Pleides

I actually can recommend a couple poly bushings here and there, but I mostly use them in places where they're prone to falling apart quickly in these cars, like the trailing arm bushings, front LCA bushings, rear lateral link bushings (replace these with the Whiteline KTA124 kit 100%), and upgraded sway bar endlinks and bars and you've got yourself quite a stout-handling car. For the Cobb Accessport, DEFINITELY keep it. It's required by many tuners for their dyno tuning. Any tuner worth their salt will prefer tuning on an Accessport over the old open source way, and some might tell you after certain power levels that they'll do AP only. For the Bilsteins, yes, they're OK, but I've heard that many prefer the Koni shocks over the Bilsteins, esp. with an aftermarket lowering spring. See if that route is available to you. Coilovers that are worth your time on our cars start at like 1700+ dollars.

Are your engine and transmission mounts original? Original pitch stop (if the non turbos have those)?

If I weren't upgrading my pads and lines here I'd buy these in a heartbeat. GLWYS. Please, for whoever buys these, send them to Madrig so he can make clones! These things aren't super easy to come by.

From my limited experience, the car will send a CEL if your BOV isn't working right, something along the lines of a cylinder running too lean. My car often nearly stalls when pushing the clutch in, however I have two culprits for it. One, the car needs a valve adjustment (think a motor out job - this is not easy and I'm waiting for the motor to blow up rather than paying someone to do this). It often will stall when you're creeping in traffic, and you'll just go "Wait, the hell? I barely let the clutch out?" Two, I've replaced my oil control valves with new parts and most of my stuttering/stalling issues went away briefly, only to come back a couple days later. Seems the culprit could be some gunk in the oil. Running Seafoam through the oil then changing it shortly after seems to help, but it does keep coming back. I've come to just accept that it is what it is. Hopefully that can give you a starting point. Have you done a valve cover gasket recently? That would be where you would check valve clearances. If they're super tight <.1 mm) then you're gonna have to accept that your car will stall sometimes. Idle will often be rough as well.

Do you make replicas of the JDM side spats that fit our cars, Madrig? These guys.

I'd really recommend not messing with the intake on a car with a turboback exhaust. Boost creep is super common on Subarus with these modifications. You say you have an EWG uppipe though, so I guess you've at least got your wastegate figured out. I'd imagine that would solve your potential boost creep issues if you went through with putting all of this on. For the intake, no, an later model year won't work quite right with it. If you wanted to go the route of re-tuning the car with a WRX/STi MAF, then go for it, but I'd just stick with what works on this car without adding more variables. For a turbo inlet, I have a Perrin unit installed by the previous owner. It's been on for about 3 years now. No complaints here.

I found that my pitch stop, engine mounts, and trans mount were all equally beat to shit at the same time. Replacing all three if you haven't over the life of the car with 100K+ on it would be a good idea regardless of whether or not is solves your problem. I highly recommend Group N parts for all three. I have a Perrin pitch stop and it's a little too stiff and and adds a little too much NVH for my liking. Also, I have found this car to be much harder to learn to shift smoothly in than any other manual car I've ever driven. You gotta get back on the throttle a little faster between shifts to prevent some of the drivetrain slop that comes with an imperfect upshift. Flat-foot shifting is an absolute no on these things, even if you have the much more durable 6-speed. You say you're a Subaru tech. Can you have another tech look in the engine bay of your car while you have the car on a four-post and lift it 6 inches off the ground, then do whatever recreates the problem? Having a stethoscope might help too if you have one handy. As for symptoms in this car with failed mounts, for me it was pretty much impossible to shift smoothly with worn everything. Starting from a stop required feathering the throttle and clutch just right. One of my engine mounts actually started peeling like an orange, which is when I had Surgeline replace them. Another user mentioned spot welds. I wouldn't know symptoms of failure here. My car has been an occasionally spirited drive kinda daily car. If you're a tech though, I'm sure you'll be of more use than us shadetree guys on here

NAPA auto parts will read your code for free. Go there, write down the code, get to Googling. My OEM MAF went at 202K. I was stalling all the time, some other symptoms similar to yours. Check engine light came on and found all four cylinders running lean/rough. Funny story, I feel like mentioning it here because it's just so damn surreal. I had just bought the car as a bit of a project to become my daily driver and it broke down on me in SW Portland. I stopped in the middle of the road, propped the hood up, checked every single thing I could and didn't see anything wrong. Coolant, oil, vac leaks, nothing obvious was wrong. Some random guy walks by on the sidewalk adjacent to me and yells "Hey man, is that an 05? Legacy GT? I've got the same car dude." We have a quick yelling talk over the sound of traffic before he yells "I had the same problem with mine. Check your mass airflow sensor!" After quite literally blowing on the electronic in the MAF sensor like an old Nintendo cartridge, the car started after a few extra cranks. I went home, cleaned the MAF sensor, and it ran OKish with the light gone. I posted the story on Reddit, hoping I'd find the guy again and thanking him, but never could find him Replaced the MAF with this part and the car hasn't had a CEL since. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B007WMG8A0/ref=ppx_od_dt_b_asin_title_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1 Part is 197-6040 if you can find it cheaper elsewhere.

I was only using the VF48 as a reference point for what to expect. I'm not planning on putting one in, I'd go for a VF52.

Subaru leather is pretty soft. Perhaps find an auto fabric reupholster and see what they can do? They can use softer foam in the bolsters and whatnot.

PM sent

Borla is my favorite. Here's a sound sample of a car with the exact exhaust I have. It isn't obnoxious and has a sexy rumble. I get lots of compliments on it with my Perrin catless uppipe, Borla catback, and Invidia catted downpipe. Here's one of Gunnar's Vaderwagon with a catless downpipe. The Greddy axleback with an Avo midpipe also sounds really good, hard to find clips of that. I don't really love the Q300 Invidia system as it's way too loud for a muffled and resonated exhaust IMO.

Mine never had a roof rack or the optional under-seat subwoofer, but it has one of the original keys plus a newer style of Subaru key that you could find on something like a base-model Forester today, so that's neat. One less object to carry around. No valet key here. My car also has 212K and I'm the third or fourth owner. As boxkita said, come to the west for one of these. They're abundant (especially in Oregon and Washington) and the majority will have no rust. If you find one you don't like, go on FB Marketplace or Craigslist and find 15 more. As for engine covers, the 2.5 turbo engine uses an engine cover that has a cutout for the top-mount intercooler. The regular NAs may not have actually had one, I'm not certain. My mother's NA 2006 Forester does not have one, and it's a two-owner car including her. Google isn't turning up much there, so I'm guessing they didn't have one. All wagons come with a privacy cover. It's a two-part system with a tonneau cover that breaks all the time and a privacy cover that attaches to that whole system and covers the space between the trunk and the tonneau cover end. They also come with a full-sized spare tire and a jack. My car is missing the part of the jack that spins the little handle to jack the car up, so you gotta use the lug wrench to turn that thing. Tedious, but luckily I haven't gotten a flat. My car came with two cargo nets in the trunk, but I don't know if those are optional or not. Floor mats are carpeted from the factory but nearly all Subaru dealers here include rubber mats with their cars because people take them camping, up mountains, and it rains here. The net on the back of the front seat (only one seatback has a map pocket net) is prone to looking like an old teabag after awhile. Sometimes they're missing if the rear was used to haul kids and they kicked the shit out of it. The plastic coverings for the seatbelt exit slots in the back of the backseats comes out too. Hard to explain it, but it's a little guide where your shoulder sits on the backseat where the seatbelt comes out of the seat (they don't come out of the C pillar on the wagons, can't speak for sedans). Mine are both missing. Wagons came with a couple styles of mudguards from what I've seen. Mine have almost all fallen off at some point, front and rear. There's the basic mudguard style that's mundane and then there's a slightly more aggressive style, like on this car. I hope that helped in some way. In reality, these cars are old now. Don't fret if they're missing a key or owner's manual.

Pardon me for a dumb question, but I hope it's not unappreciated by those who know as little as I do. I am shoveling money into a savings account for the day my motor blows up (212K on it, valve clearance is super, super tight on #2 and #4 exhaust valves). I have 30K on my IHI VF46 and am thinking about upgrading to a VF52 with a new motor per the recommendations of numerous forum users here. Of all of the turbo Subarus I have driven, I don't believe I have driven one with a VF52. However, I have driven a stock 2017 STi, and that has a VF48 turbo. I LOVED how that turbo spooled. From what I can find online, the VF52 and VF48 *should* spool similarly and use similar hardware. Is that correct? If I liked the VF48 power band, I should like the VF52 equally, right? Thanks for answering my dumb question.

I know your fear of plastic parts is very real, but have you considered that the wagons (in the form of the Outback) are extremely common cars and, if you break out the angle grinder, any part you break can easily be replaced? I'd just tear into it man. You're just gonna get more frustrated trying to dilly dally about it.

To those with VF52 LGTs, how comparable would it be to my experience driving a stock 2017 STi? From my quick research, it seems that the VF48 in that car spools very, very similarly to the VF52. I loved the way that STi drove, even with the stock tune. Definitely drove a lot better than my wagon that desperately needs a valve adjustment and a good cleaning of the oil pan and OCVs

As I understand it, they both have optional Swift springs (I looked at buying the FA500 before I bought my Koni+H&R) and they also have optional Hyperco springs. I don’t know who the spring OEM is for the standard coilover. My only complaint about the Koni and H&R is that it doesn’t go as low as I’d like, and if I go lower I’d like to keep coilover options in mind. The FA500s are at an attractive price point, but if they use the same valving as BC BRs then I’d cross them off my list.

Anybody know if the ISC/BC BR/FA 500 are all just rebrands of each other? I don't understand how the FA500 could hold the price point it's at if it's no different than the BCs unless you're paying for their customer service.

I might not be understanding your issue super well, but is it boost limited in first gear?

This is exactly what my wagon sounds like. Uses a catless uppipe, Invidia catted downpipe, and Borla catback. Here's one with a gutted stock downpipe from a user on here named Gunnar (can't remember his username but he's got a dope wagon called Vaderwagon somewhere on here), I'm quite partial to the Borla because it isn't super loud. It has the token rumble. The Greddy exhaust also sounds good. Similar to the Invidia Q300 but a little quieter and lower-toned.

The Q300 is too loud for my tastes but it’s up to you. The Borla and Greddy exhaust systems for these cars sound really good to me.

I actually did that mod and it did help a lot. Lots of NVH increase though if you have an aftermarket turboback, which I do. I did some Whiteline rear diff mount bushings and those helped a bit too. I've driven a few manual Subarus and have always felt that they were a little clunky, so maybe just a Subaru thing. Haven't driven one that wasn't throttle by wire though.

Enjoy the GT! Definitely toss that catback in the trash. My car had that turboback from DNA and it didn't fit worth sh*t. Previous owner put it on and told me it was difficult to fit it without modification. It sounded like a Honda at high RPMs, so I replaced it with a lovely Borla unit. Spendy, but sounds great. Check all the rubber on your car when you get a chance! The rubber in the suspension just wears out way too quickly in them.

If you'd like, I'm in Portland, OR (Wilsonville, actually) and can drive your car to help you diagnose. I can't go into first in my car without revving it up a bit unless I'm going less than maybe 3 MPH. Also, our cars buck a little if a clutch job has been done in their lifetime because almost all owners replace the stupid dual-mass flywheel assembly that these cars come with and opt for a regular solid flywheel from am 07 Legacy GT/08 WRX instead. That doesn't dampen slight errors in shifting very well. I can count on my hands how many perfect 1st to 2nd shifts I've had in my car since I bought it December 2018. The rear diff moves around a lot in these cars, even with upgraded bushings, so you're gonna get some drivetrain bucking. This doesn't happen nearly as much in FWD/RWD cars, especially with ones that don't use drive-by-wire throttles.

Holy rust Batman! I’m glad they leave salt in the ocean for us west coasters.