Im on my 4th new Scooby and in my opinion the 2.5 engine is brill,I wouldnt go back to a 2litre. Theyre in the past,just like german cars designed before the millenium bug was due

 

My GB270wagon was a great car, we had it for 3 years and it never missed a beat, we got 29mpg on a run and paired to the 5speed box it was very torquey.
We paid 20k for it and got 13.6k back so it was good value also. I too love the 2.5 engine and have only seen 1st hand problems when modded and used on track

 

The problem is that when you talk to someone about Subaru WRX's - everyone is an expert.
"Oh you don't wanna buy one of them mate - you've got to service then every 6000 miles"
Wow - in that case I won't bother.
After reading some of this forum some folks were saying that the 2.5 WRx saloons engine just "goes pop" but there are very few cases of this happening.

I am very happy now this has been cleared up. I am currently shopping for a 2007 WRX Saloon with 1/2 owners - less than 40 k miles and FSSH. I want to buy from a main dealer just so I have something to fall back on, (after my x-type Jaguar engine blew up).

Thanks for the help. I will post again once I've bought.

 

Best of luck bud, hope you find the car you want

 

Good luck mate you asked all the questions I was going to ask soon, I think I'll stick with the 2.0L blobeye personally, the way I look at it is if you are going to spend considerable expense buying and then running a Scooby you have to buy the best model (STI, though I do like the GB270 wagon and the older WR1 STI). :-)

Looking forward to seeing what you buy and what you think though.

 

I've got a 06 WRX 2.5 and i have't had a single issue with it. The cars at about 65k miles and she is stock apart from a Nur Spec-S backbox and suspension upgrades. The car is serviced every year by Datum Motorsport and they always check the car over to ensure nothing is wrong.

I'm planning on doing a full de-cat and a re-map and leaving it at that as tuning the car anymore than that and i'll just be living on borrowed time in terms of engine and clutch life (but thats the same for any engine not just the 2.5)and i can't afford to have the engine go pop.

I've seen Hawkeye WRX's up for sale for less than £7995, ok they may have more than 30k on the clock but i still think that figure is to high. I would suggest you get the STi if you can afford one mainly down to the 6 speed box (i wish i had an extra gear in mine).

As long as the car your looking at has been serviced correctly i.e. had decent oil put in, fluids checked etc etc and it has been looked after properly then you shouldn't have a problem

 

The basic advice is always the best advice .... buy the best car you can for the money you have available.

When I say 'best' car I mean .... STANDARD! Buying someone elses modified tat is going to see you parked atop a breakdown pick-up truck ...... we all know it's true!

When I say 'best' car I mean .... ONE OWNER! Buying a car which has changed owners every 12 months is BAD news, always is, always will be!

When I say 'best' car I mean .... FULL SERVICE HISTORY! Accepting that the owner has 'lost' the Service Book is NOT acceptable!

When I say 'best' car I mean .... MATURE OWNER! Who the hell wants a car from a 20 something who hasn't the experience to drive properly yet? NO-ONE!

When I say 'best' car I mean .... ALL OLD MOT's! You want a folder with the car that shows the Owner has taken pride in his/her ownership - you want NOTHING LESS!

When I bought my Scooby - 12 years ago - I read these pages and I was convinced that I had a chocolate engine (until I saw sense and it was simply the simple who had modified their cars who were melting engines!).

Through these pages I learned that I would be woken up in the night surrounded by 5 masked 15 year olds demanding my keys ..... because of one or two Mr Muscle types who got their cars taken off them - at 20 stone, I'm not going to get anything taken off me!

So, in a nutshell ..... do not buy modified tat and you will have a solid, reliable car on your hands.

And, finally, remember this - bad cars and bad characters go together ... they always have - if the car is being sold by a 'Jack-the-Lad' RUN AWAY!!

And take the ramblings on the internet as just that ..... let your head rule.

Good luck!

 

Good advice.
The only thing i would add is Generally speaking it's best to buy a standard car but in the case of the subaru 2.5 i would go for a car that has had forged pistons fitted professionally. There is modified then there is curing known issues to build in reliability.

 

What are the 2.5, semi closed blocks? Do they come in CDB?

Thanks

 

The information offered by PSLEWIS is spot on. My last car was a 51,500 pound Jaguar Xj8 4.2 sport. The car has a complete mechanical failure at 65k miles and I ended up in the sea.

I want 1 owner, FSSH, Low miles, All previous Mot's and immaculate condition and from a Main dealer or Franchise. Bit more expensive but you can generally get an AA or RAC warranty from them, (the only warranty companies to pay out) and if something goes wrong they do not like legal challenges.

I have reading up a lot on the modest and less modest power gains that can be attained from a 2007 wrx 2.5 just by modifying the exhaust, air filters and an ECU re-map from Duncan @Racedynamix.

I am a bit unclear on Cat up/down/left/right exhaust and swapping these at MOT's.

I would like small power upgrade - 250-280 BHP with Exhaust upgrade, Air filters and ECU remap but I certainly do not want to be swapping exhausts around at MOT time.

Experiences anyone?

Oh there was a 2007 WRX 2.5 with 28k miles on the clock.
8000 down to 6500 at a Renault Main dealer on autotrader BUT the salesman was vague when asked about previous documents/Mot's/ FSH / Owners so I walked away. I am in no hurry.

 

The 2006-2007 exhaust has no Cat on the up-pipe so ignore that bit, the exhaust is made up of the Down pipe, Front pipe, Centre section and backbox.

The first Cat goes from the back of the turbo down to the front pipe, the second Cat is on the front pipe. The Cat on the downpipe is the most limiting and if you are only wanting a modest gain without messing around with swapping pipes at MOT time that is the one to do. Bear in mind once that has been changed you will need to re-map the car. This should see you to roughly about 250bhp.

The standard exhaust is a 2.5 inch system which, if you are not planning to upgrade the car is fine there is no need to go 3 inch. If you do find the standard backbox to quiet you can replace it with an aftermarket one which will release the burble. I have a blitza Nur-spec S on mine and it makes a really nice noise not to intrusive.

In regards to the air filter the standard panel filter is fine but you can replace it if you so wish most people i believe go for the K&N panel filter.

 

No cat in the uppipe on a hawkeye. Most restrictive cat is in the downpipe so go for either decat or sports cat downpipe. I bought a brand new decat downpipe from scoobyworld £179.99 i think. Japspeed have an offer on sports cats at the moment i believe.

If u go for the sports cat option you can decat the 2nd cat pipe aka cat replacement pipe and still pass MOT.

If u decat the downpipe then you will need to keep the cat in the 2nd pipe in order to pass MOT.

or

You can go full decat and swap either either pipe over at MOT time in order to pass. Probably easier to swap the 2nd cat pipe back. Any good mechanic will be able to do this for you.

I previously ran 267/326 with decat downpipe, scorpion imola backbox w. de resonated centre pipe, cosworth panel filter, remap.

4wd AA inspection is £260 if your a member or you can use somebody else's membership no to get the discount. They are v thorough

 

Oops. Looks like your question was already answered ^^

 

Really useful guys, thanks very much.

 

Picture makes it clearer........

 

That is really useful.
The guys on this forum have made it much clearer for me.
I now know what I want after listening to the experts as opposed to the dummy experts and scaremongers.
Thanks again.
Any other info relating to 2007 wrx saloons let me know.

 

Depends what you want to know really. The standard WRX brakes aren't great so if you are someone who enjoys a spirited drive possibly think about changing the following (bear in mind this is coming from my own experiance):

1) change to braided brake lines and DOT 6.1 brake fluid as the standard rubber hoses do let in moisture and the brake fluid can get diluted a bit.

2) Buy a set of front STI brembos or similar either new or second hand. This is a common upgrade apparently and i would also suggest getting the rear calipers refurbed as they will come back better than they were originally.

Other items to consider are:

1) 22mm Front and rear anti-roll bar as the body roll is quite noticable

2) Anti Lift kit, this is worth doing if the car you get has coilovers installed as it gives you the ability to add more caster to your geometry setup

3) Uprated drop links, the CDF Racing ones are worth looking into

In the end it all depends on how you drive the car, how much money you want to spend on it etc etc. These items will help the handling of the car quite a bit and with the power of the car (even if you take it to 280bhp) it will make it alot of fun to drive especially in the corners

I hope you find the car you want soon