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'95 EJ22 Into '83 Brat


themixtoo
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Ok, Just started the EJ22 swap and 3" lift to my '83 Turbo Brat clone. EA81T and auto trans are out. Rad, ac condenser, oil cooler, engine cradle (crossmember), brake lines, under hood wire harness, struts, strut rod brackets all removed. Engine bay cleaned (looks pretty good for 22 years in the snow belt) and the left front inner fenderwell removed so I can weld in the Impreza piece as it has special mounting points for the fuse box and battery. CHECK THIS OUT.....If I could only figure out this 'cut and paste' thing I'd send a better picture........as I get more done I'll send pix of each step.......Gary

post-8096-136027600565_thumb.jpg

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That's pretty cool, but why didn't you go with a d/r 5spd and Mudrat's adaptor?
I thought about it but, I took the whole drivetrain out of my daughter's 'totaled' Impreza Outback and if I put a stick in this thing it's just one more thing for my better half to complain about. In 30+ years of marriage we haven't had many dissagreements but the fact that the only two new cars I've bought both have manual trans in them and I tried to teach her to drive the first one ('74 V8 Gremlin that I still have) but she just couldn't get it so I'd rather not tick her off with this deal. Plus this Brat allready had an automatic in it and I am getting just a little tired of this clutch pedal thing anyway. Gary
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Plus this Brat allready had an automatic in it.
EJ22 and auto trans bolted in (well engine and cradle bolted in) talk about close fit, .25" clearence on the valve covers on each side frame rail and that's with moving the cradle (crossmember) foreward about .75" from the factory EA81 mounting points. This relocation of the Impreza crossmember only moves the front axles forward about .25" so hopefully the front wheels will still stay centered in the fender wheel opening and if not I think it will be easier to trim the front arc of the wheel opening than the rear. MORE PIX COMING SOON

BRAT 3.MOD.bmp

BRAT 3.MOD6.bmp

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EJ22 and auto trans bolted in (well engine and cradle bolted in)
Just today's update....I'm hav'in a real problem modifing the strut rod bracket to accept the rear pivot bushing on the Impreza lower 'A' arm because this bushing lines up exactly under the old frame rail and I don't want to modify that part of the original Brat. PIX COMING........Gary

BRAT 3.MOD5.bmp

BRAT 3.MOD4.bmp

BRAT 3.MOD3.bmp

BRAT 3.MOD2.bmp

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what are you doing with the lower A-arm?

 

if you want to put the 5-lug suspension on it, you can supposedly just drill out the Brat control arm to accept the larger ball joint... am i missing something?

I got the entire car ('95 Impreza Outback wagon) for $350 (that's 10% of what the insurance co. totaled the car for) and I don't want to piece XT6 parts, Brat parts and Impreza parts together. When I'm finished I want to be able to BOLT ON STI suspension components, not have to modify each peice as I go along. I don't just want 5-lug suspension, I want to be able to use STI wheels, brakes, struts, axles, etc. By the way how can you even compare a Brat control arm to an Impreza one? Oh yea and I want them tires stickin' out those wheel wells too.:grin:
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well, you have the impreza spindle and ball joint and strut. that saves you a lot of piecing together. the XT6 spindle, the Legacy spindle, and the Impreza spindle all use the same ball joint.

 

you can use the XT6 caliper on any of those spindles to retain the front E-brake setup, as the Impreza and Legacy brake systems have the E-brake in the back. Or you can improvise your own setup.

 

as far as what you've got now...

if you drill out the brat control arm it will accept the larger ball joint in the impreza knuckle.

 

you can then keep the impreza strut and put the 2-bolt EA81 strut tower mount on top of it.

 

I have been told to match the spindles, rotors, and axles all from the same type of car for proper fit. You will have to use custom axles because the EA81 cars are too narrow. the EA82 cars can use the EJ axles because they are wide enough.

 

in other words, there's not quite as much piecing together as you might think. :)

 

so, if you want to use STI brakes, you will have to reengineer the E-brake cables' routing, as that will dictate that you run a rear E-brake setup.

 

You will not be able to use STI axles for the reason noted above.

 

If you want to use STI control arms then you are on the right track with what you're doing, I guess.

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I have been told to match the spindles, rotors, and axles all from the same type of car for proper fit. You will have to use custom axles because the EA81 cars are too narrow. the EA82 cars can use the EJ axles because they are wide enough.

 

in other words, there's not quite as much piecing together as you might think. :)

 

so, if you want to use STI brakes, you will have to reengineer the E-brake cables' routing, as that will dictate that you run a rear E-brake setup.

 

You will not be able to use STI axles for the reason noted above.

 

If you want to use STI control arms then you are on the right track with what you're doing, I guess.

I took the trans tunnel and everything with all e-brake stuff, center console, heater controls, dash, computers, steering column, fuel tank, fuel lines, all of it. The only mod I think I'll have to do is shorten the the rear main driveshaft:cool:
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Here's the latest image Gary sent to me...

 

640x480@87k (less than 20 seconds@56k dialup)

http://www.fjeer.us/usmb/BRAT3[2].MOD8.jpg

 

Gary - If you send them all my way, I'll stick them on my server and make more links back so everybody can see those other images that are "postage stamp" sized. :D

I hope everybody else can see it because I can't open it up and yes thanks, I'll edit a couple more pix and send them your way:) ...Gary ***Oh yea, borrowed a mig welder from a friend, wired a seperate circuit off my breaker box in the garage over the weekend. Now I just got to get up the nerve to 'practice' welding on these suspension mounts. I guess there's a first time for everything:rolleyes: Up to this point in time I've always paid someone to do my welding for me, but now that my wife is not working (job out-sourced to India after 31 years) I've got to watch the 'budget' now:-\
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  • 2 weeks later...
*Oh yea, borrowed a mig welder from a friend, wired a seperate circuit off my breaker box in the garage over the weekend. Now I just got to get up the nerve to 'practice' welding on these suspension mounts. I guess there's a first time for everything:rolleyes: Up to this point in time I've always paid someone to do my welding for me, but now that my wife is not working (job out-sourced to India after 31 years) I've got to watch the 'budget' now:-\
Well....welding practice is not going as well as I had hoped. Burned my ankle, my head, my arm, my hand and my A$$ but I did get a few good SPOT welds to take:grin:. I think 'practice' will take place on something less critical than the front suspension and I'm going to 'bite the bullet' and pay someone to finish welding this stuff. I really don't care if a rocker panel falls off because of my poor welding, but not any suspension stuff....Better to be safe than sorry. Gary
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I think 'practice' will take place on something less critical than the front suspension and I'm going to 'bite the bullet' and pay someone to finish welding this stuff. I really don't care if a rocker panel falls off because of my poor welding, but not any suspension stuff....Better to be safe than sorry. Gary
OK, Left front suspension finished, but now I noticed the right side front A arm mount on the crossmember is bent about 3/4". So I pulled the engine/trans AGAIN and one of my buddies has a body shop and he thinks he can straighten this for me......This is taking longer than I expected. LOL:rolleyes: Gary
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  • 3 weeks later...
crossmember is bent about 3/4". So I pulled the engine/trans AGAIN and one of my buddies has a body shop and he thinks he can straighten this for me......This is taking longer than I expected. LOL:rolleyes: Gary
SOOOOO...Body shop 'buddy' looks at crossmember and says 'Bent too bad, can't be fixed, go to JY and get another':banghead: This is just the kind of stuff that ticks me off. DON'T TELL ME IT CAN'T BE FIXED. I JUST LUV A CHALLENGE! Well, it's almost fixed as of today, just a little more tweeting. I thought about heating it up and bending it back but decided that would weaken the peice too much, so I cut the welds , bent it back cold and had it welded back in the correct position. I think that will be stronger (and cheaper than a JY crossmember). Next project is to design a top strut mount bracket that will bolt to the Brat and align the upper Impreza strut mount in the correct position (which should be about 2 inches wider than the existing mounts). I took the LH strut off my '98 Impreza yesterday and made a template out of metal and wood that bolts between the engine crossmember and the upper strut mount. Now I have an accurate pattern to transfer to the Brat, PIX COMING SOON.........:grin:
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  • 2 weeks later...
Next project is to design a top strut mount bracket that will bolt to the Brat and align the upper Impreza strut mount in the correct position (which should be about 2 inches wider than the existing mounts). I took the LH strut off my '98 Impreza yesterday and made a template out of metal and wood that bolts between the engine crossmember and the upper strut mount. Now I have an accurate pattern to transfer to the Brat, PIX COMING SOON.........:grin:
Man this upper strut mount is pretty tricky it's taken me two weeks to get it just right. Last bit of welding should be done today. At least now the RH strut mount should only take half as long to fabricate.. PIX COMM'IN...:brow:
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:slobber: ...awaiting pics...
OK, OK. I got all excited when I finished the LH upper strut mount and forgot to snap a pic before I bolted the strut to it and installed it. So I just unbolted it from the Brat but I took the pic with the Impreza strut still bolted to it because those new shiny nuts are OEM and their self locking. JUST TRIED COPY/PASTE AGAIN. CHECK YOUR E-MAIL I'M GETTING P$$$$$D OFFFF AGAIN:banghead: GARY
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lol.. I've gotten it taken care of. No worries mate.strutmount_low.jpg

Click on the image for a larger version, 800x600@120k.

Thanks again, I'll snap a pix of this assy mounted in the Brat. By the way, is there a way to reduce the pixles or something without losing the quality of the pictures? I know it's a dumb question but I'm still not to good at this digital stuff yet. Gary
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This is some really awsome custom stuff. Thanks for taking the time to snap shots as you go. Love tracking real progress! :drunk:

 

If it's not too much to ask; could you please snap more shots of http://www.ultimatesubaru.org/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=2425 Specificly how it's mounted in with the rest of the unibody.

 

Also I noticed you had a lot of images with text on the first page of posts. Anyway larger images could be posted?

 

Thanks!

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