PrinterTechnician

Hello. I apologize if this is the wrong place to post this. I recently acquired this 1986 Subaru GL Wagon AWD/3spd auto. I made an account here a few years back while helping a friend with his '87 Brat. If I'd never worked on that Brat I wouldn't have given this $500 listing the time of day. The car is relatively clean for sitting in field in Odessa, TX exposed for a decade. Some rust under the cowl visible from the engine bay from debris sitting in it. Then some from a failed brake booster or master cylinder that was leaking. I'm technically the second owner since the guy I bought it from didn't register it, tried getting it to run off the fuel tank, failed, and gave up on it. Today I got around to setting up a Home Depot bucket fuel pump setup and ran it straight to the carb. I changed the oil and filter because the filter looked ancient, topped the radiator and reservoir off with some distilled water, and charged up the battery. I was surprised when the car eventually was able to run on it's own at about 1200-1500rpm. The carb was dripping fuel so I didn't want to run it long. The temp gauge climbed up a bit past halfway, so I quickly set some bricks around the tires to test the transmission without rolling away. I was able to roll forward and backward so I called that a success and shut it down. I noticed a burp in the coolant reservoir and some bubbles inside for about a minute after shutoff. I'll do a combustion leak test on it to verify. I'm going to list some major items that will need to be addressed before it even goes on a test drive. Engine - Verify if this engine needs head gaskets. Then go through cooling system and timing belt. Carburetor - Weber swap or try and work on this stock Hitachi Complete braking system refresh - Including the booster, master cylinder, and rubber lines. Transmission Drain/Fill and filter. Some less major items that will need to be addressed. Headlights housings are rusted through and don't work (I guess from filling up with water?) I'd probably try and find some sealed beam DL headlights and grille. CV Axles - All 4 CV boots are leaking and they'll probably fail pretty quickly. Suspension looks original. Door locks don't work and the passenger rear door is stuck shut. Rear hatch struts. left turn signal works with hazards but not stalk. No spare tire. But I have all the hardware that retained it. I think the battle going forward is going to be parts availability. I'm spoiled from working on Toyotas. I remember struggling to even find shocks for my friend's '87 Brat. The automatic transmission is also a downside if it ends up having issues. I've found a number of great write-ups on this forum and some other websites so I have that on my side. Here are some pictures and videos to go with my random assortment of thoughts.

I considered a package forwarding service from Australia. But that would cost about $550USD for just the struts and then another $500USD+ in shipping to the US. My friend is not interested in doing the EA82 suspension conversion. The easiest option would be knowing someone in Australia who could ship the parts to the US for a reasonable price. Or convincing a US vendor that there is a market for these. Which I doubt would be possible with how few of these are rolling around.

I've been using 1984 in my searches. No major chain, rockauto, or any other online retailer has anything for the front. I checked some specialty shops with an online storefront (mostly out of California) all with their sketchy 90s looking websites. Only place that listed them available was 2kracing.com. When I called them the guy was quick to tell me "yeah all the Subaru brat guys keep calling but we haven't had any in some time" so that was a dead end. The last company that appears to have produced them in the US was KYB under part# 234028. I really don't think an EA82 suspension conversion is in the cards. I'm going to seriously consider trying to get some shipped from Australia.

I found an eBay listing here that explicitly says it won't ship to the US. Pedders didn't seem to have any fronts available on their AU site. I guess I could ask about international shipping.

So I've been tasked with assisting my less mechanically inclined friend with a complete suspension refresh on an 87 Brat GL 4-speed with dual range. From what I've gathered the Brat stayed on the "2nd gen" older chassis here in the states until it was cancelled in 1987. I've also determined that no one is currently making a front strut for the 2nd gen chassis as of this year. After all my searching I've only really found people converting to the 3rd gen suspension setup. So what have the 2nd gen Leone owners been doing about this? My concerns on converting would be finding a donor. Not many old Subarus sitting out in West Texas.