Hi all, I thought I’d start a little build thread to share & keep track of my progress on my latest Suby.
2017 built MY17 Wrx Premium S-Edition Manual
Mods so far…
Ultrex Ultimate 3" SS exhaust – Cat back presently
Process West Verticooler
Process West Charge pipe
Process west pulley/Alt cover
Boomba BPV
COBB Aluminium turbo inlet
Perrin Short shift adaptor
Perrin shift stop
Perrin brass shift bushing
Perrin Pitch stop
Perrin Fender shrouds
Perrin Dipstick handle
Grimmspeed Radiator shroud
Whiteline 22mm 3 point adjustable rear sway bar & supports
Whiteline solid rear end links
Whiteline adjustable front end links
Super Pro front sway bar bushes
Super Pro rear diff bush inserts
Milk jug delete
Ultrex ABS STi style side skirts
STi style ABS rear diffuser
To Do…
Ultrex Ultimate J pipe with 200 cell Cat
Grimmspeed 3 port BCS
Grimmspeed aluminium turbo inlet
Grimmspeed engine dress up caps - Black
Perrin Turbo sump restrictor
Custom dual catch cans with AN fittings and black braided hoses
MSR tune with EGR delete
Perrin engine cover
Turbo XS Billet Vacuum pump cover
STi 1.3 bar Radiator cap
Carbon fibre door trims
I’ve had the car for about a year and a half now and originally my intention was to leave it stock and enjoy it for what it was. It’s my daily driver so big power was never on the cards and going crazy on a FA20 with stock internals doesn’t usually end well as you probably know. I was happy to add to the mix some small refinements, to make the car a bit of fun and better to drive but as time went on, there were a few things about the car that I wasn’t enjoying so the mods started. It’s the first WRX model and also the first single turbo powered model in a line of 6 Subarus that I’ve owned (consecutively).
It’s a 2017 built MY17 Wrx Premium S-Edition manual 6 speed in Crystal white pearl. It was a one owner WRX in very decent condition with 50K kms on the clock when I secured it and it has an exceptional service history. Definitely been looked after. Not many blemishes on the paint either, just 2 rock chips and a scratch that were unfortunately repaired by the dealer with some random white paint they had on hand. I now have the correct touch up paint so I’ll be trying my hand at repairing those when the weather warms up a bit.
As for the S-Edition variant of WRX, it’s a “warmed-over version of the WRX Premium” with some interior and exterior enhancements that was limited to 250 units in Australia (125 Manual / 125 Auto). For an extra $2350 over the Premium WRX, the S-Edition includes a bunch of STi bolt-ons including STI base Wheels, front strut tower brace, gear knob and front lip, darker tint and a rear S-Edition badge. That’s about it for the extras, quite reasonably priced in my opinion considering the individual value of the items included and this was a big draw card for me as I am a massive sucker for all things with the pink badge.
Previously I owned a very vanilla flavoured 2014 base model Impreza with CVT auto. Whilst it served its purpose as a cheap and comfortable commuter (flawlessly), there was hardly any joy driving it and it was far from passion inspiring. I never felt any kind of love or even attached to it really but it was a great car for all intents & purposes.
A change in my Job location meant I could sell the Impreza and finally get the car I wanted as I wouldn’t be putting on anywhere near as many KM’s commuting to work in Sydney from the Central coast. I put about 125K kms on the Impreza and the bumper and bonnet were peppered in stone chips from driving the 160km round trip to work on the freeway. There’s no way I wanted to do the same thing to what was the most expensive car I’ve owned.
Here's the Impreza looking great on the day she went away to her new home, all nice and shiny.
I’ve really liked the shape of the VA WRX since its release, it’s my preferred shape between the WRX models and it was such an easy transition for me after owning an Impreza from the same generation as this WRX. Everything about the car felt familiar to me.
I added some side skirts and a rear diffuser soon after getting the car home to compliment the STI front lip spoiler. I bought some rear pods but never got around to fitting them as they were a gloss black finish and I think they’d look mismatched with the rest of the matte ABS body kit. They’re kicking around in the shed collecting dust now.
I’m not thrilled with the side skirts to be honest, not a great fit like the OG OEM STi skirts. They’re not terrible but they do look a bit cheap and that grinds my levels of OCD. I have decided to go with the FLOW Designs side skirts and rear spats sometime in the future. I love the looks & textured finish, they’re tough and they Australian made & owned. (If anyone from FLOW Design reads this, send me free shit for the big shout out haha!)
Those of you who know me or have read my previous build threads would know that tidying up engine bays with a bit of bling is my thang. I love a colour themed flashy & clean bay. This time around there was to be no bright colours or fancy pants show and shine malarkey . As much as I honestly do like them, there’s too many WRX engine bays dressed up with fluro yellow, teal & red already. It's so overdone.
Black… just black, and lots of it.
Perrin fender shrouds were my pick of the bunch, the Grimmspeed radiator shroud looks and fits better than the Perrin item IMO, so I got that one. At this point not much else was done to the engine bay besides a bit of covering of exposed coloured wiring for concealment. There’s a couple of extra parts I’d like that are on my shopping list to add in the future like an STi oil filler cap and 1.3 bar rad cap and the yellow bottle & reservoir caps will be swapped out for black Grimmspeed caps when they’re back in stock at Prospeed Racing. Chuck in a custom twin catch can set up with black AN fittings and braided hose and she’s done.
Initially I thought the suspension was fairly good, stiffer than I expected, looked low enough and it seemed to handle alright through the twisties. It wasn’t until I hit boost exiting on a large roundabout that I realised it wasn’t even close to what I expected it to be. The understeer was damn right dangerous and it ended up sending me across lanes without much control.
A massive brown pants moment.
And the mods begin…
“Hello Whiteline my old friend, it’s been a while but I’m back for you to take my money once again.
Like all the other Subies I’ve owned, I whacked on a 22mm 3 point adjustable rear swaybar. A great upgrade, good bit of kit. The VA kit comes with mounting point braces also. I complimented it with solid HD Whiteline endlinks.
For the front I kept the stock swaybar and upgraded from OEM to SuperPro bushes with Whiteline adjustable HD endlinks. This alone made a big difference in handling and I was happy with that set-up.
Next was the exhaust note. At idle it sounded great but it was quiet as hell as you go up the rev range. I chose the Ultrex Ultimate SS Cat back because of price and they’re Australian made. I was stoked with the finish quality & sound. No fitment issues whatsoever. Nice and shiny mufflers & pipes with nice welds too. Very happy.
After a couple of months of driving & getting used to the car there were a few things that I wasn’t entirely happy with and that were making my driving experience less enjoyable. The clutch was the first noticeable thing I didn’t like. It was hard to find the sweet spot & I’d either be slipping it or over revving most times that I wanted to take off quickly. It was hard to find a consistent rev to take off in first gear and it felt jerky as hell changing gears right up to 4th gear. It honestly left me doubting my abilities and feeling like it was a result of driving an automatic for the last few years & I was now learning to drive a manual all over again, like a noob.
After researching the issue online I found it to be a common gripe with VA WRX owners and the clutch is generally considered terrible in these models because of excessive rev-hang in the stock tune.
For a while I used that as an excuse to make myself feel better by telling myself “it’s the car… not me” but I wasn’t happy to just accept that it was the way it was going to be from here on in. I began to process it all and it got me thinking firstly, that perhaps a newer or heavy duty clutch might be an adequate solution and make the clutch feel more tolerable. It would be an expensive chance to take but at the very least I’d have a new clutch as a trade-off.
The second option would be to deal with the rev hang by tuning, which as I said earlier, I wasn’t intending to go down that road as I wanted to keep the car fairly close to stock for a number of reasons. Mainly because it’s a can of money worms I didn’t want to open at this stage of my life and the car is also my daily driver. But I knew that if a clutch replacement didn’t totally fix the problem, I’d end up wanting another car before too long.
Weighing this up, I got in contact with Michael South from MSR in Sommersby for some advice. He explained tuning options & confirmed that changing clutches wouldn’t solve the issue entirely. He also pointed out another issue with the Subaru tune which I had noticed and was bothering me but I was yet to focus on. That is, under boost there is a flat spot around 4000rpm and the top end is lacking thanks to the dog shit Subaru tune.
WOT was lacklustre.
He recommended deleting the EGR system as nothing good comes from returning hot exhaust gasses back into the induction side of an engine.
Considering all the above, I said “Stuff it” and made the decision get it tuned and let MSR sort it out.
With that decision, came the realisation that if I’m doing it, it would make sense to have some supporting mods. Mainly an intercooler, bigger charge pipe, BPV & 3 port BCS. Michael stated also that the stock airbox is more than adequate and gains from a CAI are negligible unless you’re upgrading turbos. Keeping the stock air box was fine with me.
Sticking with the Australian theme, ProcessWest came to mind for the intercooler. Top mount all the way – because, it’s not a race car and there’s a scoop on my bonnet for some reason.
MSR recommended the Verticooler over the newer style Khanacooler so I sourced the Verticooler & charge pipe kit. The kit also came with a nice powder coated alt & pulley cover which was a bonus.
Subyclub legend and admin aekOne was selling a Boomba BPV from his Levorg build so I jumped on that sale and installed it for some nice induction choo choo choo noises. I loved the sounds it makes so I did a “Milk jug delete” removing the air filter box noise resonator thingy, to promote turbo & BPV noises. It worked and cool noises sounded cooler.
The car definitely performs better with the Verticooler, charge pipe and Boomba BPV. The heat soak reduction feels massive compared to the stock IC.
I’ll be putting on a Grimmspeed 3 port boost control solenoid and aluminium turbo inlet for longevity as the plastic standard inlet is a weak point and is prone to cracking around the BPV hose. The Grimmspeed inlet has much better flow qualities also. I’ll be using the Ultrex 200 Cel catted J pipe to finish off & match up to the Ultrex Ultimate exhaust system I already have, then it’s off to MSR for a tune. With that set up I should be looking to see somewhere around 200+kw atw, a much improved top end and linear power delivery.
So that’s the direction I’m headed now. Not too crazy compared to some of the builds here but exciting for me all the same. Should be a fun & hopefully reliable car when it’s all sorted.
I’ll keep you all updated.
Cheers,
KONG
