DiscoPete

Its the same here in Maryland - inspected every 2 years using the OBDII port. My OBXT passes fine with Stage 1 installed because it isn't throwing any malfunction codes. If your "Check Engine" lamp isn't acting up, the car will pass an OBDII test. Don't know how it would work out in a place where they measure tail pipe emissions.

It may be common for factory wheel alignments to be out of kilter: I bought a new 1985 Ford pick up truck and needed new front tires by about 20K miles due to poor aignment. No great loss - the stock tires were crap - dangerously slick on a wet road. Recently I bought a low mileage, one-owner used Porsche. It had 20K on the odometer and I had to replace the front tires by 23K. The alignment shop measurements showed that none of the four wheels had matching toe-in or camber. The Tech said it looked like a factory "alignment". The date codes on the tires showed that they were not the original set. IOW, the car ran through two sets of front tires in 23,000 miles. The first owner must have burnt through a pair of front tires in 12K or so, then installed new ones without getting an alignment. It might be a good idea to assume that a new car requires a wheel alignment.

Just curious - What is to be done when these Bilstein shocks break or wear out? Can they be rebuilt without sending them to Japan or Germany? Would it be advisable to buy a spare shock or two to keep the car on the road?

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There isn't any Group Buy. Member rB5 researched it and found what seems to be the best deal on the Bilstein kit and no group participation is required. Everyone makes their own purchase at the current exchange rate and shipping costs. Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe that the source for the kit is HKC, found at http://www.hkc-speed.com/index.php

Better control arm bushings - a good idea. That goes on the list. I see that you also installed 25 mm sway bars front & rear. What brand did you select and why did you choose that over the other brands available? Did you add stronger bar mounts and end links? Many people just add a rear sway bar. Does the front one make that much extra difference?

to me, too. Maybe someone can enlighten us. I'm surprised to hear that a turbo adds a few hundred pounds to the car's weight. I thought that they were supposed to the light-weight solution to more power. It didn't seem to me like that little turbo and inter-cooler sitting on top of the engine would weigh that much.

Mike's car is identical to mine and he's very satisfied with his modification, so I imagine that it would work fine for me, too. I don't know enough to engineer my own suspension set-up, so I'm willing to go with something already proven to work well. I DO know that the stock suspension on my Outback needs help. Early in my experience with the car I did a fast lane change at highway speed on the interstate and was alarmed by the way the car was pitching and rolling back and forth. I must have done it just right to get an oscillation going. I prefer a more planted road feel. You mentioned something about the weight of the 2.5 XT vs the 3.0 engine being almost the same. Do you know of any advantage to using a different set-up? You probably know more about this than do. I'm ready to listen.

Thanks for that corrected information. Many things popped up when I Googled HKC. I want to be sure that I have the right supplier in mind. The most likely of the bunch was www.hkc-speed.com/ Is that the place?

Here is the parts list supplied by Mike: Parts list: 1ea. JDM Bistein BTS-5056J. www.hirano-tire.co.jp - Export divison; exportdivision@hotmail.com (the Company regularly advertises 128,370 Yen for the BTS 5056J Kit) 2ea. USDM SpecB top hats, 20320AG01A. local. 2ea. USDM SpecB dust cap 20320AG000. local. 2ea. JDM rear shock perch 20370AG010. www.japanparts.com 2ea. JDM rear rubber upper 20375AE011. www.japanparts.com If I'm following this correctly, Item #1 is the suspension kit identical to the one available from HKC. The top hats, dust caps, shock perch and rear rubber uppers would be purchased separately. I've seen ~ $200 mentioned as the cost of those items.

I'm interested in the Bilstein suspension setup. Just to be sure - Is the kit from HKC exactly like the one M. Schneider installed on his car? If so, the part numbers that he provided for the extra installation bits are the right numbers, which is good to know. If my participation in a group buy will drive the price below the $1,800 (delivered) quoted by HKC, I'll join the group buy. Otherwise, I'm inclined to contact HKC for the most current information and do a deal. What's the latest word on the group buy?

^^^^ The Cobb AccessPORT Stage 1 upgrade makes the car even better.

My experience so far: For the single day that the upgrade has been installed, I've been running the 93 octane Stage 1 map in Real Time mode. The only hitch in the installation was that I had to disconnect and reconnect the dongle (the plug that connects to the OBD port) before the AP would marry up to the engine computer. Except for that, installation went by the book. The Stage 1 programming brought about a nice improvement the performance. It hasn't turned into a race car, but its now much more fun to drive. The motor has significantly more pep and that occasional stuttering throttle response seems to be cured. I don't understand why Subaru didn't configure the car like this from the factory. Were they afraid of frightening the Soccer Moms? If no problems crop up in the next few days, I'll convert the R-T Map to the Base Map. I was able to buy the AP from a Subaru dealer and apply Subaru Bucks to the purchase. That sealed the deal.

I installed my new AccessPORT yesterday, making me an "instant expert" - not yet a Sage - but I believe that I can answer your 5th. question and the last part of the second one. Once the firmware and the map programs are loaded into the AP hand-held terminal, you won't need the PC again until you update the unit. The maps stored in the terminal can be displayed and selected for installation. The software downloads from the Cobb website are free, probably because they are useless to you unltil you have purchased an AP.

As I understand it, the purchase of an AP conveys a license to install the Cobb software on only one vehicle at a time. If the AP was unmarried from from the original vehicle, it stands to reason that the Cobb map would be deleted and the stock map reinstalled, allowing the AccessPORT to be used on a different vehicle. The vehicle's original map is downloaded to the AP during the procedure to install the new map and is available to be reinstalled.

There is a video on the Cobb website that shows how to use the AP. http://www.cobbtuning.com/products/?id=3268 If I recall it correctly, the user is instructed to save the existing map to the AccessPort before the new map is installed, so that the original settings can be restored if need be.

Nice! I wish mine was that color. I've done two long distance purchases, where the cars were shipped from an out-of-state CarMax location to the one near my home. In both cases, the cars needed several hundred dollars worth of minor repair. CarMax has a 30 day repair warranty, so it cost me nothing except the time to take them in to be fixed. Good luck!

If you get a Chase Subaru MasterCard you can earn Subaru Bucks that can take a lot of the sting out of having work done at the dealership.

Welcome! I got my '05 OB XT back at the end of July. They are nice cars. I'm really enjoying mine. This is a good forum, too. -Pete

Nice color!

'05 OB-XT Limited, 5 speed manual, silver