Author Topic: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt  (Read 2517 times)

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Offline JJx

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Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« on: August 29, 2019, 10:24:22 pm »
Finally starting a thread, mostly to keep track of what I've been doing to her.
 Bought just over a year ago with the swap already done --http://www.westernsubaruclub.com/smf/index.php?topic=56480.0--

20190910_201139

Red is previous owner/s

Powertrain:

- Built EJ255, make pistons, King bearings
- KillerB oil pickup
- EJ257 Heads from 2012 STi
- EGR block off plates
- Deleted EVAP system
- 2012 STi TMIC (temporary)
- HKS blow off valve (temporary)
- Tomei Expreme UEL headers and up pipe
- Ultimate Racing turbo back 3" exhaust (temporary?)
- ver 7 STi non-DCCD six speed, R180 rear diff & Brembos
- USDM STi subframes front and rear
- Forester subframe spacers deleted
-Group N tranny mount
- perrin pitch stop
- Crankcase and valve cover breathers are vta through ebay catchcan (temporary)

Suspension:
-Version 7 sti wagon strut/spring takeoffs with 3/4"  rear spacer ( eventually konis or agx?)

- Cobb Front/rear sway bar
- whiteline? ALK


Interior:
- GR STI front seats
- Defi gauges Boost, Oil Pressure, Oil Temp
- JDM Forester STi gauge cluster
- STi titanium shift knob (temporary?)
- custom leather shift and e-brake boots
- 2007 sti head unit (with aux)

Exterior
- oversized carbon fibre scoop painted
- Prodrive GC-06D forged wheels 17x8 with 245x40x17s
- Rota 17x8 with 215x55x17 tires (winters)
- Blue sparco mudflaps
 
Current pics to come


Offline JJx

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #1 on: August 30, 2019, 12:46:55 am »
First thing when I got her back from calgary, was to repaint (spray cans from Carlsons auto body supply with duplicolor acrylic laquer clear coat) the heavily rusted and chipped hood and the carbon fiber hood scoop with failing clear coat.

Eventually I'll replace the hood with an aluminum fxt hood. Finding it in the same colour may be like hitting the lottery, so if I get it in another colour I might spray it in the same colour as the mirrors and rear trim, which is interestingly Lada 625.
https://photos.app.goo.gl/xtFj9MXcxnCwN6Xx8[/img]

Offline Canuckrz

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #2 on: August 30, 2019, 01:09:17 am »
Very neat and rare color. Also hell of a bargain. I think I've only ever seen one or two XT's in that color semi locally.

Offline Asstuna

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #3 on: September 01, 2019, 11:05:58 am »
Is that JasperSTI's old Forester?

Offline jellynuts

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #4 on: September 01, 2019, 05:01:10 pm »
Is that JasperSTI's old Forester?

No, Jasper's was silver and had GD seats.  This one is gold with GR seats.  I think Jasper's was a 5-speed as well... 

OP, you want a spare 07 STI headunit?  lols
uckfay, Johnny with the back-handed slap. You're clearly the Oracle.

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Offline JJx

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #5 on: September 03, 2019, 11:55:25 am »
Thanks! I do have mixed feelings about the colour, it can be a little pukey depending on lighting, but other times it looks great!
I've seen my twin in edmonton once- same colour with similar rims and also lowered, but he was going the opposite way on the henday hehe.

Jellynuts I appreciate the offer but unfortunately I already blew 20$ on one. Was a pain to get the aux working as they have that dumb switch on the oem aux receiver. Ended up getting a cord on Amazon with the right pigtail, just had to repin it to work with the subaru HU.

Offline JJx

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #6 on: September 03, 2019, 12:24:18 pm »
The current wheel set up has been a rubbin since I bought the car, the lips have just started to rust and I have small crack in the paint in the rear. Decided to roll the rear fenders and reseal everything after.
Was looking at renting fender rollers, but with the deposit most guys wanted a total of 140$+ for a fender roller that was 120$ at princess auto. This sketched me out so I ended procrastinating until one got posted on FB marketplace for 40$.

Rolling fenders went as expected (not smoothly) and even with heat the paint was cracking everywhere. Sanded/ wire brushed all the rust/bad paint then did a couple coats of rust converter. The tiny rust spot ended up being a nickle sized hole ::) . oh well. Bondo, primer, paint, and clear coat later the repair ended up being good for about 3feet. I could've done a better job blending it but I wanted to minimize the damage done to the good paint.

20190814_160817_HDR

20190819_203402

20190825_185517_HDR

20190825_185437_HDR

Offline JJx

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #7 on: October 07, 2019, 09:59:51 am »
The current sti struts were labelled sedan by the importer, so I'd been looking for sti wagon springs. Finally found a set for 250$ off of Facebook.
Swapped the rears first, and with the rear struts off I was able to see the spring paint code. They were identical. So either the spring codes are meaningless or the importer mislabeled them.

To make my strut change not pointless, I decided to add another 3/8" spacer in the rear, which required longer hardware. Had no interest in buying the right studs, so I just used some grade 8 bolts and double-nutted them.



[url=https://flic.kr/p/2hryfaf]

Offline Asstuna

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #8 on: October 07, 2019, 04:56:49 pm »
The spacer now has hot spots around each nut. Effectively you're loading 1/4 the rear weight of the car on those three little hexagonal surfaces (or 1/2 on six).

Offline Canuckrz

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #9 on: October 07, 2019, 05:38:00 pm »
The spacer now has hot spots around each nut. Effectively you're loading 1/4 the rear weight of the car on those three little hexagonal surfaces (or 1/2 on six).
One could hog out the holes so that the spacer goes on around the nuts rather than sitting on. The center should keep the spacer centered anyways.

Offline Mason

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #10 on: October 07, 2019, 08:48:18 pm »

Offline RedBimmer93

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #11 on: October 07, 2019, 10:33:38 pm »
Is that an old cutting board?

It's the best way to do it!!  ;D

Although I used a new cutting board for mine



Offline JJx

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #12 on: October 08, 2019, 08:30:46 am »
Good catch! I counter-sunk a spot for the nuts, just didn't post the picture cause of my inability to cut along the lines:

20190818_174039

Offline JJx

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #13 on: October 08, 2019, 08:32:21 am »
It's the best way to do it!!  ;D

Although I used a new cutting board for mine

Student budgets don't allow for new cutting boards  :P

Offline Asstuna

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #14 on: October 08, 2019, 07:06:40 pm »
Excellent.

Not the cutting. That's not excellent.

Offline JJx

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #15 on: October 08, 2019, 10:33:49 pm »
Finally installed a crawford AOS that I bought with a broken bracket. Got a buddy to weld it up for me, but didn't remember that it was the 08+ bracket... Just one bolt holding it for now. I'll figure some bracket out to one of strut top nuts.

20190901_204132

I like how simple hose routing is. Ended up needing a 3/4" to 3/8" 90 barbed elbow. Greggs didn't have it. Ended up mentioning it to my father, turns out he had just the right fitting in one of his endless drawers.

 20190901_192851_HDR

Still not sure if I want to bother with the heater hose... Any recommendations?

 20190902_202639

Also... Got a box from Latvia... More exciting car stuff soon to come.

Offline JJx

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #16 on: November 07, 2019, 11:25:05 am »
I had this horrid squealing noise that I thought was my tire rubbing on something, but couldn't find it. Then it changed to making the noise all the time and I realized it was the wheel bearing... First time doing a pressed in wheel bearing,  I think the increased in difficulty is worth the cost difference between the bolt in hubs. Not to mention the ability to repack the bearings with some quality grease.

Only ended up taking a photo of my improvised bearing press (threaded rod) using cad tires rentatool bearing punch


Went very smoothly only using hand tools, though I had to chisel the inner race of hub, as I didn't have the right tool... That'll be an investment for next time.

Also made a bracket for the aos as I didn't love how un-sturdy it was.


Just some sheet metal and a hose clamp.



The threads to pertrude past the end of the nut and it torqued to spec. Aos is rock solid now.


Offline JJx

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #17 on: November 29, 2019, 12:25:46 pm »
Decided to do some rust protection from the inside, as the rear arches seem to rust from the inside out. Bought some sound deadening off amazon to use while I had everything apart...

Sure enough they were rusty. Started picking the old sealer off.



Soaked it in rust converter a couple times, didn't bother picking off the seam sealer where it hadn't failed. It's easy to tell as it won't come off even when you try.



Gave it a wipe and then painted it with some rust check rust killer. I vetted it first on my father's rusty prius door, and it held up impressively. POR15 may be better, but this was 10$ for the container, and should have a relatively easy environment.

Finished it off with some brush on seam sealer after a couple days of drying.
Some sound proofing:




Offline JJx

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #18 on: May 16, 2020, 03:06:12 pm »
After over a year of looking, ended up finding a gold forester xt hood on kijiji. Peeling off that 3m clear stuff is a pain.

annoyingly the new one is a slightly different gold.

Think I like the regular sized scoop compared to the large one I had on the previous hood. I think a 02-03 sti scoop would be a good medium, but they seem somewhat hard to come by for a reasonable price.
Using my finger gauge, the intercooler temperature with the smaller scoop with the modified stock splitter, is about the same as the big scoop with no splitter.

Sanding and polishing my headlights gave a remarkable improvement with is hard to capture on camera. Put some ceramic headlight coating that my neighbour lent me to protect it.

There's still some crazing in the plastic, so new headlights may be an eventual purchase.

Offline JJx

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #19 on: May 23, 2020, 04:38:42 pm »
Swapped my uel headers for equal length headers, should work better with an eventual Helmholtz resonator. Not the best looking piece, but they were cheap. I Ceramic coated them with VHT flameproof.


I also swapped my engine mounts for some yonoka motorsport mounts. NVH is a bit more noticeable at idle but about the same everywhere else.

Offline firebane

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #20 on: May 23, 2020, 06:16:11 pm »
The large hood scoop on the forester is very similar to those of the JDM versions. A lot of people put XT scoops onto bugeyes as they are bigger.

As an example here is a stock 02 bugeye scoop https://i.imgur.com/msYQyaN.jpg
Here is a JDM version https://i.imgur.com/sxnhdL2.jpg

Thing is if you don't match scoop with splitter your not getting any benefits. I personally prefer the JDM as it makes the front look better but I need to build a proper shroud.

Offline JJx

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #21 on: May 24, 2020, 12:15:21 am »
I realize I didn't have a photo of my previous scoop- it's just a carbon one off ebay that I painted gold. It's like bird eating big:


Oh the jdm one does look the right size but it's hard to tell from photos. Just a bit bigger.

Offline JJx

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #22 on: June 22, 2020, 11:35:56 pm »
Fit some some of my favourite oem subaru wheels. Used some 15mm hub conversion spacers as they're the 5x114 bolt pattern. More temporary as I'd like to do a 5x114 hub swap eventually.
drilling out the pockets 5mm so I didn't have to cut my studs.


They're stupid heavy but for some reason I dig these wheels.

Offline jellynuts

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #23 on: June 23, 2020, 09:03:39 am »
I always thought they were a good looking wheel too. 

What did you drill out? 
uckfay, Johnny with the back-handed slap. You're clearly the Oracle.

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Offline JJx

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Re: Goldilocks, JJx's sti swapped forester xt
« Reply #24 on: June 23, 2020, 12:11:22 pm »
Agreed.

Since I was only running 15mm conversion spacers, I drilled out deeper pockets for the old lugs to sit it in, as otherwise they contacted the back of the wheel.