Noob 02 OBS owner... ;)

coondogg

coondogg

New member
Hiya all! I just purchased my first Subaru, an 02 Impreza OBS as a winter ride for up here in Maine. I found your forums after reading a bit on NASIOC.

The OBS that I picked up (Casper) is a great looking ride for the year and mileage but it has some small issues that I hope can be resolved with all your knowledge. Okay, enough DONKEY kissing and on to pics and issues...
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I haven't thoroughly gone over the car after inspecting it before my purchase but these are the issues that I found so far:

1. glove box door is busted. Fixed

2. the rear view mirror is busted. Fixed

3. passenger rear shock is blown (actually, all 4 were blown).

4. right front wheel bearing is growling. just combo of snows and bad struts

5. outer (or inner) tie rod on passenger side needs replaced. was the strut

6. power mirrors are not working (not sure yet if just the switch) Fixed

7. trailing arm bushing on drivers rear (axle side) is a little loose. Fixed

8. leaking oil from somewhere behind oil pan (rear main seal?) Is actually the passenger side head gasket. Will fix in the spring..

9. alignment and oil change are obvious on my list. done

10. The drivers side door is sagging just a bit. noticeable when closing.

11. drivers rear door is stiff to open and close. (passenger side doors are fine). Fixed

12. key doesn't work in drivers door

13. can't crank the radio, it sounds like it is shorting out. Was blown speakers. Replaced HU and door speakers

14. Radio display does not light up see above.

15. clock in the center of dash does not light up

Any insight into what I've listed so far would be helpful.

I don't even like to drive a car with issues so the whole list will be address and everything else that I find. I've also never driven a stock car for very long so I'll start another list for that:

1. since strut is shot, upgrade struts. Maybe springs too.

2. CAI

3. Radio head unit

 
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Welcome.

Sounds like you've got quite the laundry list. The thing that stood out to me was the key not working in the drivers side lock. My 02 RS had the same issue, not really sure what's up with that.

 
Thanks guys...

I never thought of checking to make sure that the key worked in the door before I locked it. I was shitting bricks when we stopped at Dunkin Doughnuts for coffee and the key didn't unlock the door. I never thought to check the key before I locked it. Thank gawd it opened the passenger side door, lmao...

 
Hey welcome aboard man! Issues are lookin pretty familiar. The good news is, pretty much all the Imprezas of that generation have some interchangeable parts, including the WRX's, RS's, and OBS's. The glovebox on my 04 WRX came broken, the two little nubs at the bottom were snapped off. I got one off of an 03 OBS that was gettin junked. My radio was crap too, just couldn't go above like 7 volume without breaking up...I wound up grabbing an aftermarket head unit to fix that, the install was fairly easy. My rear main seal (as well as some other misc. part where the engine meets the transmission) was leaking oil and I had that professionally done a week ago, which I'm still a little bitter about.

As far as the mirrors, I know this is silly advice but...do run through the fuse box. I had a window issue on mine and it just wound up being a blown fuse.

So it sounds like you have some projects to occupy you...the car looks great though! Manual or automatic?

 
It's a 5 speed. Someone suggested spraying the POOP out of the locks (the hatch doesn't work either) with WD40 so I'll give that a try.

What did you get banged for fixing the oil leak? I've always done my own wrenching and don't mind it at all. But I do mind working out in the cold weather. If I have to get it fixed for inspection, I'll probably pay to get it done. Once we get past the holidays crap, I'll start sourcing parts from a junkyard/ebay/forums for everything that cant be fixed, lol..

 
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it will only fail if its on the exhaust,if it is just spray it down with a parts cleaner prior to and youll be fine....nice car man..welcome

 
coondogg said:
It's a 5 speed. Someone suggested spraying the POOP out of the locks (the hatch doesn't work either) with WD40 so I'll give that a try.

What did you get banged for fixing the oil leak? I've always done my own wrenching and don't mind it at all. But I do mind working out in the cold weather. If I have to get it fixed for inspection, I'll probably pay to get it done. Once we get past the holidays crap, I'll start sourcing parts from a junkyard/ebay/forums for everything that cant be fixed, lol..
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Ah good choice on the five speed. The difference between the manual and the auto is night and day, seriously.

And around 650. Mainly I needed to take the car out to Connecticut for the holidays so I just needed it fixed. That and I read that some oil leaks in that area can ruin the clutch pretty fast and my clutch has a lot of life left, so I didn't want to risk that. I'd like to think that I can do some of my own work, but that's wishful thinking...in reality I can do the little fix-up stuff but not really the engine/transmission at all.

 
Wrenching and grease don't bug me at all, it's the farking cold! I still dunno what I'm going to do when I change the struts out. My garage is full of everything but cars... :/

This is what I did this fall:

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250 miles later, I blew up the trans doing a 1st gear burn out into a 2nd gear power shift.

 
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The cold is nothing. I just spent 3 hours dropping my RS trans in a wet concrete garage
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Struts are cake in comparison.

FIVE OH DERAIL!!!!!!

What intake manifold is that?

Pops and I are pulling the 5.0 from his race car this weekend. Stock 5.0 with just a procharger and 1xx,xxx miles. Forged rotating assembly, I think so.

What trans did you pooch? T5?

Pic of the whole car?

 
2point5RS_Dan said:
The cold is nothing. I just spent 3 hours dropping my RS trans in a wet concrete garage
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Struts are cake in comparison.

FIVE OH DERAIL!!!!!!

What intake manifold is that?

Pops and I are pulling the 5.0 from his race car this weekend. Stock 5.0 with just a procharger and 1xx,xxx miles. Forged rotating assembly, I think so.

What trans did you pooch? T5?

Pic of the whole car?
Click to expand...

The motor is a 99 Explorer 5.0 with the GT40P heads. I installed a Trickflow Stage 1 cam and valve spring kit before I put it in the car too. Yup, was the T-5. The needle bearing cage under 1st gear exploded. Replaced 1st & 2nd gears and a syncro kit (I have the rebuild vid if ya need it, lol). That was about 4k miles ago, lol. I wont show any pics of the drivers side as she isn't a beauty queen and has some cancer. She has it where it counts now tho...
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Info on "Bonnie" here: http://forums.corral.net/forums/showthread.php?t=1240767

 
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Ordered struts today, decided to go with the KYB GR2's. Would still like to find a set of WRX wagon springs if anyone has a set.

Also messed around with the radio to resolve it's issues. It was cracking up at medium/high volume so I figured that something was causing it to short out. I though that it was the head unit since there was evidence of something spilling (from the cup holder) all over the inside of the dash. I replaced the head unit with the one that I had in my Mustang only for it to still crack up with medium/high volume. The drivers side speaker never was working so I tore into the door thinking that the speaker/wiring was the issue. Everything looked okay so I removed the working speaker from the passenger side front door to test the wiring on the drivers side. The passenger side speaker worked in the drivers door confirming that the original drivers door speaker was just blown. The passenger back door speaker is also blown. With both of the blown speakers unplugged the cracking went away so I ordered up a new set of Kicker KS650s & spacer rings for the front doors and KS400's for the rear doors. Going to keep the Blaupunkt CD player from the Mustang in the OBS for now...

 
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Got the car inspected. Was a lick job but who cares...?

Figured out the mirrors not working. Once the switch was plugged back in, they worked just fine. Go figure, lmao...

 
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