortunately the rear sway bar installation got nixed when Rally Subaru couldn't get the end links off (they're completely seized), which means new end links are headed for my future work list.
2010 Subaru Forester XT (Sold)
2002 Subaru Impreza WRX Wagon (Sold)

Offline canehdianJ

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Re: Arcturus' FXT / Humble Beginnings
« Reply #12 on: April 28, 2014, 05:40:18 pm »
Took advantage of the weather to unleash a collection of new cleaning products on the car. Not sure how I made it this far in life without tire gloss.  8)



Big week ahead! Front bumper under spoiler and RSB go on tomorrow, and then steering bushings, springs and mudflaps on Tuesday. I want to get a feel for some of the suspension changes before switching the rims/tires up, and hopefully I can get that done later in the week.

it really does look like a beach landing craft in stock form doesnt it.

Offline Arcturus

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Re: Arcturus' FXT / Chin Job Complete
« Reply #13 on: May 02, 2014, 01:32:04 pm »
I managed to get my Whiteline Steering Rack bushings, Swift Springs and Rokblokz mudflaps installed in time for this week's Edmonton meet and cruise. For around $200 parts+installation the bushings have produced a very noticeable improvement to the steering feel of the vehicle. Note that you'll likely need an alignment after installing those bushings, which I was getting anyway thanks to the springs.

The springs were meant to go on following a rear sway bar upgrade, but I had to change up my plans due to uncooperative end links. Nonetheless following the modest drop (about .8")  these stiffer springs on their own have already dialed out a lot of the vehicle's pronounced body roll. No real surprise there, there's a reason why so many Subaru owners go with Swifts (I had them on my WRX too). Between these two upgrades the vehicle's much funner to drive; no more leaning into every corner like a motorcycle rider from an instinctive desire to survive!

Side profile before:



Side profile after:



I went with the "short" version of the Rokblokz mudflaps, which are roughly 1.5" shorter than the normal ones. I chose these over RAs because they're cheaper, come unbranded (I have my own design in mind), and don't have a really ungainly looking front sidecut.
2010 Subaru Forester XT (Sold)
2002 Subaru Impreza WRX Wagon (Sold)

Offline Jessica

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Re: Arcturus' FXT / Riding a Little Lower
« Reply #14 on: May 02, 2014, 01:36:17 pm »
I <3 the steering rack bushings in your toaster.

Offline Dylan780

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Re: Arcturus' FXT / Riding a Little Lower
« Reply #15 on: May 02, 2014, 01:36:41 pm »
Wow, that grill and under spoiler change the entire look of the car. Looks really good!

Offline Claw

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Re: Arcturus' FXT / Riding a Little Lower
« Reply #16 on: May 02, 2014, 01:56:48 pm »
Nice.  I do like what you've done.  Did you get the Rokblokz directly from them?
They're going to park their car over there. You're going to park your car over here. Get it?

Offline Arcturus

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Re: Arcturus' FXT / Riding a Little Lower
« Reply #17 on: May 02, 2014, 02:44:53 pm »
Thanks guys and gal.

Did you get the Rokblokz directly from them?

Yup, ordered through their site and had them shipped via USPS. Took 8 days to reach me from Utah.
2010 Subaru Forester XT (Sold)
2002 Subaru Impreza WRX Wagon (Sold)

Offline Arcturus

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Re: Arcturus' FXT / Riding a Little Lower
« Reply #18 on: May 09, 2014, 10:38:13 pm »
New shoes (18"x8.5" Enkei TSP6) installed. Bolted right on with no fitment issues. 8)





Amusingly the Enkei's are about 1.5-2lbs lighter each than the 17x7 stock XT wheels they replaced.

My end links arrived from Touge so they (and my RSB) will be going on next.
2010 Subaru Forester XT (Sold)
2002 Subaru Impreza WRX Wagon (Sold)

Offline cheech00TS

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Re: Arcturus' FXT / New Shoes
« Reply #19 on: May 10, 2014, 10:23:48 am »
Great looking wheels! Always nice to shave some weight too.

How quick did your stuff from Touge ship? Did you pay a lot for shipping? I'm looking at the same from them sometime this summer.
'06 2.5i Wagon: 60KM->sold
'01 Forester S: 217KM->sold
'10 2.5i Wagon: gone...
'07 WRX Wagon: 167,xxx really fun kms!
'11 2.5i Limited Wagon

Offline Arcturus

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Re: Arcturus' 2010 FXT / Tight Rear End
« Reply #20 on: May 12, 2014, 01:56:23 pm »
I've ordered a number of items (springs, end links, steering bushings and a bunch of exhaust accessories) through Touge and the shipping rates are reasonable and clearly proportional to the size of the package (free for the end links, around $40 for the springs). Looking back through my last few transactions the fastest anything got to me was 10 days, and no longer than 24 days when he needed to order in a particular item. I believe he has faster options than Xpresspost, but I was never in enough of a rush to pay the premium for it.
2010 Subaru Forester XT (Sold)
2002 Subaru Impreza WRX Wagon (Sold)

Offline Arcturus

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Re: Arcturus' 2010 FXT / Tight Rear End
« Reply #21 on: May 12, 2014, 02:55:47 pm »
Took advantage of the beautiful weather on Sunday to dip the chrome handles on the Forester and do some rattle suppression work in the "hatch" area.



It was my first time working with Plasti-dip and thankfully I managed to not burn the car to the ground. After 6 coats of flat black and 2 of glossifier the results were only so-so, mostly due to my learning curve and being a little too heavy on my first few coats. The trickiest part was placing a narrow strip of black electrical tape behind each handle. This is meant to prevent the Plastidip from peeling, but it can also jumpstart the peeling process if you screw up its placement and then need to re-set it. Having skinnier fingers would have helped.

I'll probably redo it sometime later this summer, but I already like having the chrome gone from the sides of the vehicle. There's so much black trim on the Forester that the handles blend in better now.



Rattle Suppression

An annoyance with my Forester has been the amount of rattling from the back of the vehicle. At first I suspected the metal STI license plate frame (which only has two top mounted screw holes) was vibrating, so I went to work on it with some double sided tape (between the front of the plate and the plate holder) and then some weather stripping (between the bottom half of the plate holder and the vehicle). While this completely immobilized the plate, and helped the overall problem somewhat, there were clearly other culprits at work.

A key discover was when I noticed how much quieter the rear was when the seats were down along with the cargo cover removed. So after investigating a bit on subaruforester.org I not only discovered that reclining split-folding rear bench seats were a thing, and that my Forester possessed them, but that their latches can also be a significant source of unwanted noise. It wasn't really worth taking pictures for it, but following the suggestions there I reclined the entire bench to the middle setting (those mysterious square buttons on the seats near the door control this) from the highest, and then wrapped each "latch loop thing" with a small amount of electrical tape. It took a few tries to get the bench latch to take hold of the loop thing, but once it did, it was on there solidly with no play at all. Next up was the cargo cover.

It was also suggested that there can be a fair amount of lateral play to the cargo cover and, sure enough, I found I could easily shake the sodden thing a half-inch from side-to-side after "snapping" it into place. I'm not sure what the product is normally called, but I used a few squares of that grabby, rubber like product you use to line kitchen cabinets (which happened to be lying around my place and matches the interior of my vehicle) at each end of the cargo cover. Now it doesn't move at all.

I've driven the car around town a few times since and the difference is hugely noticeable! This mod cost me $0 and took about 5 minutes to execute.

Rear Sway Bar and End Links

Carrying on today's theme I dropped by First Gear Automotive and finally got my 19mm STI rear sway bar (replacing the meek 16mm OEM one) installed on the third attempt. The first two (at an unnamed dealership) were thwarted by a missing bushing and then by a need to cut off my existing end links when I had no replacements on hand... but interestingly... I see that First Gear had no issue removing my previous end links so I'm not sure what that was all about. I haven't had a chance to really run the vehicle through its paces, but it's feeling nice and solid back there.  >:D



^ New swaybar, end links (silver), and a guest appearance from my Swifts.
2010 Subaru Forester XT (Sold)
2002 Subaru Impreza WRX Wagon (Sold)

Offline Arcturus

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Re: Arcturus' 2010 FXT / Le Brake Job
« Reply #22 on: May 29, 2014, 06:45:50 pm »


I dropped in to First Gear this afternoon to get my Stoptech pads and Technafit brake lines installed. Poor braking performance was a real safety concern with this vehicle over the first 5-6 months I owned it, and while a switch from 7" wide, low rolling resistance all season tires, to 8ish" wide summer performance Bridgestones really made a big difference, this upgrade adds some extra insurance. I'm not sure whether the braided lines, the new Motul brake fluid, or the combination of the two deserve the credit, but pedal feel has been greatly improved. It always used to feel like the first inch of compression on my brake pedal was serving no mechanical purpose beyond exercising my heel.

I haven't needed to do any heavy braking yet, but I suspect that the planned Centric rotors will wait till my existing rotors wear out and that the master cylinder brace will get axed from my plans for the FXT.

2010 Subaru Forester XT (Sold)
2002 Subaru Impreza WRX Wagon (Sold)

Offline Zac

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Re: Arcturus' 2010 FXT / Le Brake Job
« Reply #23 on: May 29, 2014, 07:05:03 pm »
Not sure if your Foz has the firewall flex issue that the 08+ WRX has but installing a master cylinder brace made a day and night difference on my Legacy even after I did the brake lines and fluid flush

Offline Asstuna

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Re: Arcturus' 2010 FXT / Le Brake Job
« Reply #24 on: August 13, 2016, 10:45:10 am »
This thing popped up in a recent Google search of mine. Owner hasn't been on since May and I'm just wondering if there's anything new as it's still a bloody good looking Foz.