Tlag

The off side head is the same as the Impreza turbo. The offside is also the same except for having oil feeds at the rear for the other turbo. The oil galleries are present on the single turbo heads, but are blocked off. Where as an impreza has a two port solenoid on the offside suspension turret. The twin turbo Legacy has a solenoid box. A vastly over complicated vacuum powered system that was conceived by the devil himself. The vacuum system has a tank in the nearside inner wing which stores vacuum. The solenoid box is a rats nest of vacuum hose and solenoids. These control all aspects of the twin turbo system. The intercooler has two separate feeds, one from the primary and one from the secondary. The sump and pick up is the same as Impreza. Medchanically, the heads are the same, depending which model the Legacy heads come from. GTB are shims over buckets and GT are Shims under buckets. The twin set up has no additional sensors but plenty of solenoids in that box. I will try and find some pictures. If not, I will take some when I remove mine.

I have seen Damien's wide arch work. It's absolutely superb. Not sure how that would convert to a later estate, but that's in the future after the mechanical work anyway. My current twin turbo set up is just the standard GT-B set up. The vast majority of which will be coming out very soon. Any questions you may have about it, please ask.

Thanks for the comments guys. Looking forward to a project room :)

Wasnt sure in which section to post this, so opted for here for now. I did say, I would let you into my build idea at Christmas, so here goes. :) The car as it is right now Its a Subaru Legacy BG5 Twin turbo GT-B Ltd in Cashmere yellow. Its a bit of an oddball car to be honest. One or two things didnt stack up when I bought it so a bit of research was required. First, the roof. The eagle eyed amongst you will have noticed the lack of roof rails. Having taken the roof lining out, I can assure you that the factory did it. No signs of any work to fill any holes. That led me to find out that the only models that had no roof rails were either the BK model which the USA got but that had a flat roof, or the BG model that they called the 'racing wagon'. These were made to order for the track. The next item we found that was odd was the interior trim. Nothing matched. The front seats, the door cards and the rear seats all have different materials. The carpets were also just thrown in and not fixed down. Under the carpets were signs of a cage being fitted. At this stage I would have said it was probably used on track and then stripped of its best bits, and any old interior thrown in, just to sell it. What stops me saying that though, is, why use a Ltd model, with the rare front bumper and special trim fascia bits? Its all a bit odd. Anyway, its only been in the country for about 2 years and off the road in my ownership for over a year of that time. We bought it as 'spares or repairs'. This was due to the engine failing to start on occasion for the previous owner and various garages couldnt work out why. He didnt want to risk it any more and we bought it. Strangely, once we trailered it home, it was fine and work flawlessly for a few months. Then, one day it wouldnt start. Lights on dash but nothing else. Despite my knowledge of these cars, we just couldnt get it started. As I had another GT-B anyway, this got put on the back burner. Then, I came across these pictures: My first thought was similar to 'I want those wide wings'. Not sure about the full body kit, but the wings are just awesome. Thats where the plans started!!! I've never been particularly conservative when it comes to altering my cars. I dont like following trends. This was my last car that I owned for about 5 years and gradually it evolved into this. Anyway, I,m still looking onto bodywork mods that may or may not happen. Mechanically, however, things are changing. This is the work done so far: Complete loom change. (never did find out why the car wouldnt start, so stripped the entire loom out and started again) With the engine out, cleaning can start. Before! After. Next stage was to swap out the gearbox and rear diff. The Legacy ones are ok for up to about 340-350bhp. An upgrade was required, so a box and diff were aquired from a WRX and fitted. Its worth pointing out that at this point in time, the plan was to go for about 400bhp by changing the twin turbo setup for a single turbo. Its was just after the gearbox was fitted that my plans changed a bit. I managed to obtain a very good condition 2.5 nitrided bottom end for a good price. The plan was to use this in a single turbo conversion with a MD321T turbo and stage one was to reign it in to 400bhp for now before increasing power later with more supporting mods. It was whilst I was looking for a turbo that things changed again, with the arrival of a GT35 turbo. It was a bit of an impulse buy and only once I had it, I realised it needs rotated up and down pipes and external wastegate. This is fast becoming an expensive project. With so many changes so far, who knows where its going? I have actually collected some bits together for the original conversion, which I am now going to have to change for different items for the new plan. I used to be indecisive, now i'm not so sure :D This wont be a quickly built project, so please dont expect updates every week, although I will update as I go. :)

Subaru engines are interference engines, which means that when the timing is out (or belt breaks) the pistons and valves will hit each other. Some manufacturers engines are non interference but Subarus are.

Yeah, those black and white hairy kerbstones are a pita :)

Amazing recovery at that speed. Superb driving

Have I missed something? I knew there was talk of the Impreza not being available in the UK anymore but I thought that was a good few months away. I just looked at the Subaru UK website and not only has the Impreza been deleted but so has the Legacy!. Choices if buying new are, XV, Forester, BRZ and Outback. That's it!

Hmmm, not sure about the back end if I'm honest. The bumper is a bit boxy when the rest of the car has curves.. Just my opinion. On the flip side, the interior looks really nice. :)

I've never really looked at them til now but I like what I see of yours. :) Just off to google what the back end looks like,

Looks like a bit of lift off under steer to me :) Gambit, you must be the first person ever to get the words Austin Meastro and rallying into the same sentence.

A simple test, although not totally conclusive. with the engine idling, unplug the maf. If there is absolutely no change to rpm or smoothness, the chances are the maf has had it.

The good news is that physically it will fit. The bad news is that you will need a good proportion of the legacy it came from. Wiring loom, ecu, vacuum system (of which there is lots). Probably lots more that escapes me at the moment. Not saying its impossible, or even difficult but it will need a lot of work.

So when you plug the two blacks together and turn the ignition, the two red lights do nothing? If there are no codes stored (so no issues) the light should bling continuously and steadily. If codes are stored, they should give long flashes and short flashes, but I guess you knew that. :) Might be worth asking if you could borrow a same colour maf (they have coloured labels on) on the internet around you.

Im fairly confident it will be Lambda or maf to be honest. A Lambda is not too expensive but mafs are so it would be nice to be able to interrogate the ecu for stored codes before buying one. If you have a look at the wiring loom, somewhere near the grey plug, you should ideally find two, single wire, black plugs and possibly two green ones. By plugging the black ones together and turning the ignition on, you can see how many times the check engine light flashes which equates to a code. If you have no check engine light or even the plugs, we could be struggling a bit. If thats the case, it might be worth asking the installer if he has a MAF that you could borrow, just to test before buying one. Try these people for parts. Not everying is on the website so worth a call if you cant see the bits. http://www.importcarparts.co.uk/default.asp

Although you have two probes. Only the wired in one is the Lambda. The other probe is a heat probe and the engine can be run easily without it which is why I guess its been chopped. Yes, its a 22mm spanner. Its always worth a clean before buying another. It might just work. Even if it only works for a short time, at least you will then know to replace that item. You may have a big problem finding a code reader. It was a thing called Subaru select and was phased out when OBD became the norm. You may get lucky and find someone with an old one, so worth asking.

The Subaru 'book time' to do a cambelt is 5 hours from memory. All I can say is that that must include at least two coffee breaks and a long lunch! The problem is that a garage with no experience of Subarus only has that figure to refer to. We have got it down to about an hour/hour and a half now, but thats after doing a lot of them :)

Hi, and welcome. Thats a really neat looking install. :) At this stage, looking from a keyboard, it could be a few things. I would look at the O2/lambda sensor. They have 2 circuits. When one goes down, you get really bad fuel consumption and when the other dies it can produce what you describe. Its only when both circuits fail that the 'check engine' light comes on the dash. (do you have the full wiring loom and dash installed?) The other possible is the MAF, which is normally engine side of the air filter box. If this was still in a Legacy, you could check for error codes to give you a pointer but Im not sure how much Subaru wiring you have installed.

Wish I had read this thread before replying to the PM now. That will teach me.

Excellent write up Gambit. First time you do it it will take ages. After that, each time you do it, it will get faster. In the end, it's a 20-30 minute job....... Once you've grown the double joints you need in your fingers. ;)

Got to be honest. I don't know a lot about Fozzies. It's the same EJ20 block and ancillaries as the Impreza so no reason why you can't change things and fettle things in the same was as the Impreza. The XT is the closest in mechanical spec to the Impreza (other than the STI) so a good base to start with.

Hoover? How did you know? :) I will l be sucking up the air from the atmosphere and converting it into lots of noise and lots of forward motion, :) I will be a starting a build thread on the car, probably around Christmas time.

Unfortunately, it sounds like classic Subaru head gasket problems. Due to the design of the engines, it's very rare to find the oil and coolant mixing when the head gaskets go. Is far more common for the gasket to go, between the water jacket and the combustion chamber. The water system gets pressurised and the escape route for the coolant is through the expansion tank.

Totally agree, but when it comes to my project car............ ;)

The next time I go, I will be driving my project car. The Christmas overtime is going straight into that :) Anybody else in the family wants to take there own car, they can fund the trip themselves. :)