pleiad7

A friend gifted a '92 SVX to us recently that had been sitting uncovered and with the windows open for a few months. The clean-up was pretty repulsive. Aside from the leaves and moldy seatcovers that also contained a mystery spill of pinkish-red fluid, we found magazines, electrical diagrams (car had been blowing the main fuse), a pillow, a sunshade for the windshield, ancient mints, old tapes (remember those?), a dangly earring, several abandoned yellowjacket nests, $2.26 in change, and a fat green bud. :-\ The interior looked like this when we picked it up:

Quoted for truth... I had a chance to toss one around on an auto-x course last weekend, and I have to say I was very impressed by how it handled out of the box. There is much less tendency to understeer now, it handles a lot more neutral than any other stock Subie I've ever driven. Maybe it'll take a while for the loyal following to warm up to the design, but from what I've seen over the last 6 or 7 years I believe it'll happen eventually. One thing is for sure - the new Impreza will definitely have a broader appeal to those who never even considered buying a Subaru before.

I've heard good things about the PIAA Ion Crystal bulbs. Personally I'd stay away from HID conversion kits, especially for foglights. Here's a good tech article on foglights: http://www.danielsternlighting.com/tech/lights/fog_lamps/fog_lamps.html

You'll find more detailed tire discussions for Forester-specific applications on subaruforester.org.

OK, you are the god of Subaru wiring. Happy? The point of this thread was to recommend a competent shop/mechanic in the Sonoma County, CA/North Bay Area. I think that was accomplished. Not sure if your input is really that valuable to the OP seeing as you're in Virginia...

Yeah, ok... And how many magazines have you been featured in? This pic is of Adam @ LIC... (aside from SCC he's also been written up in the Japanese Impreza magazine): http://www.sportcompactcarweb.com/tech/0403scc_subaru_gbd_wrx_engine/photo_11.html

Why would the Traction T/A's not work well for AWD vehicles? We ran them on our 98 Forester S very successfully, and I know of many others who have. Also, you might find this thread helpful.

If you think so... I don't know anyone who didn't rave about them after taking their car there. http://www.i-club.com/forums/showthread.php?t=165148

What everyone else said... our 98 Forester has 166k now and runs as strong as ever. As long as you keep up on maintenance, she will not let you down.

The Forester XT has had the semi-closed deck since its inception in MY04 (engine is identical with the one in the STi save for slightly different heads).

Yep, I replied to your post because the same thing was happening to me. Almost every time I've logged in over the past few days there were no new posts, and it appeared that I was the only person on the forum at the time. And now my post is gone along with your thread. What the heck??

I think only the 98-01 2.5RS came with rear headrests, but not the base models. My 2000 OBS didn't have them either.

wrong forum... that is decidely not "new generation."

Awesome! Make sure to post up at http://www.subaruforester.org as well (we already have one member with a STi-swapped SF there). Very refreshing to see the older Foresters get some attention, instead of everyone rallying around the FXT all the time.

You probably hit the parking light switch on top of the steering column.

You can go with a 225/60/16 tire on the 6.5" stock rim with no problems. It will be just slightly taller than the stock size, but will fix the built-in speedometer error (speedo reads slightly high from the factory). Directional tires are not a problem either; you just rotate front to rear. You might want to check out the wheel/tire section at http://www.subaruforester.org; there are a few discussions on the brands/models of tires you are considering.

If it came out of an Impreza EJ20, then it is positively a WRX 4EAT, unless it is JDM. The final drive is 4.11 for those, at least for the 2002-05 model years. They changed to 3.9 in 2006. If it is JDM, all bets are off...:-\

Be careful with that one... I think it has two holes behind it! Any glue residue cleans up nicely with Goo Gone too.