t3hWIT's Impreza L Buildup

[t3hWIT]

Whoa, update! After work last Friday, we made our way to the Michelin Proving Grounds to prepare for the following day's autocross. Our pictures at the event pretty much sucked; We were playing with my new filters and managed to screw up every single picture. Someone else managed to get a few decent ones though.





It was an amusing event. This was only my second event on the Falken tires and H6 front antisway, and the car handled awesome. I managed to keep a few people entertained with throttle-on oversteer at both hairpins. My last run involved two turns like that, and while it was fun, it seemed slower especially when the car "snapped" out of it and started to understeer. No matter, my last run was the fastest of the day bringing me to 5th out of 13 in SM. Consistance counts.

My girlfriend took a video of my last run, but it's so shaky you can hardly follow the car. I never tried to share a Facebook video, so someone please let me know if this link works:
http://www.facebook.com/v/515284179932

Next week I'll be installing significant roll bar padding. I'm tired of looking at the sticks of it chilling in the corner, and I'm sure I'll be glad I did when some big-honking-suv-on-24's decides to T-bone me.

I brought home a battery from work, which will be used to set up the HID's and make sure everything works correctly. It'll also ensure that the two separate bulbs I purchased are of exactly the same color.

Finally, I have yet another excuse for not having the money for parts. The British Pound is down, and I want to buy as much of it as I can before the exchange rates skyrocket again. I'm doing this because I was invited on another trip overseas. While the trip will set me back about as much as a decent front clip or a really nice set of coilovers, it's yet another that can't be missed.

[tnice17]

awesome! the video works, loved it

you need a new camera guy though.....

[t3hWIT]

I can't complain, my girlfriend was nice enough to sit around all day in the freezing cold weather pointing a camera at everything with starry grille emblem.

[poleboy90]

Any pics of my car? It doesnt matter if theyre not good ones. Whats filters were you using that screwed the pics up?

You almost beat me at Michelin when I had more hp, more than an extra inch of grip per tire, and I had been on almost the exact same course before. : I had a 64.2 but clipped the second to last cone on the slalom so my fastest was 65.8 or something, I shouldve been able to get sub 64s that day. Nice driving though Shaun, very impressive with how competitive SM was. BTW, I also used some trail braking on that 180 to rotate the car, much fun. Hope to see you at another one soon.

Charles

[ryno50485]

I like the uncontrollable amount of torque that is lifting your front end up a little in the first picture! on a serious note .. it looks like a lot of fun! you'll be unstoppable when u get your coils

[t3hWIT]

Originally Posted by poleboy90

Any pics of my car? It doesnt matter if theyre not good ones. Whats filters were you using that screwed the pics up?

You almost beat me at Michelin when I had more hp, more than an extra inch of grip per tire, and I had been on almost the exact same course before. : I had a 64.2 but clipped the second to last cone on the slalom so my fastest was 65.8 or something, I shouldve been able to get sub 64s that day. Nice driving though Shaun, very impressive with how competitive SM was. BTW, I also used some trail braking on that 180 to rotate the car, much fun. Hope to see you at another one soon.

Charles

Hey man, sorry I didn't get to talk to you much there, we just had a lot going on. I have a dark tinted filter to keep my photos from being washed out with the sunlight, but it was cloudy by the time my runs were up and I forgot to tell Crystal to change lenses. My camera doesn't shoot well when it's dark, and all of our pictures came out grainy. I changed to the polarizing lense for your runs, but they were still sketchy. I'm thinking it's more from the heat shimmer off the pavement since it gets worse the farther away the vehicle is.

This is the only somewhat decent picture of my car:



The only decent one of yours:



And a crappy one of yours, but you can clearly see daylight under one of your tires.



Thank you though. The slalom was a nice touch, right before the hairpins. It set the car up perfectly to have the ass end kick out, which caught me completely by surprise my first run. I don't know if you saw, but I slid straight into two cones, dead center front bumper. I thought I was going to stop in time, but I heard a bit of a thunk. I knew the run was shot if I knocked them over anyways, and I didn't want to damage my bumper by dragging them, so I just backed up and went around them (the right way). I guess I pulled the cone back up on its base because I didn't get a penalty that run.

It was the horrible 79 second run if you were wondering. I was just feeling out the course and getting a feel for the car, so I planned on throwing that run away.

Slightly related, but I found the best in-car setup to help me stay focused. That would be air on low, windows and roof vent shut, stereo on loud enough that I can hear it, but not blasting. Figure about as loud as a codriver would be.

Originally Posted by ryno50485

I like the uncontrollable amount of torque that is lifting your front end up a little in the first picture! on a serious note .. it looks like a lot of fun! you'll be unstoppable when u get your coils

Aye, it'll be longer than expected. I'm saving for a trip to Germany.

[t3hWIT]

I almost forgot, but I'll be getting an outrageous credit card bill this month. The good news is that it will be accompanied by $100 in Subaru Bucks, which will promptly be sent to www.subaruwrxparts.com for JDM tails.

[poleboy90]

Haha, Ive always wanted a three wheelin' picture, but I guess thats not really a good thing :/. If you want, you can take the pictures down of my car (I saved them) since this is your members journal. It was definately a fun course though, hopefully next season I can rig up an in car camera mount so I can review my runs.

Oh yea, awesome dog too! If you can be sure to bring her along with you when you can, Ill see you and the GF next season though.

EDIT: JDM tails + white car = hawt. Oh yea and Ill be at the Carowinds auto x tommorow/today, hopefully Ill do well.

[t3hWIT]

No worries man, this is more of a "discussion" thread anyways.

For Christmas I asked for a camera mount for my roll cage, but the only decent one I've found is a whopping $110. If I don't get it, and I don't think I will, I think I'll fab something up with exhaust clamps and parts from a Walmart tripod. Times like this I really wish I had a crossbar in the back, or at least diagonal B-C pillar bars. I think I'll just end up mounting the camera on the passenger side B or C pillar bar. The video should be a combination of my driving on one half of the screen, and diagonally out the windshield on the other half.

I'll be using my girlfriends camera for the video, so no worries about photos.

Taffy went nuts at the first autocross I attended, and my girlfriend had to take her home when the gokarts started running. She was a bit more mellow this time, and I'd like to bring her to more at least for her to get used to the loud cars. Unfortunately, we have to take two cars if she comes with since my tires take up the back seat.

To remedy that, I'm looking into options on a hitch and a small utility trailer.

[t3hWIT]

Oh hai! Mo updates?

All of my HVAC LED's took a shit on me, so I ordered brighter, wider range blue LED's from www.superbrightleds.com and installed them two days ago. They live up to their name, and now I have to get brighter cluster LED's to match. -_-

Installed roll bar padding on the upper cage in pretty much every place an occupants head could hit in an accident. It looks like arse, but I'm sure I wouldn't care how it looks if I were dead from head trauma.

Ordered JDM tailights from www.subaruwrxparts.com and will hopefully have them in time for January 3rd's Nasioc SouthEast install day.

I've also been in contact with Yuki from Japanparts.com, sourcing the correct hardware to affix the foglight covers over the foglights. I think we found what I need, just waiting on pricing.

Purchased 93-96 headlights from an RS25r in Japan, so I can get started on the retrofit when they arrive. If the retrofit turns out good, I'll be looking into a basic HID kit for the foglights to match.

Also purchased the Gears oil catch can from the same member. While it doesn't look as good as the custom oil catch can I already have, it has more volume, a gauge on the side so I can see when it needs to be emptied (often with leaking rings on cylinder #3), and a nice little drain on the bottom. This will then give me room to move the filter back a hair, as well as the ABS hydraulic unit to make room for the retrofitted headlights. I intend on fabricating something this spring, using a bit of fiberglass, to close off the filter from the rest of the engine bay.

We're back in PA right now, we left SC when I got home from work last evening. We hit quite a bit of freezing rain on the way home, to the point that my wiper arms were literally two inches thick with ice, and a similar amount of ice bent my antenna. I took some pictures, and hopefully they came out.

Speaking of pictures, I'm planning on going out after breakfast to get a few more while the scenery is still white. Then I'm going to hell to sleep, I've been running nonstop since 11:30 last night.