All the pics were taken by my brother-in-law, James. You can see the full gallery at his blog James Fleishel.

Before:

Dyno from over 2 years ago

After:

Dyno from yesterday

It was interesting how two years ago I had noticeably more whp than wtq but this time it’s the opposite. whp stayed around the same, a bit less than before but my car now has about 40 more wtq and I can definitely feel it. Not only this but now my car makes power quicker. At pretty much every RPM range my car is making more power than before. My car feel smoother and more powerful than ever – I couldn’t be happier. The blue (run 10) on the second dyno is the last pull when my clutch slipped I believe, red is the final tune with the new clutch.

The only difference on my car from both dynos is after the first dyno I put a carbon fiber drive shaft, new clutch and lighter flywheel in my car. Scott also mentioned tires can affect the dyno numbers and I do have a different set of wider tires on now.

 If you have any questions, thoughts, comments feel free to post!

I didn’t know much about the x-brace but when I clicked on the thread I saw lots of very positive comments about this brace. I did a site search for the x-brace and even more info came up on how wonderful this mod is and some people were saying this was the perfect first suspension mod for them. The price was about the same as getting both front and rear sway bars and it sounded like I would get more benefit from the brace so I decided to join the group buy and bought the brace.

Before I explain the tricky install process, I do want to say that CarLabs customer service is superb. I ended up cross-threading the turnbuckle to one of the poles and when I gave CarLabs a call they immediately shipped me out a replacement free of charge! If I ever need something else for my car, I’ll make sure to check if they make it first. Ok, back to the install. When I first tried to install the parts I didn’t use anti-seize on the turnbuckle and while I was tightening one side I seized the threads. I talked to Andrew at CarLab on the phone and his thought was maybe there was some residue in the pole and when I screwed the turnbuckle in it cause the resistance which led to the cross-threading.

After I received the replacement parts I tried this install again. This time, I read some info from others who installed the brace and followed their instructions. One guy (and these are the instructions I followed) recommended test fitting the brace on the car before trying to install it because in his case the bottom bolt hole on the brace didn’t line up to the car frame. I did as he said and found out I too had the same issue. I had to burrow a dremel tool from a friend to make the hole larger and then everything fit correctly.

The install took my friend and I about 2 hours after we fixed the hole with the dremel. Over all it wasn’t too bad, there were just parts we had to keeping tinkering with to get things to align correctly. After the install I reattached my seat belts, reinstalled my back seat, and went for a drive. My first impression was I could definitely feel the back end tighter. The feeling of the back end wanting to slide out during a turn is not there anymore. I’ve only had about a week of driving around with this on the car so I haven’t had a chance to really test it out but so far I’m happy with the results. My only issue so far is I hear slight vibration in the back some times. I’ll probably take out my seats and make sure everything looks right this or next weekend. I do know the poles are really close to the frame of the car so maybe during a turn they end up touching? I’ll have to do more investigating.

Four weeks ago I went on a mountain pass with a few people and had a blast. Unfortunately half way through the pass my car started acting up. I floored it like I had been all morning and then my car cut gas around 5k rpm and my check engine light turned on. Someone had a code scanner so we tried to read the code and nothing was coming back. The guy then reset the code (since there was none) and the check engine light turned off. I decided to try giving the car gas one more time to make sure it wasn’t just one isolated random incident and it wasn’t. Same thing happened and my check engine light came up.

About three weeks ago I went to TopSpeed since they’ve done everything to my car and had them take a look. After some analyzing they noticed two issues. 1) There was a crack on a section of my intercooler pipe causing a leak so that needed to be welded shut. 2) My SMC Meth pump was leaking pretty badly so that needed to be replaced/fixed. They fixed my pipe and I drove home.

I called Steve at SMC the next day, told him about my Meth pump and he asked me to send it his way to get it fixed free of charge (great customer service if you ask me – it’s a two year old pump). I took the kit apart and sent it to Steve. I also order an intake cleaning kit from Perrin for my Perrin foam intake since it was completely covered in nastiness and needed to be cleaned.

A week later I received the SMC kit and put it back in my car. I was so excited to drive my car again – it felt like it had been a few months since the last time I drove it. I turn my car on and with a huge smile in my face drive off. I waited for an open road to give the car a quick test and did so. Gas cut off and check engine light . The way it happened was a bit different than before, but my car still had issues. I called TopSpeed, set an appointment up for the next week and left my car alone until then.

Dropped off my car the night before my appointment since I couldn’t be there that day – had to be at work. At some point in the day I get a call from Scott at TopSpeed and he lets me know that they found the issue and it was the coil pack (I didn’t know what that was so I had to google it to find out it sends a signal to the spark plug to create the spartk or something like that). They replaced it and tested the car first to make sure before they called me. I gave him the go to charge me for a replacement and the only thing left to do was to tune my car.

I drove to TopSpeed after work to pick up my car. Scott said he’d stay as late as he had to to finish tuning my car (those guys are great! The best customer service you can expect. I can’t recommend TopSpeed enough). When I got there, I sat down at the waiting room with my gf. A few minutes later it happened… On one of the dyno passes, I heard my clutch slip. It was very obvious when it happened and a minute later Scott comes to the room and tells me there’s a problem. Yup, the clutch is slipping at 450wtq. This was both good and bad. Good because he said he still has a couple more psi he can add to the tune. My car was making 435wtq before and now it’s at 450wtq and he’s not even done! Bad because I have to spend more money on a clutch. If I’m getting a clutch I might as well get a lighter flywheel… things start to add up quick. I was hoping four weeks ago my issue was minor and a couple hundred bucks later I’d be driving around again but now I’m four weeks into this and a few thousand bucks later my car is not done yet. And don’t misunderstand, TopSpeed is doing a great job, there were just a few things wrong with my car and they all surfaced at the same time.

Currently my car is running on the tune from that day with a new performance clutch and lighter flywheel. It’s not a final tune but I need to break in the clutch before I go back. I have a tune scheduled for next week when I should have enough miles on the clutch and Scott can finish what he started. I’m very excited to get this tune done. Can’t wait to see the numbers. Right now the car is pulling really hard and I can’t imagine how hard it’ll pull then. I’ll keep you all updated with the results. Moral of the story, you have to pay to play and always have money saved up for rainy days.

I called Tray up at TopSpeed and told him I wanted more power and what he recommends.  His question was simple, how much power do I want and I answered 400whp.  The FP20g wouldn’t get me there, green would be closer, but his recommendation for my needs and budget was the FPRed.  He listed a whole bunch of things that need to be changed in the car for this turbo, told me the price, and I gave him the OK to proceed with the project.

The project got to a rocky start because FP was getting a ton of orders and it took a few extra weeks to get my turbo.  While I was waiting for my car to be ready, I started reading about this “Methanol” thing. I called Tray to ask him what this was all about and he said that for 500 bucks I could get 50 or more hp. I was very upset when he told me this because I was already over my budget but how could I not get this… this was probably the best dollar to horse power mod I could get so I told him to order it for me. Eventually TopSpeed got all the parts in and installed them.  The list of parts was:

• Ecutec
• Perrin FMIC
• FP Red
• Perrin Big MAF
• 860 injectors
• fuel pump
• ACV-R
• Tial BOV
• SMC Meth kit

Doug tuned my car and when everything was done, I went to pick up my car. They greeted me with the numbers I was looking forward to hearing: 455whp/435wtq. Two thumbs up for TopSpeed and Doug for such good work on my car. I was very happy with these numbers and the first thing I wanted to do was go out and try it out. Below is the dyno from that day:

I had never been in a 400+ hp car before so I didn’t know what to expect.  I drove to the highway on the way home, looked around to make sure it was a safe straight to give the car a quick test and I floored it. WOAH! I could not believe how fast the car was… it was scary fast… almost too fast (well for the first couple times :p). I was so excited.  Every morning I couldn’t wait to get in my car and drive around.

Eventually I started getting lazy.  Because I was always getting on the gas, I was using up my meth pretty quick. I had a 5 gallon container that I would go fill up at TopSpeed every so often (about 1 hour away). I started getting lazy in the sense I didn’t want to go fast because I would use up the meth so I would have to refill the reservoir in the car and eventually drive back up to TopSpeed. It’s a silly reason really, but that’s what happened.

Looking back what would I have done differently.  I think I would have gone with an external wastegate… more for the sound but I guess it makes tuning a bit easier with boost or was it that you can hold boost better with it… or both? I think I would have also gone with a rotated setup, probably a GT35r and no meth. I have no issues with the red other than now if I want more power I need to go rotated since I don’t believe I can fit any bigger turbo in the stock location. I would have also gotten a trunk meth tank (bigger) so I wouldn’t have to refill so often (I could do that now for not much more money).

Actually, knowing what I know now, I wouldn’t buy an FP product anymore.  Why? Read this. If you do read it, it’s not because of a turbo or two going bad (things happen), it’s because of what the FP guy says about the Subaru community. I would think people trying to sell their products should know it’s a bad business practice to insult your possible customers.

I bought the car from ‘Herman Jones’ at ‘Classic Cadillac and Subaru‘ after a few hours of negotiations.  I was very happy with the purchase and I would recommend anyone interested in buying a Subaru to go talk to Herman.  The car was everything I was expecting it to be if not more.  4 cylinder boxer engine, turbo, 300hp/300tq, all wheel drive, sport seats – so much performance I didn’t know what to do with.  So of course, my first thought was… more HP!

After a proper one thousand mile break-in that weekend (or was it two?)  I contacted ‘Knowledge Performance’ and asked them to upgrade me to stage 2.  Stage 2 usually consists of an intake, exhaust, and engine management.  Since this car is full of electronics, it benefits greatly from EM and tuning.  If you have an STi, make sure to get it tuned when you add modifications to it.  The mods were TurboXS intake, turbo back exhaust, and UTEC EM.

I didn’t get a dyno while stock (around 250whp maybe?), so I’m not sure how much power I was making before the mods but after they were done I was around 290whp.  I don’t remember how much wtq but it was around there as well.  My first impressions when I drove off were wow… this thing moves quick!  Unfortunately, there was a nasty side effect from either the tune or running UTEC which was hesitation.  It’s hard to explain but the car hesitated at various times while driving which made my driving experience less enjoyable.  I was not very happy with my car.  I went back to the shop and asked them to fix it but after a few visits and more money nothing changed and I never went back.

Shortly after I started to lose interested in my car (or gained interested in World of Warcraft) and just drove my car around for a year without making any more changes to it.  Then the mod bug hit me again and I wanted more power.

To be continued…