bugeye_fever
New member
My wife said my first picture should be where the car.. and I spend most of our time.. So she says, lol
Well I was gonna do this last night, but I started reading the VGT turbo thread.. then it was midnight and I needed a cold shower..
First a little background on me. I'm from the Midwest where everybody has a truck. Somehow I wound up in a sporty little car, a 1988 Toyota MR2. Didn't really bother me much as pretty much everybody in my family had a truck, there were plenty if i needed to borrow one. I really loved that car and had told myself many times that I'd never ever sell it. It was really cool, and the more I looked and researched into it the more fasinated I was with sports cars. I have always been a corvette fan, and still am, but I'd come to appreciate small, light, low powered cars as being lots of fun without all the associated costs of a large powerful car. I'm not sure what Dad was thinking when he brought that car home, but being an engineer I'm sure he thought of if as a cool little car too.
Well I drove the nuts off of that car for about 3 years, it busted my cherry on turning wrenches, bloody knuckles, spins, slides, some offroad experiences.. even wowing some young ladies. If you all get bored, try looking up some history on the toyota 4A-GE and the Toyota Atlantic series. Its a great engine even for displacing just 1.6 liters. I could go on and on about that car, but thats not the focus of this thread. Anyway, after 3 years of driving that car I'd graduated school and was working constuction in the next town over. Once day on the way to work I went by the local Subaru dealership and right there in the front was this kinda weird looking bright blue car I'd seen on a few rally videos. It was shining like a diamond, World Rally Blue and bright gold rims! I drove it off the lot with my dad's co-signature a week later.
Payments weren't bad but insurance was high for a 19 year old, and premium was expensive(if I only knew how bad it would get, lol) Kinda funny to think about it, but the first time I topped it out my future wife was riding shotgun, we were just friends then. Anyway, I drove it for 8 months or so and enlisted in the Marines. Off I went to boot and in the garage it went. Then i went to MCT, then to school, then to another school, all along the car stayed in the garage. Then when it was looking like I'd get to drive her some more.. I'm headed for Japan. Fast forward to May 2009, finally I'm back from Japan(didn't buy any parts while I was there. I think I had kinda forgot what was in the garage at home, lol.)
Once I had it back and had some disposible income to blow I looked back to an old article I had read (back in '03-'04 think.) The Car and Driver Supertuner Challenge. Featured in this was a monsterous bugeye made by Cobb Tuning called the Conebasher. Another something to look up if somebody gets bored, that thing was a 450 horse, widebodied beast build soley for SCCA prosolo domination. So the first place I looked for modification was Cobb Tuning of course, I orded up the stage 2 kit, turbo back and the Accessport V2. I finally made it to my first AutoX at the very end of 2009 down in Wilmington, and it was a blast, think I got 4th in STX on all seasons. Shortly after that I was rolling over 60,000 miles and decided to do some servicing.
I was basically teaching myself how to work on the car since I'd never really had a chance to tear into it prior to the Marines, so I had alot of fun relearning things. I had all the 60k service done except flushing the radiator, so I got some fresh subaru coolant and drained the radiator. And here's where things when oooh so wrong. Now I like to do things myself so even though I had never messed with a radiator before.. how hard could it be? I mean you drain it out.. fill it up. let it run with the heat on and there you go. Well come to find out in 2002 Subaru didn't put a radiator cap on the radiator, which makes some sence as it isn't the top of the system. Unfortunatly that makes filling the cooling system about 10 times harder as you fill through the coolant tank on top of the motor and the coolant very slowly fills the radiator and block through a couple of tiny hoses. Subaru obviously realized how foolish this is because they fixed it in 2003...
Well, I filled the system a much as possible but somehow was not able to properly burp the system, I limped it to the dealership for some help, on the way it overheated and blew a head gasket. Dealership confirmed antifreeze in the oil and quoted me a large sum to rebuild it. But like most young guys think, when it breaks its time to upgrade!! A little research on Nasioc and I found a guy who could build me a STI shortblock w/ forged pistons for a decent price and also happend to have a JDM non-DCCD 6speed and drivetrain for sale. The plans included more power than the little 5 speed could handle so it seemed like a good idea to me.
I had the engine back and ready to put in early in 2010, and I ran the car for a few monthes with the 5 speed still installed as i was still finding parts for the 6 speed swap. During that time I had a very odd problem, on the way to my second AutoX the engine quit on the highway crusing at 65 mph. Once I had it back to the hobby shop, I found that I had a broken bolt. This bolt held the right side exhaust cam pully to the camshaft... it was bad!
Had to pull the motor and take it down to Epic Motorsports, the shop that had originally put the motor together for me, they had never heard of such a thing happening before. Needless to say I was pretty unhappy, but 8 weeks later I had my engine back again. Put it in still with the 5 speed in July 2010 I believe and drove it 'till September when I finally had.. I thought, everything I needed to complete the 6 speed swap. Not long after I had the 6 speed in I took it to an AutoX on Cherry Point and promptly broke one rear axle on a hard launch. At the time I was using the hybrid LGT spec B axles with my stock WRX outer CV joint. We had to use heat to remove the stock LGT outer and I'm sure that weakend the axleshaft as it broke about 1/4 outside the CV joint, inside the boot. Late in 2010 though I installed proper rear axles(strong ones!) and she has been a dream ever since.
Despite being pretty underpowerd compared to alot of tuned up cars around here, she's still a barrel of fun, and begging for me to finish up under the hood. Here's a rundown of what all is going on and what I'd like to get done:
Engine:
EJ257 short block w/ stock sti crank and rods
Some sort of race bearings, ACL I think?
Mahle forged pistons
Stock EJ20 heads w/ plugged stock STI cams
Stock WRX TD04 turbo
Stock headers/ up pipe
Stock intake w/ K&N drop in filter
Kartboy light wieght crank pulley
Cobb 3" turbo back w/ catted DP
Cooling:
Mushimoto Radiator (ordered a GMS, got a Mushimoto.. same thing lol)
GMS radiator hoses w/ T-bolt clamps
Autozone 170* failsafe thermostat (same as a GMS t-stat~1/3 the price.
Drivetrain:
Stock STI clutch
STI braided clutch line
V7 non DCCD 6 speed
Supposedly Suretrac Diffs front and rear, not sure whats in the center diff
R180 rear diff
DSS Stage 5 conversion rear axles (way overkill)
Group N engine/trans mounts
TIC Rear Diff mount bushings- Race
TIC Trans X member bushings
Kartboy Rear subframe outrigger bushings- Race
Kartboy Rear subframe Lock Bolts
Whiteline steering rack bushings (amazing!)
Brakes:
DBA 4000 slotted front rotors (overkill)
Hawk HP+ front pads
Stock rear everything
Goodrich braided stanless brake lines (on car originally)
RBF 600 brake fluid
Suspension:
Whiteline 27mm front swaybar w. adj whiteline endlinks
Whiteline 22mm rear swaybar and upgraded swaybar mounts
AST SST spec coilovers 7k front 5k rear (total sweetness!)
Stock tophats (going away, thank goodness)
Stock bushings
Wheels/Tires:
OZ/Prodrive P1 17x7 +53 offset i think? not sure
Yokohama Avid w4s 215's for daily
Tot 43.0 lbs
Stock '04 STI Gold BBS
Kumho V700 Victoracer 225/45 17's (beat!)
Interior...
Stock
Exterior...
STI fog light covers (JDM fa shoow!)
Micellaneous:
Kartboy Short shifter kit w/ all the stiff shifter bushings and stays.
TIC HTS Titanium wheel bearing shields
HJC CL-16 brain protector!
Wow that list is longer than I had expected! My latest dyno numbers at Epic where 215 hp and about 270-275 ftlb. on 28 Dec, 2010. 17 psi maxed the stock injectors(WRX) so thats not really saying much. Now to the fun wishlist part:
Either:
Blouch 18g-xt 8cm. I've gone round and round with all of blouchs turbos. I'm confident this will do what I need for the least amount of cash. Not sure if I want the 2.4 or 3" inlet yet.
Or:
Moore Performance Dragonslayer set up, though I'm not sure of this yet. I need to see more results.
Light PnP/ bowl blend, GSC S1 cams and valvetrain.
Grimmspeed port/polish/coat headers, turbo, throttle body, intake manifold, TGV's w/ delete.
DW 300. Whichever would be better for running E-85
I love the parallel fuel system that George did, maybe if he see's this he'll help me out..*Cough Cough!
Ixiz FRails and ICE
1000cc 5.0 topfeeds
Ixiz AOSep w/ CCVent
Tial 38mm MVR EWG, 4 port boost controller
Spec Stage 3 6 puck, maybe an ACT streetlite flywheel
Some sort of custom intake/turbo inlet that i'll build
I'd also like to fab up a down pipe that blocks off the wastegate side since I'll be going EWG, but isn't a bellmouth. Something that will really probably end up looking like the stock downpipe, but 3" and extend past the flange as close to the turbine outlet as possible. I believe this would be the best set up for stock flanged turbo's running an EWG, for the smoothest possible flow exiting the turbine.
Lots of heat management stuff from DEI
Big topmount or some sort of custom WRC style intercooler.. pending my fab skills
Something sticky and in a width of about 275/ fender flares to cover. Rota DPT's to fit them, Gold duh.
This is whats happening this winter for sure:
Vorslag camber plates f/r
Camber bolts f/r
Replace all the suspension bushings with whitline/ TIC
Whiteline offset caster bushings (SM legal!)
Ventus Z214's in 225/45R17, I can't afford A6's, lol.
I guess I'd like to put down around 400 at the wheels on E-85. Wouldn't be worth the forged pistons if I didn't. I don't really care what the exact number is or what dyno is used or any of that stuff, I just want something that I can daily and makes good power with great response. You know.. everybodies goal, lol. I'm an avid autoXer but I'd love to one day do time attack with it, when I've got something else to drive daily. I attended my first HPDE earlier this year at VIR and it was outstanding! Easily the most fun I've ever had in my car... by myself
Take it easy!
Here are a few autoX pictures from this year so far:
This is where I can normally be found:
..and the other end.. who keeps taking pictures of me under the car?
I always liked this picture, but keep in mind.. this is Not the way to leave a Chicago box, lol
Last edited:
