DCAWD.com

Engine:
EG33
(details coming soon)


Intake/Exhaust:
Custom Intake
Moore Performance & Race Parts full exhaust
Coatings by Engaged Performance


Transmission/drivetrain:
STI 6-speed
Cobb short throw shifter
Extended shift handle
Group N gearbox mount
Group N differential bushings
ACT 6-puck clutch
Exedy Lightened flywheel

Steering:
Howe 1.5:1 Steering quickener
Sparco 383 Steering wheel

Electronics:
AIM MXL Strada gauge cluster
Custom LCD secondary gauge display
Custom Intercom System with 2-meter HAM radio in/out, squelch/compression control, and 2 aux in/out
Terratrip 303 Rally Computer
Terraphone Practice Headsets

Fire system
OMP AFFF Fire System, 4.25L Side Valve Bottle (Electronic)


Suspension:
TBD (Gravel)
Undecided suspension (Tarmac)
Group N suspension bushings

Brakes:
Stainless Stell Braided Brakelines
Carbotech XP12 brake pads
Slotted rotors
Custom hydrualic E-Brake
H6 Rear brake upgrade

Interior:
Full cage built by Havspeed
Carbotron Composites custom carbon fiber dash
Carbotron Composites custom carbon fiber door cards
Carbotron Composites custom carbon fiber roof vent/plenum
Terralight


Seats/Harness
Sparco ProADV
Schroth Harnesses

Wheels:

BRAID wheels provided by Team Illuminata


Exterior:
STi Aluminum Hood
Version 6 STi spoiler
Custom front skidplate and underbody protection
Rear differential guard
WRC style CF mirrors
Universal Light Pod fitted with Hella 1000 driving lights

Current State:
Back home and ready to start construction



This post will be updated as plans are finalized and more decisions are made. This list will grow much longer.



Thanks for looking and I hope you enjoy!

Sponsors:





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We're now on facebook! Click here to Join the group!

Well I gotta start somewhere. Might as well be with a bit of a story.

As most of you know my car luck as of late has been... well lets face it comically bad. First the WRX showed it's suicidial tendencies and then the RS decided to pack up on me as well. It's ok to laugh. I know I am. Well after some long hard thinking I decided that it was time to start on something that I had never thought I'd ever find myself doing. A swapped GC. The road to finidng a car was also quite silly with lots of strange twists. I finally found a swap recepient in Philly. A EJ18t Impreza L coupe.


The beauty of this build is since I'm starting from the ground up I can pick and choose EXACTLY what goes onto this car. A lot of subaru guys have always wanted to do something like this. It would be much cheaper and easier for me to just fix the WRX wagon and call it a day but this is more than just a "man I've always wanted this kind of car" project. I had to do some thinking before committing to this. This is going to be part educational, part personal challege, and a whole lot of fun and stress. I'm aware of most of the headaches assocaited with an ambitious project like this and I'm sure I'll discover all new ones that I never even anticpiated. The hidden costs, the long hours put in just to accomplish simple things, and the unexpected halts to work due to any one of the millions of possible hang-ups that can occur.

I'm extremely lucky to have a large group of very talented, very experienced, and very intelligent friends who are all very eager to help me see this project come to life. They range in background from custom fabricators, engineers, rally veterans, tuners and subaru techs to weekend garage grease monkeys, american muscle fanatics, truck mechanics, tech school students and just average joes who have only ever touched a wrench a few times in their lives. I have also already received very strong support from local Subaru forums with dozens of total strangers offering to dedicate weekends to coming out and helping me bring this to life for little more than a beer and a good conversation. In fact I'm shocked how well recieved this project has been even in the pre-build stages and how supportive everyone is. I'm starting look forward to the actual process of putting this thing together as much as I am driving the final result.

Either way I hope to make this a good read for anyone who wants to follow it. The IMV Films crew is going to be getting involved with this as well so there will be a video log of the build. I'll try to keep it entertaining and informative. You'll hear about the good, the bad, the ugly, and the downright goofy that happens on every stage from start to finish.


So there you have it. Hope you enjoy.

I'm definitely going to cheer ya on with this build. I just want to see ya in a great running car!

Sabre wrote:I'm definitely going to cheer ya on with this build. I just want to see ya in a great running car with a working parking brake and adequate oil supply!

good call!

Cereb Daithi wrote:I'm extremely lucky to have a large group of very talented, very experienced, and very intelligent friends who are all very eager to help me see this project come to life.

You may have fewer of these once finished with a project of this scale

But seriously, when you finish this project, you will have something that I suspect is both more rewarding, and more fun than the current offering from Subaru.

Sabre wrote:I'm definitely going to cheer ya on with this build. I just want to see ya in a great running car!

Thanks man! I appreciate it.

complacent wrote:

Sabre wrote:I'm definitely going to cheer ya on with this build. I just want to see ya in a great running car with a working parking brake and adequate oil supply!

good call!

har har har

snaab wrote:[
You may have fewer of these once finished with a project of this scale

But seriously, when you finish this project, you will have something that I suspect is both more rewarding, and more fun than the current offering from Subaru.

I suspect some might quickly lose interest when they realize this is going to be a long complex thing. The total strangers will probably go first followed by the aveage joe friends. Thankfully many of the guys I really am hoping to depend on have done long builds themselves so I THINK (hope) they know what is in store. A few of them have GC swaps under their belt already so I'm counting on their knowledge to help me with this one.

Cereb Daithi wrote:I suspect some might quickly lose interest when they realize this is going to be a long complex thing. The total strangers will probably go first followed by the aveage joe friends. Thankfully many of the guys I really am hoping to depend on have done long builds themselves so I THINK (hope) they know what is in store. A few of them have GC swaps under their belt already so I'm counting on their knowledge to help me with this one.

Excellent! Be sure to pace yourself, so that whatever you do on a given day/weekend, you can complete within that time frame. It will make things easier mentally.

Car acquired. It's going to be a mountain of work.

EDIT: New pics incoming shortly

Alright here we go.

Day 1

You're a brave soul. I'd lose the patience for a project like that.

Godspeed!

snaab wrote:You're a brave soul. I'd lose the patience for a project like that.

Godspeed!

Thanks much. Truth is I'd probably lose patience too if not for the fact that so many people are going to be pushing me to work on it. On top of that I have a few other friends working on builds at the moment as well (1979 Z28 Camaro, 240SX LS1, FD RX7 4g63, and an unknown eagle talon build) So we're all eager to better each other. This thing surpasses any previous projects I ever thought of attempting. Lets hope I'm not too sick of this car to drive it at the end of the build.

Everyone has different tolerances for projects. And like I said, in the end it will be highly rewarding, worth the effort!

That is definitely the way to start out fresh! Wow! I'd KILL to get started on a GF8 project.

potential this thread has.

It's going to be a lot of work, but it will be worth it in the end. I've been helping out a friend for over a year on a Bronco that was more complete and we still have a ways to go.

Cereb Daithi wrote:
Thanks much. Truth is I'd probably lose patience too if not for the fact that so many people are going to be pushing me to work on it. On top of that I have a few other friends working on builds at the moment as well (1979 Z28 Camaro, 240SX LS1, FD RX7 4g63, and an unknown eagle talon build) So we're all eager to better each other. This thing surpasses any previous projects I ever thought of attempting. Lets hope I'm not too sick of this car to drive it at the end of the build.

Stress not. The Z is in similar shape. If you are working with engines designed to fit in there (e.g., you're not building a 4-rotor wankel E46), it's a lot easier than everyone will tell you. The inside however.... that's a matter of preference. I want mine bare and stainless. You may want actual, you know, interior. That part is going to take time. The "pretty" stuff is what takes the longest, IMO. That's why I was always scared to race the "primer" cars at the street races as a kid. You know where their money went...

I'm actually in agreement with you. Phase one of this build is get a working car. Phase two is improve where possible and affordable. Phase three is pretty it up. I have a feeling phase three will begin a significantly long time after one and two are complete.

Actually here's something that I've discovered as I'm getting things together for this build. Weight reduction becomes a lot more obvious at this point. This car is almost as stripped out as it can get. Every pound I add back on is put there by me and is therefore very obvious. Even the things that I want/need are already somewhat annoying to think about putting back in. It really makes you re-think what you really NEED in a car that you want as something quick and light. Like for example...all the sound deadening is gone. An acquaintance of mine just removed it all out of his GC build and apparently it was ~40lbs worth of material. As for audio. The current plan is just a simple small single DIN MP3 head-unit and 2 speakers in the front. Nothing more. Sure it'll sound crap but who cares? Back seats? Forget about it. I have the GD if I need to haul extra people around. A/C compressor? I've got windows and maybe a group N roof vent. There's your air. Roof liner? HAH!

It's funny becuase if I started with a complete car I'd probably have a hard time bringing myself to gut it like this. Once it's already gone though you don't seem to miss the though of it quite so much...



Anyways work starts tomorrow. Sorry nothing exciting yet. Just finishing up cleaning out the interior, grinding off the gunk from the floor plugs, looking for any clinging particles of sound deadening, making sure everything is in shape and then re-sealing the floor plugs. I was considering seam welding but that idea has been pushed aside. It's still getting caged though and I need to start working out the plans on that.

I'll update later!

Cereb Daithi wrote:Like for example...all the sound deadening is gone. An acquaintance of mine just removed it all out of his GC build and apparently it was ~40lbs worth of material.

I looked into sound deadener like Dynamat for a while, because riding in my car is like riding in an aluminum can filled with rocks. Some of the toll roads are paved, but the rest of the freeways are jointed concrete and it makes for a horribly noisy ride. I went to the store to look at Dynamat, but gave up on that or anything similar, because one small package weighed at least ten pounds. I would have needed about four of them to coat the passenger compartment. Booo.

Not to mention, the truly necessary stuff, like an alternator, weigh a shitton.

snaab wrote:

Cereb Daithi wrote:Like for example...all the sound deadening is gone. An acquaintance of mine just removed it all out of his GC build and apparently it was ~40lbs worth of material.

I looked into sound deadener like Dynamat for a while, because riding in my car is like riding in an aluminum can filled with rocks. Some of the toll roads are paved, but the rest of the freeways are jointed concrete and it makes for a horribly noisy ride. I went to the store to look at Dynamat, but gave up on that or anything similar, because one small package weighed at least ten pounds. I would have needed about four of them to coat the passenger compartment. Booo.

Not to mention, the truly necessary stuff, like an alternator, weigh a shitton.

Some of the spray-on sound deadening materials are significantly lighter. I've used them with a good success rate so far.

don't buy Dynamat, it's way overpriced. there's a guy on NASIOC who sells the same type of matting an a very good price. I'll try to dig up his info. I think it's called RaamMat or something like that...

Mr Kleen wrote:don't buy Dynamat, it's way overpriced. there's a guy on NASIOC who sells the same type of matting an a very good price. I'll try to dig up his info. I think it's called RaamMat or something like that...

me too, me too... i need it for the bike (don't ask).

because I have no faith that you bums will google RaamMat yourself and because Rick is a good guy:

http://www.raamaudio.com

Don't worry, I wasn't about to pay what they wanted for Dynamat. I was interested solely in seeing how much it weighs, because I figured it was a hefty summabeach.

Since then, I've all but given up on the thought, because I don't know how much quieter the car would be, since the convertible top allows in a large amount of noise.

The BS with the insurance over the WRX is finally being cleared. The RS has the new motor in and functioning.

Now I can finally get started! Parts are being ordered and plans for the cage are officially underway! I've decided on a straight cut gearbox which I'm in negotiations with a seller right now looking to maybe buy one shortly. If I can work something out with him soon I'll be getting it. If not I'll have to wait til a later date and spend more to build one. Either way. Get ready for more updates!

lol, I know a guy (Jay) who's straight cut gear box you can hear over his exhaust.... and he has a loud exhaust!

Yes, straight cut are loud as crap.