First turbo 14 wagon

[TerryCFT]

Good evening all. I am Terry. I bought a 2014 STi wagon (14k miles) in Aug to replace my Trailblazer SS. I needed AWD and enough room to haul my bicycles. I do triathlons. After driving the STi for a few months, I dont think it is as fast as the SS. The MPG is way better. STi 23. SS 15. I really thought the STi was going to be faster.
So after a couple months of research, I decided on a shop. It is hard to find a shop with AWD dyno. Now I have 400hp at the wheels and 400 torq. This ride came alive. Once again, this is my first turbo. Runs like a normal car till 4500prm. Then comes the smiles!
I am a Corvette guy. My daily driver is a 2016 C7 ZO6. 650hp/650tq. Supercharged power is there all the time. This car is a beast. Before the ZO6, I drove a 2000 C5 hardtop. 160k miles later, it was time for the upgrade. Before that was a 96 Viper. So I am no stranger to American muscle.
And just for fun I have a slightly modified Ninja ZX14.
Lets hope I can get 100k miles out of the wagon. And bring back the wagon. I like to haul stuff.

 

[Grinder34]

Re: First turbo 14 wagon

Good evening all. I am Terry. I bought a 2014 STi wagon (14k miles) in Aug to replace my Trailblazer SS. I needed AWD and enough room to haul my bicycles. I do triathlons. After driving the STi for a few months, I dont think it is as fast as the SS. The MPG is way better. STi 23. SS 15. I really thought the STi was going to be faster.
So after a couple months of research, I decided on a shop. It is hard to find a shop with AWD dyno. Now I have 400hp at the wheels and 400 torq. This ride came alive. Once again, this is my first turbo. Runs like a normal car till 4500prm. Then comes the smiles!
I am a Corvette guy. My daily driver is a 2016 C7 ZO6. 650hp/650tq. Supercharged power is there all the time. This car is a beast. Before the ZO6, I drove a 2000 C5 hardtop. 160k miles later, it was time for the upgrade. Before that was a 96 Viper. So I am no stranger to American muscle.
And just for fun I have a slightly modified Ninja ZX14.
Lets hope I can get 100k miles out of the wagon. And bring back the wagon. I like to haul stuff.

Details!!!

What'd the shop do?

And i'd love to hear more of a comparison between the Z06 and the STi.... and the Viper

Any plans to tweak the suspension?

 

[TerryCFT]

Re: First turbo 14 wagon

After reading the rules. I was not sure about advertising for a shop.
Slowmotion in Columbus did the work. You can go to their facebook page and see the car hooked up to the dyno and the dyno sheet. The sheet is with 93 octane and e85. NOT before and after. The shop was very honest and helpful. They told me about mods already done and did not charge me for parts I had. Every day by 5pm, I would have emailed pictures of work accomplished. Took them 4 days to do the work. And another to do stuff I had questions about. Money well spent.
I did have some work to the front suspension. I was missing the link to the sway bar on the left front. There was also a knock when I would hit a hard bump or pot hole. All this was fixed and I was given several options. This car also had a fiberglass hood. The hood was shaking a bit. Slowmotion took care of the adjustments free of charge. I was also told that 400 horse is the limit for reliability for these motors. Over that amount needs closed block. With only 20k miles, I opted to keep the block.
As for the comparison, I have only had the car back for a weekend after the mods. Lets compare apples to apples........The ZO6 is 650hp. STi is around 485. the STi is 700 pounds lighter. Handling is hands down ZO6. 0-60 STi. Lets not compare price. 95k to 36k. LOL The Viper was just cool. First generation was 400 hp and no windows or back glass. My motorcycle was more practical.

 

[Grinder34]

Re: First turbo 14 wagon

After reading the rules. I was not sure about advertising for a shop.
Slowmotion in Columbus did the work. You can go to their facebook page and see the car hooked up to the dyno and the dyno sheet. The sheet is with 93 octane and e85. NOT before and after. The shop was very honest and helpful. They told me about mods already done and did not charge me for parts I had. Every day by 5pm, I would have emailed pictures of work accomplished. Took them 4 days to do the work. And another to do stuff I had questions about. Money well spent.
I did have some work to the front suspension. I was missing the link to the sway bar on the left front. There was also a knock when I would hit a hard bump or pot hole. All this was fixed and I was given several options. This car also had a fiberglass hood. The hood was shaking a bit. Slowmotion took care of the adjustments free of charge. I was also told that 400 horse is the limit for reliability for these motors. Over that amount needs closed block. With only 20k miles, I opted to keep the block.
As for the comparison, I have only had the car back for a weekend after the mods. Lets compare apples to apples........The ZO6 is 650hp. STi is around 485. the STi is 700 pounds lighter. Handling is hands down ZO6. 0-60 STi. Lets not compare price. 95k to 36k. LOL The Viper was just cool. First generation was 400 hp and no windows or back glass. My motorcycle was more practical.

Yeah and the first gen viper also roasted your legs if what I read was true!

I'd love to see a list of what they did to the engine. I'm not an engine expert, but just interested to see what they did. There are also some things you can do that dont gain any extra power, they just prevent it from being lost due to heat soak--I wonder how much of that they did.

And you can definitely beef up the STI suspension a bit, but if you've already got a Z06 for butt-kicking, you may be fine stock to keep it a bit more comfortable.

 

[Alin]

Re: First turbo 14 wagon

First and foremost, welcome to IGOTASTI!!! You're going to absolutely love it here!! You need to post pictures of ALL of your rides, past and present!!!

I see that you're from Ohio as well. I'm up in Cleveland. :tup:

Is this your first tuner car outside of muscle cars? You've told us the numbers, but what about suspension and rims/tires? Can you give us a list of all of the modifications done?

As long as you maintain the car properly with on time services and drive it normally 90% of the time, 100k miles is nothing!

Any idea how you were missing an end link? Did the shop install an OEM one or an aftermarket one? I'll wait for the mod list before asking more questions! :lol:

 

[Eagleye]

Re: First turbo 14 wagon

Welcome! Love the list of past and present rides. I grew up in a Ford family so I had mustangs and raced a 66 Fairlane in High School class at our local 1/8th mile track. I got hooked pretty hard on Subarus after riding in my uncles 05 STi that he still has.

I?m also interested in the full mod list (I?ll send you a private message with some more specific quesitions). Sounds like a nice shop to have around. They seem to be hard to find as most near me are either out of their depth on anything beyond basic bolt ons or would rather be working on higher end cars.

Pictures of all the rides would be cool. Be sure to check out all the areas of the forum and ask any questions you have. Great group around here!

 

[TerryCFT]

Slow Motion motorsports
Invidia Q300 exhaust
Invida 3" downpipe
Grimmspeed top mount intercooler
Arashi 20G turbo
ID 1050 injectors
ETS header
AEM fuel pump
COBB flex fuel kit
NGK Irridium plug 7
Cusco front sway bar links
Grimmspeed hood struts.....the hood goes 90 degrees
And some other stuff I added on.
Mobile 1 oil with K&N filter
And of course dyno tune. At 22 pounds. They said it could make way more power. But backed it off to 400 at the wheels. Very nice build. And pictures everyday by 5pm. Build only took 4 days. Communication was excellent customer service.

 

[TerryCFT]

Re: First turbo 14 wagon

Actually I have never owned a 4 cylinder. Back in 1990, it was a toss up between Mustang GT and Dodge Conquest. Went with the GT. Being from OHIO, I needed 4wd. So I traded it for a truck. The trailblazer SS is a beast. 430 crank Hp LS1 Corvette motor. Last year I had an old man school me getting on the highway in a Lincoln. I needed more power. So I checked with Lingenfelter to get a supercharger. 10-12 grand and it only gets 15.5 mpg on the highway as is. So probably 12-13. Then me search started for AWD cars. But I needed a wagon. Cadillac made a CTS-V, that was up my alley. Save that story for another day. Anyway. I went to the good old inter web and looked for pre 14 STi. After I got it I really was not impressed. It ran well. But I wanted something faster. 250whp to 400whp is night and day. I need to get used to the super high rpm for power. The ZO6 has power at 2 grand!
This car does not handle well. I would like to go wider on tires. This is a winter car and pit bull taxi. So I do not want summer only compound. And of course, a used car has curb rash on 3 of the 4 rims. WTH? Why dont people take care of their stuff?
Thank you for the message. This is a good group of people. Looking forward to learning more about my new ride.
I also have a 200+ running mile and 9 second bike I ride a lot. ZX-14 Monster. I enjoy my toys

 

[Grinder34]

Wider tires is always a good place to start!

I've found that a pair of swaybars really helps the car come alive for handling. You should definitely look into a set (go adjustable if you're uncertain which diameter you might want) along with some new endlinks. It wont turn the STI into a Z06, but it'll dial out a fair bit of understeer and body roll without sacrificing much (if any) ride quality

After that, you could get some springs/struts or even full blown coilovers, but that's getting more expensive, and may start to affect ride comfort if not done well.

 

[TerryCFT]

Hopefully the wider tires will keep from curbing the rims. I hate to let my wife drive anything I own. She refuses to drive the ZO6. Which is a good thing. LOL
It seems to do a little better with the Sway bar connected. But I have been spoiled with 2 Corvettes and a Viper. The ZO6 tires only last 15k miles. And $800 each. This STi will eat up most cars. Starting to enjoy it more. Still on my first tank of 85. Curious to see the MPG. The computer has me over 24. But I dont trust a computer.