The more I dig, the more I find. My objective has 100% changed to slowing the rust and providing structural support so that the strut towers outlive whatever else kills the car. Based on my experience, I think I could have blissfully ignored the situation for a few years or more without any catastrophic failures.
With that in mind, I dug out all of the loose stuff and hit it with Rustoleum Rust Reformer. I'll add patches to reinforce, and call it good. If I were to do a good job at this, I can't see any way that it doesn't scope creep into "fixing" all of the rust in the quarters, rockers, etc. This is not the car for that level of effort.
First round of CAD complete.
Templates are all cut and the first two patches are welded in. The best part about my welding is that nobody will be able to see it. I use my welder just infrequently enough to forget everything I learned the time before, and it shows. I started with what I thought would be the easier patches. They had to cover compound curves and my idea to tack one side and work them in place with a hammer didn't go as easily as I'd hoped. There was more "spring" in the metal than I expected. The flip side is that it's hidden so I didn't have to be gentle with the hammer.
What's that old expression? A grinder and paint make the welder I ain't. Flux core and thin metal is challenging. Given that it's hidden, I skipped the grinder and slathered it in paint. Driver side is done. Passenger side will probably wait for another day.
After using the Rust Reformer, I removed paint from the surfaces to be welded and coated all of that in upol weld through primer. It isn't restored, but this repair should outlive the car.
I treated myself to this little belt sander with a HF gift card that I got for Christmas. It was very helpful getting the paint off in a couple of tight spots where the flap disk couldn't reach.
Criminally bad looking welds aside, I'm happy with the outcome of the passenger side. There was a lot of rust and it took stitching four patches together to address. Fortunately I was able to connect to good metal all the way around. I'm again confident that this will outlive the car.
Wrapped up the strut tower repair today. While I was at it, I patched the gaping hole in the spare tire well. I'm going to continue to ignore the rust in the quarters and rockers for now (and probably forever).
Those welds look fantastic! š¤£
Starting to think about 2025 season prep for this fine unit. One thing on the preventative maintenance list is motor mounts. The motor & trans were moving around a bunch last year causing some clunking and such. The question is: OEM quality replacements, the forum favorite "Group N" upgrade, or something racier (poly)? The car is not street driven. Solid mounts are out per SCCA stock class rules. I'm thinking that if I'm going to do motor mounts that I should do the transmission mount and the pitch stop mount. Your thoughts and suggestions are welcomed. TIA!
In reply to Motojunky :
Check the 2025 rules for the new engine and trans mount allowance.
ojannen said:
In reply to Motojunky :
Check the 2025 rules for the new engine and trans mount allowance.
23. Engine and/or transmission mounts and/or devices to control motion of the engine and or transmission (pitch stop, dog bone, bobble strut, etc.) may be replaced with non-metallic mounts or supplemented with non-metallic inserts. All of the original mounting locations must be used and cannot be modified. Hardware may be changed as required for proper installation. This does not allow for subframe replacement.
I interpret this as rubber & poly good, all metal (solid) = bad. Am I missing something?
Thx
In reply to Motojunky :
You are right. I was thinking about bmw mounts that look like they are sliced off a plastic cylinder. Those are legal but not the metal versions.
I had the STi pitch mount, and Group N motor mounts on my old Outback Sport back in the day and on my Outback XT daily now.
Unsurprisingly the OEM engineers did a good job of finding the right mix of NVH and stiffness! The pitch mount made a huge difference on my worn out stock on on the OBS, I recommend the Group N and/or STi parts. It's been a minute since I researched it, but I do believe there are some differences between Group N (preferred) and STi (closer to OEM).
rallyxPOS13 said:
I had the STi pitch mount, and Group N motor mounts on my old Outback Sport back in the day and on my Outback XT daily now.
Unsurprisingly the OEM engineers did a good job of finding the right mix of NVH and stiffness! The pitch mount made a huge difference on my worn out stock on on the OBS, I recommend the Group N and/or STi parts. It's been a minute since I researched it, but I do believe there are some differences between Group N (preferred) and STi (closer to OEM).
Thanks. This is the direction that I'd like to go. I don't care so much about NVH since it's not street driven but I don't want to deal with breakage and/or create problems elsewhere. Ideally I'll never touch driveline mounts again. I've been poking around as I've had a spare minute, looking for the easy button. RalliSpec (link below) advertises "STI Group N drivetrain mounts" which leaves me with a lack of clarity.
https://www.rallispec.com/mou_drv_rst4100.html
EDIT: Did a little more looking around and was able to find several old posts confirming that RalliSpec is selling Group N mounts. Order placed.
With the first event of the 2025 season about a month away, I figured it was time to get the car ready. I installed the Group N motor and trans mounts this evening. I estimated an hour to do the job. 2.5 hours later, all good. š¤£ It wasn't a terrible job but I sure wish I'd thought to do it while I had the motor out last year. It would have been much easier. I had to get creative to be able to get enough leverage to remove the rear bolt on each side. Took me a minute to figure out that starting those two bolts was easier from the top side.
The accessible forward bolt in the driver side mount was rounded from some PO. It took some fiddling but I was ultimately able to smash a 1/2" 12 point socket on it (it's a 14mm) and get it out. The threads in the hole were a little bit boogered up but they cleaned up easily with a tap. The only 10mm x 1.25 bolt I had on hand that was close in length was a banjo bolt from a Honda XR front master cylinder. I'll replace it with a proper bolt before I run it in anger. Had the rear bolt been problematic, I'd have been pulling the engine again.
The Group N motor mounts look the same as the OEM mounts but are much stiffer. I can twist the old mounts to the stop by hand - I can't move the new ones. I suspect that new OEM ones would have been a big improvement over the worn out and probably original mounts. The trans mount is visibly beefier with a solid chunk of rubber vs. smaller pieces. In any case, I'm fairly certain that the clunk I was hearing at the last event last year was a result of the motor flopping around causing the exhaust to bang into stuff. This should put a stop to that.
Why yes, that is oil all over the bottom of the engine... mixed with mud. It's a Subaru.
I had some time to keep picking away at prepping the car this evening. Changed the oil and installed the STI pitch stop. The OEM one actually looks beefier but the rubber in the big end of the STI fills the space while the OEM leaves a bit of a void. The small end bushing was broken on the old one too.
The front sway bar links are shot. That's also been a source of front end clunk. I'll order replacements and get them installed. With new hardware I'll be able to easily test connected vs. disconnected. They're so sloppy now, they're essentially non existent.
I also took a minute to look for that exhaust leak. It wasn't tough to spot. I have a terribly cobbled together aftermarket cat-back that I may use. It would be nice to be able to hear the engine better with my helmet on. I dunno - I also don't love loud exhaust.
The car is idling very low - maybe 400-500 RPM. It seems to run fine otherwise. I did a quick check for vacuum leaks, damaged wiring, etc. and came up empty. I gave the throttle body a quick cleaning with no change. No CEL at this point. We'll see what shakes out there.
Next up transmission and differential fluid change, do something about the exhaust, and then I think we're good to go.
I've got a somewhat hectic schedule between now and the first RallyCross of the season on 3/23. With that in mind I tried to knock out a few things today. First up was repacking the trailer wheel bearings - something I meant to do all last season. I then moved on to replacing the sway bar end links. For possibly the first time ever, I didn't have to cut or otherwise forcibly remove any of the bolts. That was the first little win of the day.
I needed to do something about the exhaust. When I bought my driver project, I removed the abomination below. Today I dug it and some other random exhaust parts out to see if I could whip up something that I could live with.
Ultimately I decided that I couldn't come up with anything that I'd have confidence in and patched up the stock exhaust. After getting that sorted I decided to search Marketplace to see what might be available. I should have done that first. Ten minutes from home I scored this cat back exhaust new in the box for small money.
It fits pretty well and should allow me to hear what the engine is doing. It's a little bit silly looking but I can live with it.
I had a few minutes one evening last week and did a more thorough check for vacuum leaks to see if that might be a contributor to the low/rough idle. I wasn't able to find any. I also replaced the fuel filter as a PM item while I was at it. It occurred to me today that I had the battery disconnected for a few hours back when I was patching up the strut towers. The car hasn't been run for more than a few minutes here and there to move it around since then. I'm wondering if the ECM needs to relearn idle settings. I'm gonna take it out for a ride tomorrow to make sure all is well and then load it on the trailer. I'm as ready as I'm going to be.
My only gripe with the exhaust was that the rear hanger was on the narrow side and smaller in diameter than the OEM. It looked likely to come out of the rubber isolators. I had some 3/8 stainless wire rope clamps that should make it just about impossible to come undone.
Soon...
Indy - Guy said:
In reply to Motojunky :
I have tow rig envy.
Envy is probably a step or three too far. That said, I do think that vans are overlooked for the 'race support vehicle' role because they aren't "cool." I was always a pickup guy until I bought this in 2018 to take a cross-country trip with the family. I was an almost instant convert. That old Ford has now been to all of the lower 48 states and the simple camping setup is perfect for race weekends.
