No plans for the brakes at the moment, unless a cheap set of Prodrive calipers turns up, they're ok for me as they are tbh. Pads will be upgraded though. Would very much like to find a set of new old stock Prodrive Billies and Eibachs though, but that will have to wait until I sell a kidney.

 

Just seen your post - great car. I've Just done the same - bought a mint, pampered 00MY wagon with no rust at all.

After 2 months I'm sticking to the preservation route and resisting all attempts to upgrade !

The wax-oiling was the first thing I did professionally plus front brake calipers, discs and pads from Godspeed as the calipers seize (I'm sure you know).

Can I ask - the fuel pump - is this an upgrade or a preventative maintenance idea ? I had thought about lots of things but not this ?

 

The fuel pump change was purely preventative, simply because the original was 15 years old. I put a 255l/hr one in, but that was not part of the original ppp. At £60 ish it seemed a no brainer. Easy to fit too. Engine had original plug leads on too, swiftly changed in the first month.
The very first thing I did on driving the car home was to strip down front and rear brakes, to my surprise the rears weren't seized, and in excellent condition. Same for the fronts, which had newish discs. The car has been very well looked after.
I'm doing the waxoyling up on a lift next week - I've had a good crawl around underneath and all looks well, including rear suspension turrets, jacking points, and fuel filler pipe.
There won't be any more mods (apart from the anti-lift correction) other than original Prodrive ones, all of which are reversible. I'm pretty much done now apart from gauges and a driving light conversion for the front fogs. The ALK is to try and get rid of the rather exhilarating power-on understeer

 

Ok, understood.

After a few years away from the classic Impreza and driving some really nice 'modern' cars, doesn't it really hit home how fundamentally 'RIGHT' they got this car 15-20 years ago !?

 

Discs are expensive for the Prodrive Alcons, and you'd need bigger wheels to fit them.

The Bilsteins are like rocking horse ****, as are the Eibach's.

Nice classic.

 

Indeed. The brakes are fine as they are, this car will never see a track and it won't be getting moar powah.


I'm banking on it. I need my kidney.

Thanks!

 

Was just about say i've got a spare prodrive y-pipe you could of had

 

^^May still be interested, the one I've got is a bit tired.

 

All good mods you'll have to update the photos

 

Il get some pics up tomorrow

 

Update: Had the car up on the lift last week, to seek out any rust and deal with it. Very little to do, just a bit of surface rust on the suspension arms etc, but the rest of it was rust free, rear strut towers and all. Had a look in the sills and cavities with a camera, clean as a whistle. So I cleaned the underside and sprayed it with waxoyl with shutz. The insides of the rear wheel arches inside the boot area are also perfect, with plenty of green cavity wax everywhere. It seems the bodywork services were actually carried out. Whilst it was up in the air, I fitted the Whiteline anti lift kit, and changed the gearbox and rear diff oil with Millers semi synth. The alk is great, just what the car needed, it turns in crisply and grips so much better under power, doesn't understeer any more. A massive improvement.
I managed to find a white Lamco dial set, (oil temp, pressure, and volts) in great condition with sensors and all wiring. Quick and easy to install, they work very well. Need to find a Lamco steering column mounted boost gauge now.

 

Looks great.

Do you have a part number for the anti-lift kit or where did you source as been thinking about the same for my wagon ?

Thanks.

 

Whiteline part number is KCA361. I opted for the 'comfort' option in the interests of NVH. Got it from Scoobyworld.

 

Thanks

 

Another update: found a good used set of Prodrive Bilsteins with the blue Eibachs thanks to a member on here (Cheers Dan!). Bunged them on yesterday and took it for alignment today. First impressions very favourable. Much has been said about how good this setup is, and I totally agree after a short drive through North Somerset this afternoon. I've gone for relatively vanilla geo settings: a touch of toe in, equal front and rear, and .75 degrees of front neg camber. I'm getting 3.5 degrees of caster. Lots of driving coming up, so I'll see how this works for me.
Next on the list is 17" wheels (rb5s? St2s?) to go with the above.

 

Pf7s suit classics well mate

 

Project going well

The rarer these classics get the better
Very few in the roads in Cumbria now
Occasionally see a couple on a weekend /Sunday driver sort if car now

 

Another Update: I decided to stick with 16” wheels for various reasons, and since my standard wheels are in a bad state, and I don’t like them anyway, I started to look for suitable replacements. Being a big fan of light weight wheels, I happened upon a set of Rays STi TE37s, 16x7, et 53.



As we all know, these wheels are individually hand-carved, from solid blocks of the finest unobtainium, by ancient Japanese craftsmen with tiny hammers, and this was reflected in the reassuringly high price tag. They’re so light, I’ve had to tie them down to stop them floating away. However, there is a problem. They’re gold, of course. On a silver car. Hmmmm. Not going to happen. So I’m going to commit sacrilege, destroy the jay-dee-em originality, and get rid of the original anodised finish. Haven’t decided on a colour yet, possibly silver, maybe something a bit darker. Suggestions welcome, but not black or bronze.

I also found a white Lamco boost gauge to go with the rest, nice and tidy now

 

painted my wheels ford sea grey , its a dark grey but when the light hits it its got a tint of blue, Bit different

 

Very nice car and well thought of mods, keeping it original.

Any recent pics of it with the new wheels?

Fancy selling it?

 

Wheels are being painted silver at the moment, ready next week, pics to follow. Won't be for sale for a long time, sorry!

 

Lovely wagon! Like yourself I'm more interested in preservation, with a few improvements along the way rather than 'let's mod it to to get 300-odd bhp so I can brag to my mates...' [and then break it and wonder why] which seems to have been the norm with Impreza's in the past. I much prefer seeing a standard looking Impreza in the wild

That's going to look lovely on the TE37's, my all time favourite wheel and silly light.

 

Here's a couple of really bad phone snaps of the TE37s on the car:







I bought a pair of bare front callipers on eBay, and built them up with Godspeed stainless pistons, new seals, pins, springs, and pads. Also got Godspeed discs. I painted the callipers navy blue. They’re going on the car when I have time. Nothing really wrong with the current ones, but prevention is better as always. I have noticed how bloody heavy they are though, I wonder if there’s a lightweight 4 pot alternative, that will fit behind the 16s…..

 

Re: Brake calipers under 16's
Brembo GT junior or Porsche monobloc's

https://www.scoobynet.com/scoobynet-...n-impreza.html

It's a lot of effort though! Ebc orangestuff pads, with stainless conversion oem 4pots, is fine, on the road.

 

Thanks for that, yep, a lot of effort and cash. It's purely a matter of weight rather than performance. rhdJapan do these APP 4 pots, but they’re 332mm.



AP do a 4 pot for 295x25.4 discs.



expensive and not necessary, but I’m becoming obsessed with unsprung weight....

Meanwhile, I found time today to bung the refurbed boat anchors and new discs on, along with braided lines. Sure enough, the old callipers each had a seized piston, so it's all good now.