My $700 Forester

[sjcurtis]

Well I bought another forester and my plan was to fix it to flip. The front was messed up from a wreck and the 5 speed was shot. I already had a good 5 speed at the house from my Forester X STi project and the clutch was almost new so I didn't have to spend anything to get it back on the road. As for the front end I found a wrecked forester at Pull-A-part and got everything I needed to fix it for about $150. I ended up liking the damn thing so much I kept it. It was nice having something that was not lowered and the body wasn't perfect. I even started taking it out in the mud and that was where I really messed up. I wanted more so I lifted it, put AT tires on and I've been hooked every since.



The bumper I found at the junk yard

Old trans was gone!!!!! The input shaft bearings was gone

The newish trans out of my 215K mile 2007 Forester X

And my rigged up 2007 Forester grille its ugly but it fills the hole up

 

[sjcurtis]

I ended up finding a great deal on a set of 2008 WRX seats so I did a little welding on the seat brackets and made them fit. They are soooooo much better then the crap ass forester seats.

MMMMMM so clean.

And while I was at another junk yard I found a truck brush guard that looked like it would fit over the forester bumper so I bought it. It turned out pretty good just had to make a bracket for the lower part and bolt it to the frame and used a piece or 4" flat bar on the bumper beam to mount the top of the brush guard.

Lower bracket

4" flat bar on the bumper beam with some nuts welded to it so I could bolt the brush guard through the plastic bumper

Some mud riding fun



I even found a trailer hitch on one of the foresters in the junk yard and have been putting the fozzy to work.

 

[sjcurtis]

BAM $700 from Discount tire direct, a set of 215/70/15 Cooper Discovery AT/3 tires and Konig wheels. Gave the fozzy 1" of lift

The I installed some 1" strut spacers, King lift springs, 2" Sumo trailing arm spacers and some 2007 WRX 4 pot 2 pot brakes. Oh and a cheap WalMart basket

 

[sjcurtis]

Then just when I thought I was done I run up on a deal to good to pass up. A friend of mine gets cars from copart and ended up getting me a wrecked 2004 Forester XT for $1,250 so I had to get it!!!!!


So I pulled the motor out of the XT replaced the cam seals, front main seal, rear main seals, valve cover gaskets, spark plugs, timing belt, water pump and I installed a Perrin turbo inlet, vf48 turbo and a 2015 STi tmic. Oh and I swapped the 5 speed out for the xt automatic trans.
Pulling the sad little NA motor and trans out

Installed the turbo cross member or sub frame whatever its called

Painted the valve covers, brackets and turbo coolant reservoir just to get all the corrosion off of them. This must have been a northern car.

Then started pulling the wiring harness

 

[Batmobile_Engage]

Hooooly tap dancing Christ. You've done this a few times, eh? :lol:

 

[sjcurtis]

Hooooly tap dancing Christ. You've done this a few times, eh? :lol:

This is my first full swap but I have done trans and motor swaps

 

[Doppelganger]

Looks like a fun project congrats

Sent from my ONEPLUS A3000 using Tapatalk

 

[sjcurtis]

Well I got my hands on a 2007 WRX air bag and a 2007 STi steering wheel and did a little swappy swap. I cut the pigtail off both cruise control harnesses and connected the green to green, white to yellow, and yellow to white and the cruise works perfect. The air bag explosive device has two connectors on the 07 wrx and one on the 04 forester so I unbolted the explosive devices and swapped them. Now I don't know if this is safe or if this is the proper way to do this so don't go by my word but it worked. Oh and the COBB off the shelf stage 3 forester map was giving me a lot of trouble as far as controlling boost so I put a Grimmspeed manual boost controller on it. I set it to around 14psi until I get to Top Speed Motorsport for my pro tune. Its driving way better now.



This is the 2007 WRX airbag with the 2004 Forester explosive device in it.

And the finished wheel. Man its soooooo much nicer then the 2004 wheel.

 

[Batmobile_Engage]

That shit isn't Takata, is it? I mean, yeah...funny ha ha and everything, but for real...they have recalled tens of millions including on thousand of Subarus. Working in automotive, near Takata, I hear a ton of horror stories. As you may know, many of their bags explode and throw shrapnel into your face. Many deaths and injuries have resulted. I have actually received a couple recall notices. As soon as I get my Subie running properly, it's going in for the recall.

Just tryna keep it real.

Sent from my SM-G925V using Tapatalk

 

[Batmobile_Engage]

Not trying to bring you down or anything, your builds and swaps are awesome. Just thinking about your safety. :tup: