-= STi Adjustable Lateral Links =-
Not too exciting of an install. This went relatively quick, about 20 minutes for each side.
On the Legacy, the rear lateral links (or as the parts book calls them, the rear front links... eh?
) are not adjustable. They are simple stamped, rubber bushing capped dog-bone shaped bars that keep the camber at a relative 0. Well, maybe there's a little more to that to prevent road crowning from walking your car off the highway.
I wanted a nice, modest -1 degree camber all around the car. The fronts can handle it, the OEM rears, not so much.
You start by jacking the car up in the rear (chok the fronts) and take the tires off. Behind the wheel hub is a 17mm bolt and nut that comes in right underneith the entire setup. The other end is about 14" towards the gas tank. Both nuts are put on with 83 foot pounds of torque. Take them off, use a block of wood and a hammer to knock the bolts out. The bolt heads go towards the front of the car, the nut sits on the rear side of the bar (both sides).
Take the old rear front link out
and then slide the new rear front link in.
For bonus fun, you can clean the old rear front link
and give it to someone else as a gift and then they would have a new old rear front link.
Put the tires back on unless you are going out for a Sunday drag... and drive over to the dealership or a garrage to get an alignment of your choice. I recommend -1 camber in the rear and anywhere from -0.8 to -1.0 camber in the fronts.
-= STi Performance Gauge Pack =-
The idea of this made me take notice the day I bought the car. I was waiting for the creepy assed salesman to get back with a number I would ultimately reject and send him running back to his sales manager again. This left me time to read those pamphlets that no one else ever reads unless they are stuck in the waiting room for their car.
Performance upgrades for the Subaru Legacy GT. STi Performance Gauge Pack. Interesting. Dealership wanted a cool $775 for it, not counting install, which was booked at 2.25 hours @ 89 per hour. Frak that. I did the install by myself without a metal fish tape in just about 4 hours, +/- 3 hours. OK I suck, it took me 6 hours. But it's done, clean and I only paid about 600 for the gauges.
"ouch?" you say? Performance gauges can cost you several hundred bucks EACH. This is a deal at 200 each with all the hardware, harnesses wires and instructions to boot. Plus it looks OEM/Stock. Made by Defi and responds to the interior dimmer switch.
Install required me to remove the intercooler and BOV... splice into the line attached to the BOV and install a turbo pressure sensor. I then had to remove the oil filter and quickly install a 1" spacer underneith the oil filter for the Oil Pressure and Oil Temp sensors. After running the wires cleanly around the engine compartment (I must have used about 20 cable ties)... I got to the next step that was the proverbial 10% of the project that took up 90% of the time. Fishing the 3 wires as a bundle through the firewall.
HOLY CRAP CAKES BATMAN. I had to resort to the old coathanger trick to get the wires inside. The gromet was tiny! It was tighter than a virgin on prom night and behind it was an impervious wall of high temp plastic, sharp-as-hell stamped aluminum and steel and other random wires. It took me 3 hours alone and 2 beer breaks to get all the wires inside... and then realized that they only left me enough wire to REACH the gauge. There was ZERO room for error.
As I packed the tools up and scrubbed my hands down with DL... I smiled to myself because I just saved about 400 bucks NOT going to the dealership. And then I remembered that my car insurance was due so atleast I broke even.
Here's the uninstalled gauge pod without the bezel:
And here's what the unit looks like under normal driving (vid)
