[ACHAHockey]

I got the car is the Summer of '06. It had roughly 40k miles, and as of today (4/10/08), it's at mid 80k. The car came with a COBB cat-back, and an intake pipe. It still uses the stock airbox, but the pipe is aluminum. It came with 17" Sparco Tarmac wheels (rare from what I'm told), with Falken 512 tires. It didn't take long for me to want to make it faster. Coming from a father who races/auto-xs Porsche, BMW and Ferrari, it was in my blood.

That Winter of '06, I put OBX headers, and a high flow cat on the car. The CEL was on, which I knew it would be, and it bugged the HELL out of me. The car lost it's rumble, but gained considerable low/high end torque. I ran a 6.3 0-60 time (stock is mid 7), and a 14.7 1/4 mile time (stock is in the 15s I believe). That Spring, the headers/cat came off, and the stockers went back on. I was too tired of the CEL, and running rich. I also traded trunks with mgsm666 on here, he got my wingless, and I got his STi trunk. I get mixed reviews on it, many say they hate it, many say they like it. I think it's really the only era of Subarus that a non-STi could pull off the STi trunk.

The car sat at my Dad's house getting the stuff taken off for about a month. He has a lift in the garage, which makes it much easier. I ended up taking the Porsche back to Buffalo. It's a 1995 911, Fabspeed headers, catless, Supertrapp mufflers, Fabspeed CF intake box with drop-in, chip, Sparco Evo seat, had the Autospeed roll bar, Bilstein Sport coil-overs with Eibach springs, 205/17 up front, with 255/17 in rear (Kumho).









While I had the car, my Dad told me I should try auto-x. I did, and started off in the novice class. The Porsche was ASP, and my pax number was terrible in the novice class. I was getting consistant 2nd-4th place times with the 911 in novice. I finally got my car back, and it was my main auto-x car. I ended up in 4th place out of 170 novices at the year's end. I ended up switching to a Blitz Nur Spec cat-back from the COBB, but then sold that as well. So as of the Summer's end, I was using a stock '07 WRX cat-back. I pariticipated in a few rally-xs too, and won 2 of them.





















The car in winter mode has 16" Sport Edition wheels, with Dunlop WinterSport M3 tires.








As of now, the car is getting ready for the upcoming auto-x season. Porterfield pads have been replaced by Hawk pads. Falken Azenis went on last weekend in a 225/45/17 size. The last weekend in April, KYB AGX struts with '05 STi springs/tophats will be going on. I will also be using TiC's Scooby 921 system. The car gets driven about 40 miles a day, class, work, gym. Every 2 weeks I make the 400 mile round trip to Pitt. to visit my gf at school.

Mods as of now (5/7) are:

-Rally Armor flaps
-K&N drop-in
-Cold-air pipe
-'07 WRX cat-back
-17" Sparco Tarmac wheels with Falken Azenis 225/45/17
-COBB short shifter
-OMP 4-point harness
-Hawk HPS pads up front, Axxiss pads in rear
-Super Blue fluid
-Kartboy rear endlinks
-KYB AGX adjustable struts with '05 STi springs
-Whiteline rear sway mounts
-TiC 921 spacers
-STi decklid
-JVC CD player with iPod hookup
-Escort SOLO detector, and PASSPORT G-Timer

I'd like to at least get a little rumble back, so a cat-back may be in the future again. Maybe 3rd times the charm for aftermarket cat-backs.

[fourseasonsandles]

Lookin good! How do you like the Azenis?

[ACHAHockey]

Originally Posted by fourseasonsandles

Lookin good! How do you like the Azenis?

Loving them so far! I'm sure you are too.

[fourseasonsandles]

Yes def! I missed stiffer sidewall of a good summer tire. Still getting used to the grip though.

[ACHAHockey]

Got a few pics in yesterday, the weather says rain for the next 9 days here, so I had to take advantage of the last nice day. The car hasn't been washed since Spring hit, there just haven't been too many consecutive nice days to convince me to pay $14 for a car wash.










The end of April I'll be in Albany taking advantage of my Dad's lift. I'll be putting on the KYB AGX struts with '05 STi springs I got from WRC1 on here, and using rear tophats from an '06 that I got from Crewchief on here. I got a set of stock STi sways from WRC1 as well, and I'll be putting the rear one on. After that, I'm going to get ~-1.5* of camber in the front, and ~-.5* of camber in the rear.

[ACHAHockey]

Sways and springs should be in today, Crewchief sent out the tophats directly to my Dad, and Turn in Concepts has a set of Scooby921 spacers headed that way as well. Less than 3 weeks until auto-x season, and it's all coming together. I ended up putting new rear pads on the car. Currently there are Hawk HPS' on the front, and Axxiss' on the rear.

[ACHAHockey]

Got the springs and sways from WRC1 on Thursday, and put the rear sway on Friday.

I was one of the instructors at a novice auto-x school yesterday (Sunday). It was great, got to drive a lot of other cars including a fully modded (suspension/engine-wise) Evo that was FASTTTT! Also got to drive a brand new GT500, wasn't impressed. I got to see how the STi rear sway was as well, and compared to the stock 14mm, it was great. The oversteer was much greater, almost zero understeer. The Azenis held their own as well, I can not wait for this upcoming season. Springs/struts this weekend, really excited for that as well.

[ACHAHockey]

Got to my dad's house out in Albany about 2 hours ago.

15 minutes into being here, the Porsche was off the lift, and my car was on it. The top hats from Crewchief were here, as well as the 921 spacers from TiC, and to my surprise F/R Kartboy end links from TiC.

I really never looked at the KYBs, and when I pulled them off the shelf I saw the coilover set-up with the springs. The springs are some cheap brand, and I only read bad reviews, good thing I have the '05 STi springs.

So as of now, the car is wheel-less, and back seat-less. Tomorrow should be a GREAT day.

[ACHAHockey]

Well, the next day didn't prove to be so well.

The rears went on fine, but the fronts, not so much. We stripped out the bearing in the front top hats, and this was Saturday night. We tried pressing the bearing out, but had no luck. So, Sunday, I headed back to Buffalo in my dad's daily driver, an '04 Impreza.

We ordered '05 STi front top hats off eBaY, as well as Whiteline rear sway bar mounts from TiC. Friday, I drove back up to Albany after work, and arrived around 1 am. Saturday, we fixed the problem in the front, set the alignment ourselves, and put the sway bar kit on the rear, as well as the KartBoy rear links.












The car got around .25"-.50" lower. It handles AMAZING now, no body roll at all, and a good amount of oversteer.


Sunday was the first autox of the season. I came in 7th out of 15 in the STX class. 5 of the 7 who beat me are guys who've been doing it for nearly 25 years, and the other 2 were their sons. The closest guy behind me was 3 seconds away, and last year, he was beating me, or I was right with him. The car now wants to turn, and is a serious autox contender.

[ACHAHockey]

2nd local event of the season this past Sunday.

It poured ALL day. Puddles past the wheels in some parts. Only about 50 drivers showed up, and I really wish I wouldn't have since I've become a little sick. Anyways, I ended up in 4th place in STX, again, behind the 3 guys who've been doing it for 20+ years. The Azenis handle amazing in the heavy rain, and so did the car.

[fourseasonsandles]

Originally Posted by ACHAHockey

The Azenis handle amazing in the heavy rain, and so did the car.

That's encouraging! I am always nervous when it rains - used to the RE070s that used to hydroplane on me.

[ACHAHockey]

Originally Posted by fourseasonsandles

That's encouraging! I am always nervous when it rains - used to the RE070s that used to hydroplane on me.

I was really surprised too! I didn't think they'd be terrible, but I didn't think they'd be this good. The ground never had less than an 1/8th inch of water on it at any given times. The only time the rear end came out was when I had a hard right hander coming out of a tight gate.

[ACHAHockey]

I've decided that I'm going to go back to the Nur Spec exhaust. As LOUD as it was, I miss the gurgle it had. It attracted attention like a mother****er, but I don't care. I found one for a good price over on NASIOC, so when my rebate check comes, I'll probably pick it up.

[slc14]

Looks good, rally-x looks fun, migt have to get into that.

[ACHAHockey]

Originally Posted by slc14

Looks good, rally-x looks fun, migt have to get into that.

It's REALLY fun. The first time I rallied, it was in my friend's brand spanking new '07 WRX. We rolled a bead on the stock RE92s, but he still got FTD, and I got first. The second rally was in my car, and the black scuffs down the side of the car are from pretty large rocks that I hit. Again though, hell of a time, and first place.

The last one was in the winter, and going sideways for 15 seconds straight on 2 inches of ice is a great time.