Brakes are really finished

Finally, the brakes are finished. We just need to fill the lines with fluid to see they leak. Here's a picture of the hydraulic hand brake with the brake bias adjuster on top of it.



Here's a photo of me with part of the wiring harness. This is the part that fits under the dash. Lots of totally unlabeled connectors. Lots of wires we don't need anymore (for air conditioning, anti-lock brakes, etc). The laptop in the background has the factory service manual on it, so we can figure out what goes where. It's a huge mess.


We also had John Elkin come by and inspect our rollcage. He approved our car for a logbook- which is not unexpected. But still nice to have done.
Finally, the brak

Fitting the dash and saving weight

Tonight, Dan tackled a fun task- Fitting the dashboard. The rollcage was built with the dash removed, and the only way to fit it back in was to cut it into two parts. We deliberated for a while about where the best place would be, and then Dan went to town with the sawzall. We still have some work to put it back together, though.





Dan also spent some time using a spot-weld cutter to remove unneeded chunks of metal (like the big heavy brackets needed to mount the rear seats and seatbelts.




I spent the night installing the driveline, rear axles, and straightening suspension link.s The car now has a complete drivetrain... except for the motor.


Next on the agenda is to run all the brake lines and start thinking about electrical.

Welding Training

Dan and I spent most of Saturday working on the new rally car.

We had help from Liam, Dan's son. Liam was quite interested in welding, so Dan gave him a nice lesson.


Here's a picture of what Dan was welding.


Here's a picture of the box that Dan built to hold the hydraulic handbrake. It's not very exciting here, but Dan did a nice job, and this will let our car have a cool feature.
I spent the day doing less exciting things, like building a custom castle-nut to replace the one I stripped last week. And I gutted the stock mechanical emergency brake setup- we won't need it once the hydraulic system is working. I also pulled out a rear axle that was messed up.



Today, I made a run to Subaru John's and picked up some goodies. I got some replacement rear axles, a flange to make our driveline work, and ...... AND.... John found us the motor that we've been waiting for. This is a blown motor that has all the parts we'll need to finish our nicely built motor. So, it was a good day!

Aluminum control arms!

I made a great find on Craigslist- Front aluminum control arms. These replace the stock steel ones and are much stronger. They're expensive, but I picked them up for about half the price of new.

So, these went on last Thursday.


Dan also spent some time welding up the bracket to hold the hydraulic hand brake. (Don't look directly at the weld in this photo... you could go blind!)


Progress is slow. We just haven't had much time to work on the car. Hopefully in the next two weeks, the braking system will be done, and the car will be down on all four wheels. Then, we can start bodywork, wiring, and thinking about getting the motor in.

Work Night - Brakes

Friday night, Dan, Doug, and Doug's neighbor Tim met to swap out the brakes and run new brake lines, eliminating the ABS system in the car. The new brakes are from the 2007 WRX with 4 pots in the front, and 2 pots in the rear. The brakes are installed on 3 corners. Unfortunately, we found that the "new" left front nuckle has a bad wheel bearing, and we need to fix that before installing that corner. Also, "someone" forgot to bring the brake-line flaring tool, and so we will need to run the brake lines at a later work party. We had plenty to do, so this isn't a big deal.

Tim was a huge help in installing the brakes. He's a very experienced mechanic and works very fast.


Here, Dan begins to mount the hydraulic hand brake. I don't think the cardboard piece is staying.

Here, Dan adds some blackout paint at the front of the rollcage. This is to reduce glare from all the bright white paint in the drivers eyes.

Here, Dan..... uhhhh... models his halloween costume, made from an unneeded (and heavy) bit of metal removed from the car. I'll send one Hamm's tallboy to anyone who can correctly identify that piece.


We also installed the trunklid with the wing, and replaced the lock cores in the doors (we didn't have a key for the doors before).

Next on the list is to finish mounting the handbrake (requiring some minor cutting and welding) and then running all of the brake lines.

Time to get down to business

The car finally made it to Dan's house last weekend. We're going to get it sitting on a fresh drivetrain and get all the body work done before returning it to RalliTek for the engine installation and tuning. There's a LONG list of things to do. Here's a subset:

- Install new nuckles, brakes, and brake lines - install new wheels & driveline
- Run brake lines, e-brake, proportioning valve
- Paint rollcage (ie. black in windshield area and repaint white in some areas)
- Install dash & figure out heater ducting (need heater)
- Install windshield
- Remove various metal brackets, etc (weight savings)
- Install lock cores / ignition switch
- Fit seats/possibly install or decide to go with head-restraint seats
- Figure out plan for door cards or replacement & installation of door handles/window switches
- Tow hook plan (might be able to use stock)
- Plan dash/gauges/switches
- Plan battery mounting
- Install card to separate trunk from interior
(Plus about 250 other items)


Once at Dan's, we introduced the new service crew to the car. Liam, Ezra, and Michael thought the car was pretty cool. Michael even helped remove the old wheels- He's getting good with the electric impact wrench! I just hope he doesn't use it on my car when I'm not watching.


This is Hazel. Hazel is new. She's in training to be a rally service dog. The cone thing is to protect some stitches and to keep her ears glued down. It's times like this, I'm glad I'm not a dog.

2002 - 2007

Our new project is a 2002, but we're going to make it look like a 2007 model. The main difference is in the front end.

Here's are a couple of 2002's, also called "bugeye":



And here's what the 2007 looks like:


Now we just need to find a new hood, bumper, and headlights!