Tidgy

welcome, as said get some pics up 😄

Subaru UK seem to be doing everything they can to go out of business for many years. In less than 10 years they took a large fanatical following (and i dont use fanatical lightly), alienate it and reduce the numbers to a fraction. The 2.5 engine was a distaster for the brand, but rather than put it right they carried on, burried their heads in the sand and basicly destroy the impreza's reputation and made alot of customers unhappy. This in turn led to poor sales and it became a culture of plug in to find the fault rather than a mechanic who knows the products inside and out as the mechanics wouldnt stay long as they never knew if there dealer was gonna go under (subaruy franchises dont seem to last long) and they could get paid more elsewhere. I remember when the hatch first came out, local dealer (of which there were 3 within about 10 miles, (Beeston, mansfield and derby, plus 2 others a bit futher north one in matlock and one in sheffield which is the only one still going) invited the local owners group down and basicly threw us the keys to take it out and see what we all thought (Prob didnt wanna buy that one after we all tried it hahaha). Now they are more bothered about sponsering horse trials and golf tournaments. The ironic thing is subaru US is growing in strength, they are in the US rally champ and winning it year after year, they have join RallyX and are building a decent rep in that, this has brought more and more fans back to the subaru brand to the point that US is getting things like the S209 or is it R209? what ever its called. Really does show where subaru have gone wrong.

You tend to find they already have crap reputations and people only find out after they have problems and go looking for more info. The number of dodgy places and mappers i know would shock you. The info tends not to come out till they go under. There is even one who people think are well up there in reputation, but its becuase they cover up problems and no one challenges them cos of who they are, one that even rang me with an obviously attempt to shut me up when i let on they were just rebranding parts to sell them at a massive markup. A friend of mine took the same one to court when they cocked up his engine build and they settled before it got to the court room as they didnt have a leg to stand on, part of the agreement was he couldn't speak out about it on forums and such so you dont hear about it, although i have to confess i'm not sure how that would hold up in court if he did and they sued him.

Plenty out there if you have the right budget. They do seem to be going up in price, but there are alot of rusty sheds out there so its def buyer beware.

only engine known to be worse than the 2.5 turbo is the subaru diesel engine.

welcome, glad you got there in the end 😄

ICP is import car parts so they are fine to use. they actualy suply most specialists with parts as well

Pesonaly i would go with the heavy duty ones, they will be a different material hence the 'heavy duty'. bear in mind if you stiffen up the roll bar the next weakest component will get extra flex, which may well be the drop link, also you may find the bush's are on the way out on the drop links.

At that age rot is gonna be a big issue and anything without a rebuilt engine will be getting prety tired.

should be fine

not many dealers around now adays, tbh you may be better going to a specialist.

welcome

aye true

I suspect this would invalidate your insurace policy.

I know the MSA banned them cos there were do many crap ones out there

Depends what material they are, some are cheap and nasty and you'd be better off using cable ties, some are ok. Any more details on brand etc?

great, i had pedders ezi fit before, and they are alot better than those, firm but not back breaking hard or crashy. cant fault them tbh. You can also fit edc controler on it which adjusts them to the road if you wanna go full out 😄

short version, there aint any, they are cheap for a reason. i run tein flex z on mine and they are about £850 + fitting, for that sort of budget im not aware of any better, alot seem to be to hard and make the ride crashy

i dont think check engine light comes on for afr's, how do you know its a fueling issue?

don;t know anywhere down in londaon im afraid, if you dont mnd traveling scoobyclinic up at chesterfield have done hundreds, if not thousands of them. just a warning, although you may know, you wont know the full extent of the damage till its stripped and outer wing removed, may find its got at the suspension tops in the worst case.

looking at the leak figures alone you can see the engine is otaly goosed, sorry to her 😞 hope you get somewhere with the seller

have to confess not sure whos down that way, sure other folks will know

The short version is the ecu is looking for the bits you've removed, you need to get it mapped out. My advice is stay well clear of racedungnamics, wouldn't trust the muppet to map my toaster.

Previous owner could have moded it and then returned it to stock when sold on, happens alot. if your getting it mapped then doesnt really matter either way

The stock oil filter is fine, mines setup as a 500bhp daily and runs stock, i also know full blown race cars still running them 🙂 A good way to check all ok is chuck it on a dyno, can check AFR's, det etc etc that wont be shown up by the ecu alot of the time.