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Meet Artoo! Combat Chuck's '00 BRP RS Coupe

52K views 374 replies 44 participants last post by  Combat Chuck 
#1 · (Edited)
Well, quite a few mods later, I've finally decided that it's time for me to start a Member Journal to chronicle my progress and use it as a sounding board for modifications I have planned.
Artoo is my second RS, hence R2, or Artoo. It doesn't help that I'm kind of a Star Wars geek either :)

Artoo Currently:


Current Mod List:

Engine:
2007 EJ255 WRX motor swapped by ECS Performance
Blouch 20G XT-R
HOA 3 port ECBS
ID1000 injectors
KSTech big MAF intake
AMR 3" hard inlet
Grimmspeed TMIC
TGV Deletes
Tomei UEL stainless steel header
Invidia Turbo Back Exhaust
Turbo Blanket
Cobb AccessPort Stage 2
ACT Streetlite lightweight 6 speed flywheel
Group N Engine Mounts

Braking:
2007 WRX 4/2 pot front and rear brakes
DBA slotted front and rear rotors
Carbotech Bobcat brake pads
Goodridge stainless steel brake lines

Transmission:
2007 WRX STi 6 speed
2007 WRX STi R180 rear differential
2007 WRX STi rear axles
DCCDPro Universal DCCD controller
Turn In Concepts Holy Shift Kit
Group N Transmission Mount
STi stainless steel braided clutch line
Exedy STi stage 1 HD clutch

Suspension:
STi Gymkhana Tarmac springs
Koni inserts
Group N top hats
STi Version 6 carbon fiber front strut bar
Cusco carbon fiber rear strut bar
Cusco 22 mm front way bar
Cusco 22 mm rear sway bar
Whiteline rear end links
Cusco rear chassis brace
GC8 STi aluminum control arms
2004 STi rear hubs
GD WRX rear subframe
Group N subframe bushings
Whiteline rear diff bushings
Whiteline subframe lock kit
Whiteline rear lateral and trailing link bushings
Whiteline outrigger bushings
Whiteline trailing arm bushings

Wheels:
Summer: JDM STi BBS Electra L 17x7 wrapped in JDM Bridgestone Playz
Summer: JDM STi Rays RS five spokes 17x7 wrapped in JDM Bridgestone Potenza RE-011's
Summer: JDM STi BBS Electra C 16x7 wrapped in BFGoodrich G-Force Sports
Winter: Stock RS 6-spokes wrapped in American GT tires (worst tires ever!)

Exterior:
STi Version 6 grille with pink star badge
Mesh fog covers
JDM clear corners
JDM Version 5/6 tails
STI rear diffuser
JDM metal flat fuel door
JDM rear bumper with spats
STi Version 6 front lip
Bakemono carbon fiber Version 6 wing
Rally Armor UR mudflaps (black with red lettering)
Car wash and wax (sometimes)

Interior:
JDM Ver. 2 WRX RA front and rear seats
JDM Ver. 6 WRX STi Type R V Limited gauge cluster
STi 6 speed titanium shift knob
Bakemono Alcantara red stitched shift boot
USDM DCCD switches
22B stainless steel STi door sills
WRX pedal covers
WRX style dead pedal

History:
When I began driving in high school, I started in a 1986 Mazda B2000 pickup truck. The thing was ancient, rear wheel drive, and rusted out, but had one redeeming feature: stick shift. I held on to the thing all the way through college and got more than my money's worth out of the vehicle before something in the transmission went (possibly the throwout bearing, boy was it loud) and it wasn't worth it to fix because the frame was already rotted through.

The last straw, however, was when I was driving back from work in Chicago and got hit by a massive blizzard and spun out twice in a row and almost didn't make it up a steep hill to my town due to a completely unplowed road and traffic's deciding to crawl up it at 5 mph. After that, I jumped on Autotrader and began looking for an AWD car. As luck would have it, the price tag and insurance on even a bugeye WRX was incredibly expensive, so I set out for a cheaper Impreza. I then found a 2001 RS in Cincinnati in near mint condition, drove down with my family, and picked it up.

I drove that RS for about a year and a half while occasionally lurking around here to find maintenance DIY's and such, and stumbled upon the swap section of the boards. The idea of having a homebuilt WRX without the insurance and cost of a WRX was like having my cake and eating it too, and I began researching.

Unfortunately, a swap in that RS was never to come, as I didn't have the time, money, garage space, or knowledge to do so before I was t-boned by a BMW X3 running a red light. It messed me up a little (the X3 had at least a thousand pounds on me and was going 55 mph), broke my leg, and gave me some scarring, not to mention completely destroying my car. I wouldn't be able to drive stick for a while, and ended up stuck with an automatic for a while.

Eventually, I had to find a replacement car, and knew exactly what I wanted: another RS, the same color, age, number of doors, and approximate mileage as my last one. I ended up searching far and wide before I found a car that wasn't way out of my price range with more wear than the car I had, and it ended up being in New York. Not a stranger to long car trips, my dad and I went out and picked this one up for half the price of my last RS. This one needed some work: it had been in two front end collisions, the first of which wasn't even repaired properly. But it ran well, handled fine, and was in my price range, so I picked it up. I dubbed this RS "Artoo" and began slowly taking care of issues it had.

Artoo, half an hour after the purchase in New York:






I took Artoo down to Arkansas and had a blast on the dirty back roads:






After a few months, I'd finally saved enough for a swap, and still not having the time, garage space, or knowledge to do so, I began researching shops to take Artoo into. It came down between ECS and GT, and after talking to ECS for a bit, I finally decided to have them swap an EJ255 into my RS. I took a friend and made the drive out there, dropped the car off, then flew back and did the reverse in three weeks. There were a few bumps with the swap initially, but ECS and Millenium Autos worked hard and resolved everything. The car runs like a champ now! Along the way, I acquired a set of 4/2 pot WRX brakes, and then proceeded to save up to fix the damage around the car.



A year or so later, I bought a house and got engaged. My fiance allowed Artoo to be in the wedding with one condition: I had to take care of the front end damage that I'd had since I bought the car. That meant new fog lights, a new grille, a new bumper, a proper fender, and the worst part: a ton of underbody rot that had gone unchecked, likely from the first accident that was poorly repaired in the first place resulting in the install of the wrong fender. After picking up a proper fender from Smitch, an STi V6 grille from Broken Motorsports, and the rest of the parts I needed, I sent Artoo off to a local body shop. Artoo returned in time for the wedding, and even got to pose in a few pictures too! Our wedding colors were navy blue and hot pink, so Artoo accessorized nicely (in the words of my wife).

Last up, I'd saved for a while and bought some pretty sharp BBS wheels. Unfortunately, as awesome as they looked, they rubbed in the rear.





I ended up selling them to a friend with a WRX and using the money for a Cobb turbo back exhaust. An AccessPort tune later, and it'll be on my car!

My other member journals:
http://www.rs25.com/forums/f145/t190977-hogan-combat-chucks-stm-01-obs-wifemobile.html

http://www.rs25.com/forums/f145/t194753-meet-toaster-combat-chucks-2005-forester-xt.html

http://www.rs25.com/forums/f145/t180485-l-rs-lars-combat-chucks-caribbean-green-97-l-sedan.html
 

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#9 ·
Next mod: long overdue rear wrx sway bar, perhaps? I want to keep Artoo as streetable as possible on Chicago roads, especially in winter. I'll also probably give RallyX and AutoX a shot next year to find out more of the direction I want to go.
 
#14 ·
Update:
I'm a little closer to figuring out a suspension. I'll likely end up waiting a bit until I figure out whether I want to lean more towards AutoX or RallyX (Read: Getting my butt handed to me in both sports for the first season), then go more in that direction. It'll likely be a spring/strut combination instead of coilovers, mostly due to the fact that I doubt I'll be adjusting them further once I dial them in.
I've also been gradually accumulating parts for the summer, I'm rather excited to post pictures of what I'll have done!
 
#18 ·
Thanks a lot! I appreciate it :)

Story time/short rant:

Back on Halloween night, I was driving through Chicago in my wife's OBS when I found a parking lot with quite a few puddles in them. My wife noted that it seemed like a bad idea, but I disregarded that and when cruising through a bunch of the puddles until I hit the biggest puddle ever, which happened to conceal the biggest pothole ever. Long story short, I ended up bending both her passenger side rims, but fortunately nothing else on the car. I felt bad, but fortunately two or three years prior I'd purchased a spare set of six spokes with all season tires off of Ebay. I tossed those on the OBS, then tried to exit the driveway, only to discover that one of the wheels had been curbed so hard it was bent inwards and was rubbing the strut tower. All I can think is that someone skidded sideways into something fast and hard, then pawned these off on me. I definitely should've checked them after they arrived three years ago... In any case, I gave Artoo's wheels over to the wagon for a while until I found a spare six spoke, then had the good tire moved off the bent rim.

My last set of all seasons, now on the OBS, was a set of BFGoodrich A/T's or something, and they were actually pretty good for all seasons. However, the first snow, I came to discover that the "American GT Grand Turbo" tires I'd never heard of not only didn't perform well in the dry, but they sucked even worse in the snow and wet. The only information I could really find online was someone who regretted having them on their car and wanting a different tire. Further info showed American was essentially Michelin's budget tire, as they probably didn't want their brand name associated with something this awful. Next winter, I hope to have a good set of winter tires and make a tire swing out of these or something.

Cliffs Notes: Don't be dumb, don't hit potholes, don't trust Ebay sellers, and don't ever, ever, ever use American tires.
 
#19 ·
Update: I had some friends over: one Subaru friend, one friend I'm trying to convert to Subaru :). We put Artoo up on a couple railroad ties and installed the turbo back exhaust. In the process, I sheared the exhaust bracket that bolts to the transmission, which I found odd. I'd have more expected the bolt itself to shear, but I'm just thankful I didn't shear a stud for the downpipe or something. It bolted up, I reflashed the ECU with the Cobb AP Stage 2 tune, and started it up.

Upon starting it, I discovered that I'd put a wrong gasket in, and then I threw a CEL. It turns out I need a stock donut gasket to go between the downpipe and midpipe, and the GrimmSpeed 3 inch gasket wasn't working at all. Furthermore, the donut gasket on my stock exhaust is shot. Awesome.

Additional cost of the exhaust install: 1 exhaust bracket, 1 donut gasket.

I pulled the CEL and found that I had actually gotten a value pack of three codes: P0418, P0416, and P0413. Those codes are all in relation to the secondary air injection circuit, an emissions device that didn't make the cut in the swap, and now Artoo was in limp mode. It appeared at this point I had three options:
1) Limp Artoo over to a local shop and get a protune
2) Man up, buy a Tactrix cable, and go open source to try and tune it myself
3) Go open source, try to befriend some of the local NASIOC chapter who really don't know me from a hole in the ground, and hope one of them could tune my car

I then found that Cobb's now offering a free download of AccessTuner Race to those with an AccessPort, and just this afternoon got approved for the download of AccessTuner. Looks like I'll be trying my hand at tuning :)

Pics/more details to follow.
 
#20 · (Edited)
A few pictures of the last many, many months:


Itasca Parade 2009:

I got the corner of the show!


The only police car I've been excited to see pulling up next to me:




Artoo and Hogan:




Last winter, I ended up picking up a set of JDM STI BBS wheels, a set of JDM WRX (STI?) Ver. 5 seats, and mesh fog covers. I managed to install them just before a car show at Evanston Subaru.

At the Evanston Subaru car show (silly me only had a cell phone camera):


And hanging out with some friends:
 
#22 ·
Thanks! They're mostly clean and subtle because that's all I can afford at this point. It keeps me searching, researching, and thinking a ton about stuff before I finally have the money to drop on a mod :)
 
#23 ·
As an update, I was able to use AccessTuner Race to create a new map with disabled CEL codes. I uploaded it to Artoo, and it's worked flawlessly. I also replaced the sheared exhaust bracket and installed the proper donut gasket on the Cobb TBE. Artoo sounds beautiful. The TBE produces the proper rumble when I get on the gas, but it doesn't drone or anything at high speeds. It's great, and I can't recommend it enough!
 
#24 ·
Nicely done so far. I think all you need is some suspension love and you will have one amaizing car. I also have some amber corners, but I'm looking to trade em for some blacked out corners. PM me if your interested.
 
#25 ·
Thanks! The suspension is still a pretty big gray area to me. The more I think about it, the more I'm leaning towards the Koni inserts and maybe Gymkhana springs. The thread I've been reading through sounds like it'll meet everything I want out of a suspension set. It'll take me a while to scrounge up that money though, as I've already got some other mods to put on :)
Regarding the amber corners, I ended up picking up a new set, only to never install them and later have my wife get me a set of JDM clear corners. It'll match my tails nicely, I just have to take the fifteen minutes or so to install them!
 
#26 · (Edited)
I finally got the JDM corners installed while on vacation in Arkansas. I took a few pictures for your viewing pleasure:


















I've got a few exterior mods left in mind, and I'm trying to pull the trigger on a set of Gymkhana springs. We'll see what pans out :)
 
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