42 replies to this topic

[Jimbo]

So a chapter closes and another begins...

Enter, my new sprog chariot.

After making the tough decision to part ways with the Legacy, I decided it would be beneficial to myself and my wife to have something comfortable and reliable for when mini-me is dragged out kicking and screaming. It was a touch call but timing and finances dictated I couldn't finish off the Legacy to the degree I had intended. There was plenty of argument with myself in for and against but I think I made the right choice, at this time. There's always later on...

So, long story short, after spending countless hours trawling and inquiring through every online car advertising outlet, I hand picked a few Liberty's to go take a look at. I was under a strict budget and only had a handful of cash on top of the $7k I sold the Legacy for. A few nice facelift Gen4 GT's popped up (GT's are same spec as GT-B's sans the Bilsteins, 18" wheels and aggro front bar) within budget but I was more interested in getting into a pre-facelift GT, wagon of course. Facelifted GT-B's were double my budget so maybe later.

Finding a manual is just about impossible as pre-facelift GT's weren't available in le manuel until late '05. They also seem to be advertised at double the price of autos which is Satanic. So, armed with a wad of cash I set out to check out the first wagon of the day at a little dealer out the back of Thornleigh. Wow. Owner/operator was a massive wanker and not even interested in attempting to sell the car to me. He spent the whole time we were there on his mobile. He pretty much moved some cars out and handed me the keys and pretty much said "do whatever". Only to find it had about a splash of fuel left in it, he jumped in and said he'd be back in 5 minutes. He flogged the balls off it as it had a obscenely loud cat-back exhaust on it. Great. So he gets back, and we set off. The sunroof was stuck open as none of the switches worked, the fuel gauge was pretty much non-existent in operation, none of the windows worked except for the drivers one. It was burning a tonne of oil up, pulled up to find it was leaking oil from the front crank seal onto the exhaust, as well as pretty much both cam cover seals leaking/burning. We then discovered it had a nasty idle issue.

I gave up, turned around and handed it back to the moron. I told him the issues with it and he didn't even care. Well done mate, enjoy your giant Subaru sized paper weight. Thing was worth $4k tops, advertised for $6.8k.

Anyway, so after checking out the rest of my available viewings for the day, I wanted to look at a nice Atlantic Blue wagon down in Bankstown. Now, it was pretty tidy but someone had driven the front of it into a bollard. It wasn't a huge amount of damage, but it was noticeable instantly. After umming ahhhing at that one, I got a text from a rando number asking if I was still interested in a Liberty GT Premium (sunroof, McIntosh stereo(?), leather and darker dash trim) I inquired about, which was a bit out of budget. After ringing the dude, as I couldn't remember who the fork I had and hadn't spoken too, I decided to ditch the Bankstown one and head out to Arncliffe where this silver one was.

We pulled up and the guy runs a small Estima/El Grande import business. He took the GT in as a trade-in and he was out there giving it some tyre shine and a quick wash. No here's someone who want's to make a sale today. After a bit of a chat and inspection of the car (everything looking pretty tidy so far) we went for a spin around the block. This one felt soooo much better than the last. Whisper quiet, everything worked and only a few small touched up stonechips which was the one of only a few exterior critiques I could give it. I noticed the front bar was popping out a bit between the headlights and the wheel arch, someone had attempted to fix it many times (with hot glue??) but the plastic was flogged out so it didn't hold in the retainers properly. No damage to the bar though so I dunno. 
 
The interior was just about perfect, he has a guy that refinishes interior components so some sort of permanent spray was used to fix the steering wheel and a few trim bits. Results of it were great as I initially thought it had a new steering wheel fitted until he told me what work was done. 

So, some talking was done, some haggling was haggled and hands were shaken to the tune of $7.5k down from $8.5k. I played hard ball and came up trumps.

I spent last Sunday in it's entirety cleaning up the interior. It has these awful OEM rubber floor mats which were basically rubber honeycomb which totally rekt my feet while driving.

It looked good on the surface but there was some nasty shit hiding under and around the seats. I found a giant ear-ring, a christmas decoration, a half eaten CocoPop LCM bar, 1/4 of a piece of toast (with petrified spread of some sort!), a classic Connector Pen (remember those!?) countless chips, pens, lids, Cruskits, you name it. The centre console trims were putrid in the gaps. I ended up removing the centre console entirely to clean it up!

After a good solid clean and a quick wash, she was looking good. Only real faults with it are the wheels are a bit rashed up, and the CD stacker won't load CD's. I managed to liberate some happy clapper CD which was jammed down the CD slot, made a good frisbee but unfortunately the player still wont take CD's. Might have to remove the unit and have a good look at what's going on, might be another jammed CD.

So, to wrap my long story up, I'm super happy with the car. They have a lot more grunt than I thought they would and twin-scroll huffer gives a good balance of power across the band. 

I have already fixed the bumper up with some, err.... creativity. I removed the retainers and drilled holes in them and the edge of the bar and then cable tied the jerks back in place. Looked waaay better. I also gave the MAF a clean which was filthy...

Unfortunately yesterday morning the thing wouldn't start. After checking it out, the existing battery was put in the car in 2013 and the bugger was swelling up at the sides, emitting a little bit of smoke and it smelt rancid. Yup, she's dickered, bud. New battery after the wife shot me out to SuperCrap in the morning and she starts up briskly.

Plans?

If I can scrape a few bucks together, some Ultrex twin-tip mufflers (or similar) would be awesome, even just to look pretty. A set of CS9's to can the standard GT wheels, a TurboSmart boost gauge to match the dash and some of the cool JDM ABS/Battery covers. If I'm lucky enough, a JDM SpecB bumper would be cool, along with the factory option rear lip too. Interior, apart from a boost gauge and some alloy sports pedals, will stay as is.

Oh and those ghastly yellow/black plates are going to be first thing to go. I'll go the "International" style again, not sold on the JDM style because so many AUDM shitboxes are rocking them.


Pics are a bit lame but I'll get some juicy one's on the weekend.







 

[Kieran - GT-B]

Looks awesome man,where do you think you would mount the boost gauge?

[Jimbo]

Looks awesome man,where do you think you would mount the boost gauge?

Just mid way up the A-Pillar. Always had them there. Not a fan of having them on the steering column. Only thing about bloody boost gauges is the damn mounting cups (for a good black one) are just as expensive as the damn gauge!

[twinturbosubaru]

Err, hang on, I thought you wanted a manual ??

[Jimbo]

Err, hang on, I thought you wanted a manual ??

Couldn't find any GT's in my price range. There was one for sale but it was asking $13k, dreamer. On top of that, pre-facelift GT's are rare in MT and pretty much most wagons are AT anyway.  It would have been preferred but it wasn't a deal breaker for me.

[twinturbosubaru]

Should have bought my H6 and supercharged it for the same coin ;-) would go a little better than a poxy turbo LOL

[Jimbo]

Should have bought my H6 and supercharged it for the same coin ;-) would go a little better than a poxy turbo LOL

Honestly, the thought had crossed my mind (not as far as SCing!) but my heart was set on a GT. I thought long and hard about tarbo vs H6.

[Barbbachello]

Looks good jimbo. Might i also suggest some facelift tailights? The pre facelift are gross with the big orange spooge

[CRUISN]

Well, its no Gen3 Legacy but its OK I 'spose.

 

Here's one I prepared earlier.......

 

[Jimbo]

Awww yeah. Never thought of the facelift tail lights! They look 11ty times better.

Dang I forgot how good yours looked, Mark. Such clean lines on these things.

[RX25SE]

Looks good Jimbo. Congrats!

CS9s would top it off nicely.

[NQRSoobee]

Looks very tidy Jimbo.

[Niko]

Love it Jimmy-san. Sounds like a bigday of checking out cars.

[Morgan]

Well done mate. Sounds like you've ended up with the right car.

Rear bumper plastic cover will come in handy dragging the pram in and out of the boot!

[Jimbo]

The rear bumper protector def needs some love. Hopefully its just double sided holding it on, its a bit loose anyway.

[Cam.]

Looks nice mate!

[GNGBNG]

Looks tidy Jimbo.

Turbo for the win, they produce the torque a lot lower in the rev range than the 3.0 six.

[Lukeoly]

Looks amazing for the money dude. Well done

[Arfreedom]

Nice ride Jim. Looks awesome


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