savage bulldogs

They're the avcs sensors bud , as far as I remember they have a o ring sealing them into the head 😉

Hi n welcome. All jdm classic imprezas have ally wishbones /front control arms , so any wrx , sti ,type r ect (up to 2000) will fit . You will need the bottom ball joint "cones" that stop the balljoint wearing into the ally , along with the wishbone and front drop links to upgrade

Well I've had a busy fortnight but have done everything I can do ,till I get the helicoiled water pump and exhaust manifold studs /nuts turn up . Everything is cleaned, prepped and ready to fit , so just the turbo core to sort . Obviously you can't go unbolting the turbine wheels from the shaft ,the expect to just simply bolt them back on and be balanced correctly but the cores come pre balanced , so this is simply me swapping the balanced cores over . After undoing the vband and actuator, I removed the hotside ,soaked it in white Sprit, then petrol and finally brake cleaner to remove the oil . once oil free I gave the exterior of the hotside a few coats of hi temp paint ,then removed the oil /water feeds and undid the circlip to remove the compressor housing. As I'd badly fitted a 0.6 bar spring with hardly any pre tension, I decided to fit a 1.1 bar spring with a bit more pre tension (properly ) this time but will back off the boost target and duty before I drive it anywhere 😉 once everything was clean , I brought it indoors and started assembly by fitting the compressor housing to the core . I Made sure the alignment Mark's were correct and fitted the compressor housing retaining circlip (very strongly sprung) Refitted the water feed /return hard pipes and banjo bolts , then the oil drain pipe with a new gasket . I aligned the painted hotside Mark's and fitted that to the other side of the core with the vband connector. Actuator on and job done , one tdo5 20g billet wheeled turbo with a upgraded ball bearing core 😎

Shame your so far away , I've got quite a few gaskets, washers and spares kicking about . You can sometimes get away with cleaning the old ones with some fine sand paper ,so they seal again 😉

Happy dayz @mattiekane glad to see at least one of us nearly has their engine fitted lol

A man that never made a mistake, has probably never made anything worth while 😉 It didn't feel right and I even when back to another idler that had already been torqued down to the same N,M , to get a feel for the tightness.... just a little tweek more and it was fubar lol . Found a spot of rust hiding under the battery tray 😲 it's only surface stuff and looks worse in the pic tbh . So needing something to do and making the most of the dry weather.... front end off and it still looks clean for a 26 yr old car 😎 Everything wire brushed back to clean metal and rust treated Coat of old skool red oxide isn't drying quick enough, even with a heat gun in the sun 😏 Bay masked off ,Zinc heavy primer and a sliver topcoat to seal it . battery tray area is still a bit wet but once dry will get a coat of silver too . Still got clutch ,bellhousing and exhaust system to de oil from the turbo seals going 😏 Also got to fit the new uprated ball bearing 20g core to the housings once they're clean too , so hopefully enough to keep me busy still 😊

Double checked the arp headstud torque after letting them settle overnight , then lubed the cams ,fitted the new cam seals and cam cover gaskets . Although I don't intend on tracking the car often but I might do one day , so have always thought about fitting a baffled sump . I've read that baffle plates don't really offer much more protection over the standard sump . I decided to go with a rcm oil pick up pipe extender , this is rubber and allows the oil pick up to collect oil right from the bottom of the sump . With the extender ,gasket ,sump and oil modine fitted , I made a start on fitting the timing gear and water pump . After torque'ing these down I could finally fit the kevlar belt and timing belt cover 😎 But there was a new bolt in the timing belt kit and it didn't look very good quality (no stamp or markings) so I cleaned and used all the original bolts . Unfortunately this new bolt is about 20mm longer than the original toothed idler pulley bolt , so when tightened the original bolt it kindly pulled the thread outta the water pump 🤐😏 Luckily enough pat Seager is still open and he collected the water pump today, will helicoil the thread and drop it off at some point . So it's no big deal , will be stronger than it was in the first place and will only cost me a couple of days and £20 (and a bit of shame lol) But I thought I'd post my mistake on here just in case someone else buys the same kit so ... ..... IF YOUR TIMING BELT &WATER PUMP KIT HAS A EXTRA BOLT IN IT FIT IT TO THE TOOTHED IDLER PULLEY 😊 So I pulled the inlet manifold outta the box in the boot and sat it ontop of the engine, to get a idea of the finished block . Yep looks pretty much the same as when I removed it 😂 apart from being cleaner and having rcm wrote on the headgaskets instead of cossie lol . Still got the turbo core to swap into the housings and exhaust to clean up , so hopefully enough to keep me busy till Pat's dropped the pump off 🤞

The banks are are named left and right as you are sat in the cabin ,not facing the engine bud . Gently removing the belt ,so cams dont spin and then let each cam settle gently individually . This should mean the cams aren't pushing the valves open (should have returned into the seat ) , then slowly rotate the crank . This should rule out the valves being bent if the crank turns freely without hitting anything. They could still be slightly bent and not returning fully but it would at least help to understand if that's the reason its locking up . If the crank doesn't lock , try refitting the belt ,then you usually you refit the idle pulley (bottom left as you face the engine) and then release the tensioner . This helps insure theres the right amount of teeth between cams ,crank and cams on the other bank

You can only turn the left bank cams in a certain direction when removing or refitting a cam belt , unfortunately if you just release the belt the cams can both turn in opposite directions and cause the valves to hit one another. Hopefully you haven't bent any valves , as this might cause the engine to lock , if they're not returning into the valve guides . The Mark's on the crank look a bit slightly past its correct position ? . But I wouldn't have thought it's enough to lock the engine . Could try removing the belt , taking care not to let the left bank cams spin in the wrong direction . Once the cams are all at base circle (lobes not pushing down and opening the valves ) do a couple of slow n gentle rotations of the crank . If a valve can't return into the head (its bent) the crank will lock as the piston hits the valve . If the bottom end turns full rotations freely , this might mean you've been lucky and not bent anything. Then re align all Mark's , pull back the tensioner and try refitting the belt again . This is for a ej207 but it might help

I'm not 100% sure but I think a impreza of the same year would have the same clutch . Maybe cross referencing some part numbers would confirm that though , if no body else knows for definite? Generally any 5 speed pull clutch kit fits although there is a 5mm diameter difference in some later 5 speed clutch plates . For anything up to 350hp the stock exedy blue box kit is fine ,350hp to mid 400's then a exedy pink box clutch kit ,is the usual option . The kits come with bearing, spring cover and clutch plate . As for the flywheel if its not grooved or warped it can be cleaned and re used , if it is tramlined it can be skimmed and if it's got cracks it needs to be replaced . I'd suggest fitting a new spigot bearing (in the centre of the flywheel) get both front driveshaft , prop shaft and rear crank seals (it makes sense to change these while the box is off )

I don't use polish very often , as the paintwork is now fairly good .I bought some killer wax last year that seems good . As a winter sealer I always end up going back to using colinite 845 , it's for boats and planes, so lasts a lot longer than most of the other car stuff I've used 😉

I'm certainly glad I got most of parts I needed before lockdown, I've certainly had plenty of time on my hands lately so have been putting it to good use 😉 Cleaned up the shed (again),carried the short block in and fitted it onto the stand ,then lubed the arp headstuds and cleaned the oil off the deck face. Got one of the v4sti heads out of the boxes, removed the cams and cleaned the mating surfaces on those too Seeing as I'll hopefully not be seeing the rcm headgaskets again , I took a pic of those fitted too 🤞 Lubed the apr headstud washers and nuts ,torqued the heads down ,temporarily fitted both cam covers and masked up all openings and access bungs Couple of Coats of ally etch primer . hi temp engine paint dried off with a heat gun in between coats , cos I got fed up with watching paint dry lol .

Hi n welcome, lovely looking scoob 👍 Best of luck with the remap and Keep us posted how it goes

Hopefully its nothing to serious but the best bet would be to get the ECU codes read . Under normal circumstances most garages would be able to do this but you can buy a odb2 bluetooth adapter and download the torque app on your phone .this will read most ECU codes afaik

Ring compressor turned up 😎 so I cleaned up the bores and mating surfaces of the other block half and fitted the king main bearings in both casings. Coated the bearings with graphgeon paste and lowered the crank in position. Sorted through the big box of gaskets and found the new block o rings and put threebond on the mating surfaces case halves Soaked the threads of the block bolts in oil and torqued the half's together oiled and fitted the pre gapped piston rings to the pistons, coated the bores and fitted the pistons to the rods via the access holes Fitted the splash guard , oil pick and loosely bolted on the sump Still got a fair bit to do but the short block is almost complete, so I finally feel like I'm getting somewhere 😎

just noticed this post is in the leggy section and those diagrams are for a impreza, might still be useful but I don't know if they're exactly the same, sorry

I can't remember if the 02 sensor wires spur off from the main engine loom , if so check the grey multi plug (near the battery and clutch slave) pins are making good contact . Also the engine loom ground that attaches to the inlet manifold, near the fuel hardline flow and return. Don't know if you've got a service manual? But here's a few pics that I have on my phone that might help .

Hi n welcome, I'd echo what jay has said and generally just a panel filter and remap would see 260 to 280 hp . Pending on budget most fit a de cat up pipe before mapping , as the wrx has a pre cat in the up pipe that restricts flow. But at your target hp not many mods are required before mapping . There's loads of options for suspension upgrades from sti shocks and springs to fully adjustable coilovers . I personally run meister r's and have found them less crashy than b.c's but whichever way your needs,budget and preference steer you . The front suspension has camber bolts as standard but the rear doesn't, so Buy some camber bolts for the rears as this will give some adjustment on the rear when the geo is being set up . As for brakes at 260 to 280 hp you might find a decent pad and disc combo could be all you'd need , I'd say see what you think of the standard equipment before upgrading. Otherwise most tend to fit sti brembos as the first upgrade , if the pcd is the same the discs and calipers will just bolt on .

Found that I'd left a few of my better files around the farther in laws ,while working on his old skool 60's mini so progress has been painfully slow setting the ring gaps For those who don't know , you do this by pushing the rings down squarely in the bore with a piston crown and measuring the gap with feelers gauges. Then widen the gap , refit in the bore and measure again ... normally and again and again in my case as I always worry that I'll take too much off and make the gap too big . I also remembered I no longer own a piston ring compressor so had borrowed one of a mate for the last 2 builds , unfortunately he has no spleen and is on the high risk list for the virus So I won't be popping round to see him anytime soon . The one I ordered off ebay this morning was dispatched this afternoon , so hopefully it will get here soon . cleaned plastiguage off the crank and coated the king bearings in graphgen builders paste , then fitted those to the rods and end caps . coated the arp end cap bolts and torqued them down onto the crank Cleaned the bores in one bank and that's sat in a sealed box but will wait until the piston ring compressor is here before before fitting the crank into the block halves . As I don't want the case assembly left open (no pistons in the bores ) for too long ,even in doors and in the dry 😉

Well today didn't get off to a good start Unfortunately, a bit of miscommunication from me and lack of experience with boxer engines from my engineer, ment the tang hadn't been altered on the center bearing case . I had asked him to do it and even shown him which bearing type needed to be fitted into number 3 main (old centre thrust position) but that didn't get told to the other machinist . This ment he'd used the wrong bearing type in the center main ,when checking everything over after doing the thrust conversion, overbore and hone . Wrong bearing in centre main looks like it fits fine as the bearing tang holds it central. But the thrust type 1, 3 ,5 have the tang in a different position and you can see it pushes the bearing off centre After chatting to him , I decided dust of my old metal working tools to measure up , scribe and file the casings myself to fit the tangs. Luckily enough I still have a few decent needle files ,so took a measurement off no1 main (to the right in the pic) then masked and marked up no3 . It doesn't look perfect but it's not bad and measures up spot on Correct bearing location tang now makes the bearing sit central So that ate up a lot of my time but I did still manage to check for piston skirt to oil squirter delete grub screw contact , plenty of room A quick glance at deck height .... not a wack a mole in sight (pistons don't poke out of the deck face ) And plastigauge the crank mains , which are all mid to high on standard limit I'll start tomorrow by gapping the rings and fitting them to each piston , then clean the crank ,bearings and bores before finally starting to assemble the bottom end

Looks like a nice clean v1 wrx you've found , nice choice chap 👍

I've been at home since Tuesday at the start of the uk lockdown ,so had a few (to many) beers at home on Friday celebrating my birthday and didn't do anything scooby till sunday 🙄 Although most of the parts have been through the hotwash, there's no such thing as being too clean prior to assembly. My teenage daughter's like to get involved so I put them to work cleaning parts , while I dried them with a heat gun 😊 I trust Pat's work but I will still dry build the mains with plastigauge, to triple check the crank clearances . I also want to check that the longer throw on the 2.5 crank hasn't caused the piston skirts to contact the grub screws ,that I used to delete the oil squirters 😉 At least with everything clean, dried and prepped , I'm ready to do the dry build , if all goes well , I might even get chance to gap the rings too Keep safe people's 👍

Did it run ok for long after the conversion ? Have you checked the ECU for codes and done a ECU reset ? Could try cleaning the maf with brake cleaner before buying any parts . When you changed the spark plugs did they all look the same colour , if one plug was wet with fuel or a different colour to the rest ? it might indicate a misfire on that cylinder , as the symptoms sort of sound like that might be the issue

If it was a pre planned build I might have considered soda or vapour blasting but seeing as it went from "just fit these better v4sti heads " to a 2.1 stroker 🙄 I doubt my "scooby fund " or marriage will stand much more expense atm 🤔 I've had to put my link g4+ ecu on hold for now 😏 I'm probably just gonna use ath ally etch primer and brush on hi temp block paint again , after all it lasted 8 years and 60k miles last time . Plus Bare ally furs up quite quickly ,so if I did get anything blasted I'd have to at least lacquer it anyways 😉

Only places I could think to try would be luke at import car parts , as he occasionally gets full rear 1/4 ,wings and other panels in stock . Or Alyn @asperformance as he can source most things ,if asked . if all else fails maybe you could consider cutting one from a clean "breaker " shell and getting it shot blasted . Best of luck with the restoration, always nice to see early rare cars getting some TLC 👍