I've always been curious about it but the thought never crosses thru my mind when I'm near the keyboard....until now. I've always heard people talking about 5 lug swaps on EA82's, but what are the major advantages of the swap besides fitment of wheels? How about ride height, does it make lowering a possibility or what? Just something I've always forgotten to ask. And yes I searched.......you get all sorts of useless results for "5 lug swap"

Bigger, better looking, and lighter rims, and ability to use legacy/impreza front struts mostly. As well as larger sway bars in the front.

 

It's not easy with an EA81 if that's your plan. You wouldn't gain the sway bar options, and you need modifications to the lower control arm to fit the ball joints for the 5 lug knuckles, and then you need custom shorter axles that no one makes (have to cut the shaft, and weld them together with a steel jacket). It is definately possible, but it requires some work that's not just bolt on.

 

GD

No....no plans for a sus. swap on an EA81, just been wondering about it for a long time and finally remembered to ask. You were talking about the front but what about the rear, just continuity?

Exactly - the rear suspension doesn't change at all in fact - only the hubs, rotors, and brakes get changed to accomidate the 5 lug rims.

 

GD

Ive been talking to my friend and axle builder Marshall who runs MWE axles and we think we have the recipe for making 5 lug swap axles...legacy outers and 23 or 25 spline inner joints. We also think it would be OK to receive Ea81 cores for them as to save the PITA factor for the customer. They'd be time consuming but hes willing if theres a demand.

 

So:

 

If you have an ea81 car....

And you lifted it......

Then the strut tops are taken care of by a X" spacer that has the ea81 top and the 5 lug strut type bottom.

From there you need a customized Control arm and what else?

-----Do the tie rod ends work with the 5 lug knuckles?

-----Brake line ends same?

Shawn, just like the shortblocks I have laying around here, I also have a pretty good stash of beat up axles, good for parts or rebuilds. If he needs any, let me know and I can see about getting some to bring down:headbang:

Ive been talking to my friend and axle builder Marshall who runs MWE axles and we think we have the recipe for making 5 lug swap axles...legacy outers and 23 or 25 spline inner joints. We also think it would be OK to receive Ea81 cores for them as to save the PITA factor for the customer. They'd be time consuming but hes willing if theres a demand.

 

So:

 

If you have an ea81 car....

And you lifted it......

Then the strut tops are taken care of by a X" spacer that has the ea81 top and the 5 lug strut type bottom.

From there you need a customized Control arm and what else?

-----Do the tie rod ends work with the 5 lug knuckles?

-----Brake line ends same?

 

You can drill the strut tower on the EA81 to accept the 3-bolt legacy strut without any lift blocks or spacers, so that's no problem.

 

The lower control arm has to be reemed out to accept the legacy knuckle style ball joint, but that's not really hard either. Or a custom control arm could be made with a some tubing and an old legacy arm.

 

Tie rod ends should work fine with the legacy knuckles - the EA82 shares the same end ball joint (although the cast portion of the end itself is longer), and they work fine with the legacy knuckle.

 

Brake lines should work basically the same.

 

Something fancy would have to be worked out if you wanted a larger front sway bar as you are using the EA81 lower control arm still, and the legacy sway doesn't mount anywhere close to the same way. Rguyver showed me his solution at the show - he used an old sway bar from his Hemi Cuda, chopped the ends off and make a couple brackets for the control arms.

 

GD