Subaru Crew - Meet The Members II

ateixeira · January 2002

Darn, does that mean they didn't accept my job application? ;-)

I say put Ed Bentley in charge of the US lineup of cars!

-juice

1subydown1togo · January 2002

John Felstead, one of the i-club UK members, has posted tons of great pics of the Monte Carlo Rally, including one of Mike Whelan on page 3. Here is the link to the thread

http://www.i-club.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=138018

peterson10 · January 2002

O.K., its not a bona-fide emergency, but it could be life-altering just the same. My best friend is finally giving up his money-pit Tahoe and is looking at Subaru (yea) and Honda (not the CRV fortunately, "uglier inside than it is out" were his words). He and his wife are favoring the Civic for reasons of pure economy and familiarity, but they're intrigued by the Forester and Outback, despite the greater cost. This week they tested them all head-to-head. Report: They like the larger size of the OB but love the feel/looks of the Forester. So, I feel certain that if the 2003 Forester gets a size-boost, it will triumph over the low-cost/low-risk Civic. What do I tell them, wait for the new Forester, or go to "default" and buy the Civic.

Thanks in advance, YetAnotherDave

ateixeira · January 2002

I usually tell people not to buy unless they are in love. If the buyer only finds the Civic "adequate" and is only getting it to play it safe, then he won't like it in the long run.

If he loves it, I wouldn't stop him. Otherwise give him a nudge to spend a little more and fall in love, be it a Subie or what ever (lesser) car. ;-)

-juice

armac13 · January 2002

(hope you don't mind the familiarity) I would tell your friend that a two week delay may be in order. The new Forester will be unveiled at the Chicago show, evidently, and that could help ease the angst regardless of his ultimate choice. If it sounds like what he wants, great. If not, the 2002s will soon be heavily discounted. Win-win. If he goes with the Civic, no loss.

Ross David

subaru_team · January 2002

You should be a counselor or something! ;~}

Patti

miksmi · January 2002

or should I call you YetAnother? (LOL, Ross) I'd encourage your friend to drive the new Civiccord (Civic almost the size of the old Accord), immediately followed by Forester (closer in size to Civic than OB) and ask if he can tell the difference between FWD and AWD accerleration on dry tarmac. If indiscernible, get the Civic.

juice makes a good point about auto affection -- if he loves the Civic, he'll always find something wrong with "the other" car. Hopefully, he's sitting on the fence and you can persuade him. Also, an auto purchase is most folks' second largest expense, I would take plenty of time to make a decision and evaluate all options carefully.

..Mike

kate5000 · January 2002

We went for Accord in 1997 for the same "low risk" argument. That poor thing had so many problems with it, that all local Honda service depts know our names by heart. And it's very boring to drive.

From what I hear Civic still feels underpowered, that is, unless you mod it heavily.

I agree with Juice: tell him to buy what he loves (and can afford).

bluesubie · January 2002

Y.A.D.-
Also, have your friend check out the Impreza's which are closer in size to the Civic. All of them get the 2.5's now.

-Dennis

hondafriek · January 2002

When asked I always advise buy what you really really want, anything less and you will never be happy with it.

I speak from experience here, if you buy something that you are not really happy with, it will cost a bundle in depreciation to get what you should have bought in the first place.

Cheers Pat.

miksmi · January 2002

buy what you really really want, anything less and you will never be happy with it.

Truer words have not been spoken. Amen, brother Pat.

..Mike

paisan · January 2002

I agree, you can profess to the non-believers all you want, but in the end if they are happy with their car, then so be it.

-mike

ateixeira · January 2002

Great. Now I have to wait until 2005 to get a 3-rowed Subie! Thanks a lot! ;-)

-juice

bluesubie · January 2002

My wife's cousin did the same and kind of regrets it. He leased a 99 Civic and found out it's not it's all it's cracked up to be.

One day he pulls up into our driveway on a Sunday and asks me to look at his car because the battery light is on. He popped the hood and I discovered a all of the belts were shredded. The pulley was warped and started to wobble and caused the belts to shred. He spent the night at our house because he didn't want a dead battery on the NJ Turnpike.
He'll be looking at an Impreza this spring. :-)

-Dennis

c_hunter · January 2002

Maybe I read Pat's post differently, but what it said to me was not to cut corners or make substitutions for what you REALLY want. Throughout my years as a poor grad student, I was constantly cutting corners to save a buck or two. Half the time, I ended up regretting purchase decisions down the road. Nowadays, I have learned (the hard way) to carefully evaluate purchases and not be such a tightwad. If I can't buy exactly what I want, I don't buy it at all. Nothing worse than getting stuck with a second rate product. Usually, it's well worth the extra dough to get exactly what you want. On expensive purchases, why bother unless it's exactly what you want?

Craig

ateixeira · January 2002

It's true - we ended up replacing a lot of the cheap furniture we bought right after we got married because we were house poor and in a hurry to furnish the place. In the long run we ended up spending more money to buy 2 sets of furniture.

-juice

bluesubie · January 2002

I found that out with a 95 Dodge Neon!

-Dennis

hondafriek · January 2002

You hit the nail right on the head that is exactly what I meant.

Ilearned the hard way do not settle for less than you really want, as an example why settle for a base outback when what you really wanted was a limited, and so on and so forth.

if you cannot afford what you want new then either wait until you can, or buy as close to new as your budget allows.

I guarantee you will be much happier with a used version of what you really want than a new version of what you don,t.

Cheers Pat.

aussieroo · January 2002

Have not been around for a while but the bad news is that i,m back.
there is no good news

cheers

gus

fibber2 · January 2002

Case in point: Beth wanted me to get a digital camera for years since she saw her cousin with a very early model (240x320 resolution). I said no way. If it couldn't come close to our Canon SLR, I wouldn't use it. I waited until this Spring, and finally let her buy me the Olympus 3040 (3+megpix, f1.8 3x zoom lens, etc.) for my birthday. It was $700, but worth every penney. The output comes very close to 200 ISO film, maybe better than the SLR with 400 ISO. I am thrilled, and use it constantly. Filled 2 CD's with images in less than a year.

BTW, I will not be able to make the chat tonight. AOL on our home desktop PC leaves me at the doorway to the chat room, but the screen is always blank. And my Thinkpad is still acting crazy since my experience of trying to put AOL 7.0 on it two weeks ago. I have not been able to get to Edmunds at all for days on it.

Have fun,

Steve

armac13 · January 2002

nice to see you back. Stick around.

Ross

rsholland · January 2002

Welcome back!:)

We've had to rely on Graham for the Oz Subie perspective. Where have you been hiding?

Bob

subaru_team · January 2002

I'm trying to join the chat, but for some reason the laptop I'm using keeps telling me I can't connnec to the server! I thought borrowing a PC would help. Agggghhh! I'm going to try and disable the auto log on to see if I can get in.

Patti

miksmi · January 2002

Ya, where ya been?

..Mike

ateixeira · January 2002

Nice to hear from you Gus. Some folks had asked about you.

I'm glad to report Patti was persistent and was able to get the job done, and joined the chat. Sort of the way she is for us the rest of the time. :-)

-juice

outback165 · January 2002

I agree with everything others have mentioned re buying what you want the first time, and not settling -- especially with cars where you take such a financial hit on their worth.

In June when I had to buy my car, I was looking at the Bean and the H4 AWP. Now clearly, I loved the Bean (what's not to love) but I had been driving the H4 for 5,000 miles and found that it broke in very nicely. I plan to keep this car to the point of having to pay someone to take it, so resale value in 4-5 years what not a concern -- purely which car I really wanted. My H4 now has 18,000 miles on it (yes, 13,000 in 7 months!) and I don't regret my decision for one second... and that's my lead foot talking!!! (I am thinking though of putting leather in...)

Now... why someone would consider a Civic vs. a Forester I find puzzling. If this were my customer I would ask him whether he was settling for the Civic because he hated the CRV, and if he really wanted a sedan or SUV type vehicle. The value of a 2.5RS is tremendous- and there is always the combination of utility and sportiness in the TS Wagon.

There is no way he can be disappointed with a Subaru, and if he buys a 2.5RS and decides to sell it after two years because he doesn't like it (or whatever) I'm sure he'll be impressed with how many of us, I mean people, will be lining up to buy a late model 2.5RS!

My $0.02 worth. (I love the challenge of closing shoppers on a Subaru vs another brand!)

Pete.

hondafriek · January 2002

Could not get in the chat last night so I gave up trying.

Always feel like I am missing something when I can,t get in.

Cheers Pat.

locke2c · January 2002

I have something to say about the 'buying what you really want' notion.

What I really wanted in 1999 was an Impreza Turbo. They didn't exist over here yet, so I did something that helped bring the turbo impreza, I bought a 2.5RS. When the 2000 Legacy arrived and was some 250+ pounds heavier than the 1999, I knew that the next generation Impreza would also gain weight. (it's a shortened Legacy chassis with slight changes to the rear suspension.)

So I continued to modify my 2.5RS. I really don't like the new Impreza's looks, although I could certainly live with a WRX wagon. It's an outstanding value.

From all this I've learned that I'm never modifying a new car like this again. I have to reverse most of my changes if I want to sell or trade the car, and I still loose money. If I wanted to really go wild with an Impreza, it would be much smarter and cheaper to start with something older.

A new car should be reliable and covered under warranty. To me it's tolerable to spend more on a powertrain than you did on the car itself (say WRX engine into a '95 Impreza L) but I can't recommend reshaping a new car into something is isn't.

-Colin

rsholland · January 2002

and I agree 100%.

Bob

paisan · January 2002

Have to agree (hence my 2 XT6s @ $1000 each) hmmm WRX engine+Tranny in XT6 body... yum yum...

-mike

jimmyp1 · January 2002

And, if memory serves, someone is marketing (through a thin veil, IMHO) a Euro Spec WRX engine (280 h.p.) as a "dune buggy" engine. Claims to have as little as 30-50k on the odometer. Yummy, indeed! :)Go bid!!!

Jim

kens · January 2002

So, Colin, am I hearing "STi"? ;-)

Ken

paisan · January 2002

I'd probably get it

-mike

locke2c · January 2002

Ken,

I wouldn't rule anything out, I just know that in 1999 the truly fast cars I wanted I couldn't afford. (C5, Boxster S) There were things considerably faster than a 2.5RS but I didn't want: Eclipse GSX, Camaro, Integra Type R, etc.

But there was nothing like a WRX or 350Z.

-Colin

hondafriek · January 2002

I agree with you entirely, you have warranty issues when you modify a new car, now it can be argued that that car maker has to prove that the modifications you made did indeed cause a failure.

However we all know that in the real world any car maker will give you endless grief with a modified car.

Then there is the resale aspect somebody comes to view the car and sees it modified, first thought in their minds is OH OH this car has been thrashed within an inch of its life.

I did not start to modify my 89 Accord until the warranty had expired, for the above mentioned reasons, I also did not have any trouble selling it as it went to my daughter, although to be honest I had a lineup of people wanting to buy this particular car.

Cheers Pat.

locke2c · January 2002

and it's not at all that I can't or won't do the work myself, because I can and have.

it's that I can't believe that I'm doing this work on a *new car*. when you have a 25 year old musclecar, you expect to buy new parts and fix things. if you have a project car that you're swapping a more powerful engine into, you expect to do a lot of work.

but once you start modifying that new car it looses some qualities of a new car that are kind of nice to have.

-Colin

ateixeira · January 2002

Sorry you missed the (very active) chat, Pat.

So Colin, did I just get your blessing to spend more than $7800 in mods on my Miata? Could you explain that to my wife? ;-)

I just saw "In the Bedroom", and guess who earns an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress? Sandy!

Well, sort of. A 1998-2000 Acadia Green Metallic Forester L actually plays a major role, with an entire scene spent talking about the car specifically! Friends of the parents are having dinner with them, and the woman says she worked for Mary Kay cosmetics long enough to buy herself a "Jeep", which the husband calls an SUV. They go into a little chat about acronyms, and mention it has 4WD [AWD, but close enough]. In the next scene, both couples drive off in the Forester, an L model with alloys and a push bar.

In that scene, Sissy Spacek is leaning against the window in angst for her recent loss, and my wife is thinking "poor woman". Meanwhile, I'm thinking, "hey, her window has an OK Subaru sticker too"!

Hilarious. They really portrayed it positively, like she was proud to own it. And guess what? Two real adults were sitting in the back seat!

)

-juice

armac13 · January 2002

"Two real adults were sitting in the back seat!

)"

Aren't special effects in movies great these days?

Ross

lucien2 · January 2002

Happy Australia Day!!

lucien2 · January 2002

Great debate, I must say. Just as I was ready to fork over the cash for an exhaust, Colin has to come along and throw water on the idea! :-)

On a related note. does anyone know if the '99 Legacy ej25 Mk I has the Phase II block or the notorious Mk I piston-skirt slap block? The GT has 40K on it, and yesterday I heard something funny for the first 10 seconds of idle.... :-o

kens · January 2002

juice -- That's great. I'll have to go see that movie myself. I wonder if Subaru paid for a movie spot.

Lucien -- It is possible that the MY99 Legacys have a hybrid engine -- Phase II block with Phase I top end. I think the only way you can tell is to get under your vehicle and count the number of bolts connecting the transmission. The Phase I has 4(?) and the Phase II 7(?).

So, what was the sound like? Our Phase I engines are noisy at startup and the noises can increase as the engine continues to break in.

Ken

lucien2 · January 2002

Ooh, good idea, I'll try to have a look. I know they are noisy in the morning, but this was a steady clicking noise that matched revs, hung around for about 10 seconds, then left. Not the usual cold-start clicking this car usually displays. Did not hear it today.

paisan · January 2002

It sounds like Jeep paid for the spot in the movie....

-mike

locke2c · January 2002

Loosh,

I'd almost certainly do exhaust again, suspension a maybe but touch the powertrain on a new car NO WAY.

-Colin

grahampeters · January 2002

G'day

Lucien. Thanks for the thought. We actually spent it with some newly arrived American friends who are enjoying the change from Albuquerque (hope I spelt that rright) to Melbourne. Temperature was 37C (99F) with a spectacular thunderstorm lashing the barbeque. Made for a much more pleasant evening once the air cooled down. Fortunately, I remembered to close the Outback's sunroof right at the critical moment before the heavens opened.

These folk have bought a Toyota Prado (not sure what it is described as in USA but the slightly smaller Landcruiser with 3.4l engine) and had no interest in the Jeep which is selling reasonably well here.

Separate question for you, Lucien. Tamsin (my 8yo) is taking up the clarinet with a hired Vito. She is already playing the piano and winning prizes so has more talent than her dad. If she has any aptitude, what are the better brands and what do we look for?

Cheers

Graham

locke2c · January 2002

Graham,

Sounds like what we call a 4Runner, especially if your first generation product (mid-late 80s) was a pickup truck with a fibreglas roof over the back, with leaf spring rear suspension.

Ours is considerably less capable offroad than the Landcruiser.

-Colin

grahampeters · January 2002

G'day

No it's not a 4 Runner. It is a more suburban version of the Landcruiser and slightly smaller, but very capable off road.

The 4 Runner was (maybe still is) sold her as the sort of thing naive surfers should buy. In reality, they all seem to drive Subarus.

Cheers

Graham

lucien2 · January 2002

I think that's the highlander then. I'll ask about Clarinets- I am a strings player and have no idea.

Colin- Thanks for enabling me, buddy. That's all I planned to do anyway.

locke2c · January 2002

Isn't a Highlander a Sienna minivan with an SUV body? Doesn't sound more capable offroad than a 4Runner to me.

I don't think we have an equivalent of what Graham is talking about.

-Colin

ateixeira · January 2002

LOL, Ross. I bet paisan got a real kick out of that one!

Jeep paid for the spot, ROTFLMAO! You guys are killing me!

The 4Runner is called the Hilux, at least in Latin markets. I've seen the Prado, there are actually several. IIRC the Prado had 2 doors, the Land Cruiser Prado was a 4 door but smaller than our LC. Definitely not the same as our Highlander, which is on the new Camry platform.

In fact, I'm tempted to say the new GX470 is based on one of the Prado platforms.

Sandy is nice and shining, got a bath today, finally. Oh, and Pat, I found that felt stuff. The hobby shop was out, but Michael's crafts had some, basically shelf liner with a felt-like finish on one side and adhesive on the other. I have not installed it yet but will share results when I do. :-)

-juice

Subaru Crew - Meet The Members II

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