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Aspen White 97 Brighton Coupe

30K views 84 replies 21 participants last post by  kensin0429 
#1 · (Edited)
So here is my Suba story.
I got this car July '12 from a buddy of mine that was into VW beetles. It is a 97 Brighton coupe 5sp awd with wrx brake and spring package all four corners as well as having an ej251 already swapped in. Also had wrx seats f+r, 01 rs bumper. Sale price of just $1000. Rode my bike down to get it and drove it back...well limped back. The swap was done by the previous owner and no wiring was touched to make it work. Giving more than 5% throttle caused it to bog and die out horribly

Appeared to have very little rust, just had a little around the one side of the windshield frame, but had a very rusty smell inside.
 

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#27 ·
On a side note. Do you think the RS in the pics can be saved? im sure it will need quarters, the rails in the pics, a good amount of the floor and small section of sills?
I would be doing the fab/welding, my intention is to replace the parts with factory and cage the hell out of the whole car for added safety/track toy.
 
#29 ·
thanks for the comments and subs. Mrpersonality I was able to save about 60% of the clips. I got lucky/unlucky because the glue around the windshield was lifting off the metal already and I could almost just pull them out in tact. For the clips that were properly glued there was no way they were coming out in one piece. I also had 2 cars to pull from so I did not need to source new ones.
 
#31 · (Edited)
thanks CTsubie. Got the harness taped up and the STI fuel pressure controller wired and mounted, hung the harness on the bulk head, bolted the fpc on the inside of the wheel well.


got the firewall grommets roughed in ans sealed with some silicone. i kinda want to go all out and get some proper insulation on these

cut the fourth hole for the dash


The tab on the top right is one of two. they are in a different location, the RS has a bigger gap between them.
i ignored this as it seems to not affect the structure much at all.
Am i horribly wrong on this? i feel like its support



now I got a real problem. the bracket welded to the floor is a different shape/mounting hole pattern. its for the brighton srs control unit. I have both srs systems and could either:
make a hybrid system with brighton controller and RS bags
make a bracket to mount the RS controller in its proper location
ideally id not like to modify airbags because its not safe and they terrify me..off to do some thinking/search button.
 
#33 ·
broke my camera so ive been working on the headlight harness. This donor car had a front right impact and crushed the harness about a foot away from the abs unit...so im fixin that...also seats/ headliner/door cards/inner quarters are in. pics this weekend:)
 
#36 ·
just a small update camera is still not with us.
cut some sheets of plastic and sealed up the doors. this is 100% needed. these doors leak water into the main cavity like crazy!! don't cut holes for the speakers either. I stuffed some extra plastic in the speaker cavity so that its completely sealed still.


I stuck some micro suede on the front and rear door cards too.



more when I get a decent camera
 
#40 ·
so i got this pretty dope koyo radiatior with two overflow output/inputs for the wrx...problem is it has no fans and with the fan shrowds made for this rad its not gonna fit


I have the fans that came off my brighton...and im cheap so here goes
The reason the Koyo wont fit well is it interferes with the accesory belt system on the fan side and it interferes witht he ac condenser on the front side.
so i cut the brackets that hold the lower part of the condenser and shifted it to bolt on the front of the bracket not sit in the middle. this gains almost an inch.

had to file the corner off the ac fitting so it does not dig into the side tank of the radiator

it puts the ac condenser really close to the hood latch support thing.i just pulled on it by hand to gain clearance

With that moved i shot off to the hardware and came back with $15 of aluminium angle bracket.

this goes on the bottom of the radiator to support the fans(they have plastic peg that slot into these holes.
then i trimmed the sides of the fans, the left one is untouched the right has been trimmed so that where it overlaps with the side tanks it will not interfere.

then cut and drilled the top bracket for the fans


then mounted the top sides of the fans, bolting them to the same oem clips on the fans just from the inside out.


ended up with about a 1/4 inch of gap between the fan and radiator.

this is the edge of the fan where it needed to be trimmed to fit

Also swapped out the wrx alternator for the RS, removed the overflow tank and re-installed the ac compressor
And done


really stoked about the finished product. i sanded the top bracket all one direction and clearcoated for the brushed stainless look.
 
#41 ·
cchang I did not have to modify the dash beam itself. once you mount it up there will be a gap where the two lower support legs met the transmission tunnel, this area needs a lot of attention because the srs control unit mounts to the same bracket as the lower dash beam supports. this bracket is spot welded to the transmission tunnel. I have not yet addressed this whole dilemma...still thinking about gc822bdreamers suggestion of making an adapter bracket. I want to do it but I dont know if I should snag the bracket off my RS or just machine one at work. more to come on this topic. if anybody can tell me how important it is that the srs unit be mounted EXACTLY where it was or can it be a few mm up down left or right? if I make the bracket its going to be about 10mm higher than before. due to the hardware needed to mount it.
 
#45 ·
got this rack a while back, was told its an 04 sti..can anybody help me with this one. it seemed significantly wider than my original, i plan to put some moog j spec inner tie rods
got it mocked up in the car right now. magically the hoses fit(hoses came of the blue car i got (first and only benefit of buying an already swapped car)

 
#48 · (Edited)
so I put the exhaust on and got a new o2 sensor for it, but I notice some bad things...
1. EGT sensor wires cut off not connected.
2. Boost control solenoid not existant, line running from turbo to wastegate T'd off to intake.
3. bypass valve on intercooler blanked off completely. could not see it when bolted up but had some foil **** blocking it off.
4. RRFPR on the fuel line by the pump. RRFPR on the fuel line between the intake and fuel filter.

This is how I got the engine and it ran fairly well without all this. Steady idle quick throttle response. although I never drove it it felt great.

Now that I have added the exhaust and o2 and got her up to temp its running like dookie. I let it idle for 5min and reved to 5k briefly but its really slow and hesitant.

Tried calling the dealer to see if they can reset my ecu only..then follow up by correcting all the hardware changes. so far I have removed the foil stuff and have vac lines to re-do the BCS system. just waiting for egt and a solenoid.
...facepalm for no knowing enough about the wrx ecu.
 
#49 ·
So after much deliberation and many sketches i ended up mounting the srs unit.
No brackets. slightly modified srs unit.

First i unbolted the lower dash beam supports,placed blots throught the upper holes facing backwards



spaced the bottom out with a big old 10mm spacer




The srs unit has two screws on the bottom. remove these and you can modify the base plate that it mounts on.

I cut two 8mm wide x 20mmlong diagona slots they start about 5mm above the original mounting holes
then used the existing m6 holes for the rear mount




placed two nuts over the bolts and snugged down.



sketchy maybe...but whatever im brave.

i need to seal up the steering colunm at the fire wall,mount the steering bag, mount the front srs sensors, plug it all in and my interior
is done.
 
#51 ·
Thanks gc8.
So after installing the exhaust things went bad. i purchased a rear o2(bosch exact fit) as the swap never had one and it started running really rough and threw a p0031 code(04wrx). this is for the front o2. No biggie got a bosch front o2 also exact fit
still have a p0031. replaced it for the correct denso. still have a p0031
tried unplugging the rear o2 makes no difference
i have checked all my wiring and im getting the correct voltage and grounds at the sensor and ecu. beginning to think the ecu may have an issue.
 
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