I bought a Subaru, and don’t own a flat brim hat (Subaru forester xt build)

[finboy]

Hello all, I just picked up my first subbie, a 2008 forester xt sports with 5mt. I bought it from Vancouver island, and am spending a couple days enjoying it out here before heading back to town. I will update photos and details as I get more time, for now I have some photos I stole from the ad

https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1753/41895778525_51728b4472_c.jpg

https://farm1.staticflickr.com/900/40986166580_f681990063_c.jpg

https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1727/27927938217_a7d85c96a5_c.jpg

https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1753/27927936617_99c61593db_c.jpg

https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1756/40986172330_1ca569f26f_c.jpg

Anyways, fun stuff going through the records, of which there are many.
-rebuilt motor, arp studs, tomei headgaskets, adjustable cam gears
-“race clutch” and lightened flywheel marked on the rebuild sheet, no idea on brand but it is pretty heavy
-swift springs
-divorced downpipe and invida 3” cat back (have to work on the drone)
-Cobb sf intake
-remote starter and Bluetooth deck
-Cobb v3 access port

I have been scouring threads for power making combos that will keep things reliable as I can’t afford to replace a motor or tranny at the moment, and after some emails with sunny I am looking at the following
-hunting for the right vf turbo, I think I have a line on a low mile one
-sti intercooler in my basement
-Cobb airbox in my basement
-walbro 255 in my basement
-need to find a Grimmspeed ebcs and various intercooler gaskets, turbo gaskets, etc.

Ideally I would like to take the above mods to 275ish whp, stock injectors should be the same size as an sti so I hope this is attainable.

[craigcd]

Great looking car, love Subaru's but scared of the maintenance costs of owning one :)

[Tik-Tok]

Great looking car, love Subaru's but scared of the maintenance costs of owning one :)

Subies are cheap to maintain. Unless you drive like a boy-racer douche, dumping the clutch every light, etc. Even then though, super easy to work on.

[craigcd]

Subies are cheap to maintain. Unless you drive like a boy-racer douche, dumping the clutch every light, etc. Even then though, super easy to work on.

I have heard this and will own one at some point I am sure. Regardless, lets not take away from the OP's thread! Clean car, excited to see it evolve!

[Darell_n]

I have heard this and will own one at some point I am sure. Regardless, lets not take away from the OP's thread! Clean car, excited to see it evolve!

Subarus are like lego and actually enjoyable and easy to work on.

[Sugarphreak]

...

[taemo]

congrats and nice looking forester!

im anxiously awaiting for our civic to die so that I can get a forester :rofl:

[D'z Nutz]

Nice pick up. I never noticed how nice those look until now and had to look up to see if that was stock.


Great looking car, love Subaru's but scared of the maintenance costs of owning one :)

Yeah, that's not really a thing.

[craigcd]

Nice pick up. I never noticed how nice those look until now and had to look up to see if that was stock.



Yeah, that's not really a thing.

Every other STI on kijiji seems to have had a motor replaced or rebuilt. There also seems to be alot of head gasket issues. I know they can be repaired easily as mentioned above but its still major work.

[Twin_Cam_Turbo]

Looks great, I have a soft spot for Subaru’s in general (owned 6 of them). Super easy to work on most of the time and I’ve never had any major reliability issues outside of oil leaks.

[finboy]

Thanks guys, I was worried about Subaru reliability when I was researching as well, flat brimmer specials were out for obvious reasons, and I was looking for outback xt’s or legacy gt’s. Unfortunately, subaru’s Banjo bolt oil filters tended to starve turbos, causing eventual turbo and motor destruction if owners weren’t religious with oil changes. Even with the cleanest stock models, many owners didn’t seem to be able to answer some basic maintenance questions that made me walk away. This one was different, the motor was already rebuilt, and recently. I have a stack of receipts and the shop invoices for installation. I still plan to dig into this to pull the filters, but I have a bit more piece of mind that I’m not driving a vehicle with a $6k rebuild hanging over my head.

[HiSpec]

I always have a soft spot for those XTs.

Are those OEM seats? Those are some heavy duty bolsters!

[bjstare]

Those are 1000% not OEM seats.


That's an awesome Forester, always loved these. That one's been modded perfectly.

[Buster]

Cool car.

Was worried it would be rhd.

[finboy]

They are corbeau’s but the guy didn’t transfer the airbag sensors over. I bought two seats from another 08 and will be spending Monday night making the right fixes to get the airbag system functional again

[tonytiger55]

Very nice!!! (But does it have a picnic table.?:poosie:)
Sweet ride...:clap:

[Kijho]

Looks very clean! Beautiful looking seats!

[finboy]

Got the airbags sorted out, had to take half of the passenger seat apart but the sensor bladder works! If I can get through the out of province, things should go smoother from there. One thing I did notice on the way home, aside from running quite rich, I hit (what I assume) was boost cut when passing a car. The CEL came on and the cruise light started flashing. I pulled over, checked nasioc, turned it on and off 5 times and everything seemed to go back to normal. I threw on the access port and monitored the boost levels for the rest of the trip, nothing outlandish, maybe 13psi peak got a couple? I got error codes that I will check out tomorrow, more research.

[diamondedge]

Saw your post on WSC! Once I saw the username I figured we had another OG on our hands. Looks good!! Can't wait to see what you do next.

[JRSC00LUDE]

I can sell you a hat.

[finboy]

Okay, just went through all the receipts, and my parts pile, and I think this should be a pretty accurate picture of the current state of the car.

Mods to date:
-invidia g200 catback
-invidia v3 divorced downpipe
-Perrin uppipe
-Andros spec d wheels 18x8
-Cobb sf intake
-Cobb access port v3
-tomei adjustable cam gears
-Rebuilt OEM block with arp headstuds and tomei headgaskets - install done by caliber automotive in edmonton
-Moroso oil pickup
-Unknown “race” clutch as denoted on the workform

Mods not yet installed:
-Cobb sf airbox
-sti intercooler
-walbro 255
-Grimmspeed turbo heat shield

Future plans:
-vf turbo
-Grimmspeed ebcs
-protune

Sold and bought an Element, build thread below:
https://forums.beyond.ca/threads/414961-Finboy-buys-another-Honda-2004-Honda-Element-4wd-5-speed?p=5158311

[HiSpec]

Any reason to remove those mods?

I'll say it again, the XT looks really good!

[D'z Nutz]

Since I know nothing about these Foresters, was there any particular reason why you went all the way out to Vancouver Island to get this? Are these particularly hard to find or was it just a really good deal?

[finboy]

Those mods are not yet installed, they will be when I get the other items I haven’t purchased and will get added all at one time so I can get tuned once instead of every time I add something. The sports models are actually a bit hard to find, and I was super picky about finding the right Subaru as they are so prone to abuse and neglect by previous owners. The price point is getting low enough on these that there are many first time owners doing more without the research, and making some very expensive “whoops” decisions to cut corners.

[dirtsniffer]

I did not know you could get an 08 XT with a 5mt. Saweeeet

[finboy]

08 was the last year for North America, Australia still got the manual

[googe]

IIRC those will hit boost cut if you replace the downpipe and don't port the wastegate outlet. The stock one with cats is restrictive enough that it chokes airflow, but if you open it up then it moves so much more air that the stock outlet can't dump it fast enough and pressure creeps up. I'm surprised the original owner left it like that, because it kind of defeats the purpose if you can't go WOT without throwing CELs.

[finboy]

I’m not overly surprised, the car feels like someone went through a top ten list of “what mods do I need for stage 2” without deep diving into supporting mod requirements to make things work well.

[vengie]

Man that is gorgeous! I have always wanted to pick one up, but man are they hard to find.

[redevil]

Very nice XT! I had a 2008 XT as well and loved it. Make sure you checkout Airboy to have that thing custom tuned.

[finboy]

Definitely hitting him up when I get a turbo installed, then not spending money for a while because it is a $ubaru and I need to just enjoy it once it runs right, lol

[finboy]

While waiting for some key parts, I decided to tackle a few smaller jobs. I put in the Grimmspeed hood struts because I want a lot of room when I work, and then decided since I was on a roll, I would work on the fuel system.

For the record, I hate working on fuel, the smell, the dry skin, the mess, etc. But since it has been a while since I had to wrench on anything, I figure I would save myself the money I would have paid to someone else. The upside of a forester is that no seat removal is needed, the downside is the entirety of the truck content has to be pulled.

Everything went relatively smooth with the help of some YouTube videos, the only hitch was the walbro being about 5mm longer than the OEM unit, making the pump basically feed directly into the inlet, the hose is pretty much there as a splash guard now. After ample cursing, and some interesting use of a trim removal tool, the assembly went back together and the car was running again.

Next weekend is hopefully the start of the tear down, I scored a garage and picked up a Milwaukee power ratchet and impact gun, and some 2 foot long ratchet wrenches to help deal with some of the tighter spots. Things to do for next weekend, let me know if I missed anything...

-grab injectors and install without removing the manifold (this could require patience)
-adjust the ac lines to fit the new sti intercooler
-reassemble the intercooler y pipes
-swap the turbo and hope like hell I don’t break too many exhaust studs or bolts (spares should arrive this week)
-install the cold air box
-oil change
-remove air pump and block off with vex plates
-replace turbo feed / avcs feed line and get rid of the banjo filter
-put on the new soft turbo inlet when the original tears to bits
-Grimmspeed ebcs installed but not plumbed until it’s on the dyno

The motor was out about 25,000 km ago, so I am hoping nothing should be drastically seized. I wasn’t going to do plugs as they were done before I got the car, worth leaving them in there?

With all this done, I will likely get it towed down to vex/airboy or call them about a baseline tune.

Am I missing anything?

[finboy]

Time for an update, after gathering parts for months, and scoring a garage to work in for a weekend, I finally got some time to work on the car. Unfortunately the day before I was supposed to start, I picked up an awesome fever, which made the entire install a pretty fun experience. Let me start this off by saying, I am not a mechanic, but I thought it best to at least attempt the install and get to know my car, and understand the quality of work performed from the previous owners.

To round up, I got the turbo on (68HTA from a Westernsubaruclub member), installed a samco turbo inlet (the internet is right, this job sucks), and attempted to get some injectors in (850cc bosch injectors from performance fuel injection in high river). I say attempted to get the injectors installed because while I got them in position, I never heard the “click” to hear them engage. From what I have heard so far from Vex, this assumption checked out as it spilled some fuel in their lot already.

Rather than trying to force something beyond my skill set and assume I got everything right, I opted to have VEX performance go over the car before the dyno day with airboy tuning. Based of feedback from a few subie owners, it sounds like this is a good choice. This step is something that I think will be worthwhile as I don’t want to waste anyones time on the dyno day, and would rather know that the car will be in good working order after being inspected by people who work on subarus every day.

Lets begin:

No more turbo, thankfully the engine being out 25K ago meant that I didn’t hit a single seized bolt. I made sure that any exhaust bolt going back on had high heat anti-seize. Surprisingly even the turbo feed line came apart fine, so I have a spare braided line for the future if I need it. Wisely, the previous shop that worked on this motor removed the banjo filter.

https://i.imgur.com/pK2Egrfl.jpg

Old Vs. New

https://i.imgur.com/DARBldXl.jpg

New turbo in

https://i.imgur.com/gtdy0LBl.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/1FyA226l.jpg

“Green brakets of death” actually weren’t too bad, the previous shop did not reuse the harder to reach bolts on the back of the head. I will likely modify these slightly to make them easier to reinstall, but I left them off to give Vex easier access to the injectors (along with the short ram intake and air box). This is another area where things differed from various threads, as many said the AC lines were welded to the brackets, in my case they were bolted on.

https://i.imgur.com/VRWzlkkl.jpg

The injectors, while the stock injectors could likely do what I need for the short term, I wanted to future proof the build a bit, especially as the injectors would be easier to reach when half the motor was apart. A friend of mine with an LS1 240 told me about performance fuel injection, and so far I have been pretty happy with the customer service.

https://i.imgur.com/GTmonTql.jpg

It was at this point below where I really started to question the logic subary had in snaking the inlet through the intake manifold. The stocker did not survive removal, probably for the best that I replaced it. Curiously every soft inlet had a glut of information on “this brand collapses, only buy XXXXXXX brand” which meant that every brand apparently sucks. More on that glut of information later in this post.

https://i.imgur.com/jT5RVkCl.jpg

And many hours later, with arms looking like they were chewed by small woodland creatures, it is back together for the most part.

https://i.imgur.com/WPvA6T4l.jpg

Needless to say, after doing the above, I am happy that the car is getting finalized and will hopefully be in good shape after Airboy tunes it.

One thing I did struggle with wasn’t the lack of information, but rather, information overload. I read countless 60+ page threads, all with contradictory information from product types, to ways in which jobs should be done, to year specific issues. While everyone says subarus are like lego, I found my car specifically (07+ forester) had all kinds of “it might be this way” answers. As an example, I was looking at deleting the air pump, but late on Sunday, reading another 60+ page thread from Nasioc, there didn’t seem to be a straight answer on what had to be left in an 07+ car, and was even less detail on foresters specifically (which have small differences from both WRX’s and STi’s). Instead I opted to look at the airpump at a future state, as it was working at the time and I didn’t want to introduce another variable.

This is a clear case where I need to get more involved in the local Subaru community, as a phone a friend option for someone who had done the job before could have helped sift through the noise of online articles and threads.

More updates to come as I hear back from Vex and Airboy, I am looking forward to working with both to get the car back on the road, better than ever.

[The Cosworth]

Oh man, love a FXT. Would love to build one. Looks really clean.

[g-m]

I've found there's a ton of threads and articles for Subaru's written by people who have suspect knowledge and background and often no way to know. YMMV but it's not good

[finboy]

Let’s talk today about the story of success and failure.

Vex give me a call yesterday, letting me know that a spot had opened up early to dyno, success! I had made a few rookie mistakes while swapping the turbo, a few fails but easily corrected and the injectors were in. The numbers from the tune were great (301 whp and about 325 tq), success! When I got in, they had completed the tune, but were still hearing an exhaust rattle coming from the downpipe area....

While they are going to investigate, the pesimist in me believes that the turbo I bought might be the source of the issue. Hopefully we will find out tomorrow, but if that is the case, it is going to mean no car for me while I rip it apart. I suspect this will be a sleepless night.

Anyways, details on the noise, it’s coming from the dp/turbo area, increases with rpm and is not the heat shield. #thoughtsandprayers appreciated.

[zipdoa]

Lol 300whp in a 3250lbs wagon, I bet it’s a 12 second grocery getter. That car will get you into trouble . I’m jelly and now miss my stage 3 allroad.

Can you upload the dyno printout?

[finboy]

Lol 300whp in a 3250lbs wagon, I bet it’s a 12 second grocery getter. That car will get you into trouble . I’m jelly and now miss my stage 3 allroad.

Can you upload the dyno printout?

Left it at the shop but will grab it tomorrow. Mixture of joy and anxiety today, transmission blast plates are on my radar

[dirtsniffer]

dibs when you want to sell this in the future.

[finboy]

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/-FNAC4VdHqo/hqdefault.jpg

Sound was a loose wastegate arm, turbo is good!

Vex had to retune and they are fixing a leak from the turbo drain, but otherwise...

Run before the wastewater was fixed

http://i.imgur.com/LCGBUrA.jpg

And after...

http://i.imgur.com/ekMuMtW.jpg

[Sentry]

Same peak power but fuck tons more torque down low. This will be a fun car.

[Konj]

Congrats on the purchase.

I have winter tires for sale (just the rubber) which are practically brand new pm me if interested.

[finboy]

Same peak power but fuck tons more torque down low. This will be a fun car.

Tranny wrecking power, this escapade was more expensive than I thought, so I will drive it light until I can reinforce the case in early 2019

[Sentry]

Just don't flat foot shift it, should be fine. Also blast plates asap. :D

[finboy]

http://i.imgur.com/9O1AXzi.jpg

First impressions, definitely not as insta-spool as the Mitsubishi, but it pulls solid from 3k onwards. Still have some remaining post car surgery smells due to oil leaks, but overall it seemed good so far. Bonus, it didn’t catch fire on the way home, which is a win in my opinion.

[CMW403]

http://i.imgur.com/9O1AXzi.jpg

First impressions, definitely not as insta-spool as the Mitsubishi, but it pulls solid from 3k onwards. Still have some remaining post car surgery smells due to oil leaks, but overall it seemed good so far. Bonus, it didn’t catch fire on the way home, which is a win in my opinion.

congratulations, this is a very nice car, 300whp in such a small hatchback could get anybody in trouble.

[tonytiger55]

Very nice car.
Question.. why is/would the airfilter be housed in a open gold frame..?

[bourge73]

Very nice car.
Question.. why is/would the airfilter be housed in a open gold frame..?

Because Racecar

[finboy]

Under hood temperatures on these cars are silly, the boxer motor takes up a TON of space in a not very big engine bay. I tried to heat wrap or foil tape anything I could to keep temperatures under control (certainly not for looks). The upside of the airbox, airboy tuning actually did find over 10hp on the dyno with other tunes and the box from what I could find on a few threads, but I am more concerned with keeping the engine healthy in summer.

Technically there should be a snorkel going to the opening at the front, but I am still trying to source that because, of course, foresters are slightly different from every wrx on the road, and I can’t confirm that an 05-06 will work with the new hood design.

[Tik-Tok]

You should do the Airboy intake mod. I'm surprised he didn't suggest it.

http://www.airboytuning.com/archives/79

[finboy]

From what I can see, a lot of the intake piping was removed when the short ram was installed. Definitely an interesting mod, and something I will look into when i find more oem bits

[prae]

Following this closely, always loved the FXT in a manual.

[finboy]

$1500 later one of the last Achilles heels is sorted by Vex, air oil separator installed. The exchange rate sucks, but I did get to see the glitter bomb in person!

I also ordered some wheel conversion spacers, if I can find a good deal on some 18” bbs then I will try to get them on later in spring.

[finboy]

Rad blew so minor upgrade, warm weather is here so I might actually get working on this thing with more mods soon. I also need to find some 05-07 wrx hatch strut bodies so I can do my Koni conversion

90223

90224

[Kijho]

Middle finger, ahh classic Subaru photo hahaha

[diamondedge]

finboy did you buy an OEM replacement or did you go for an aluminum rad?

[finboy]

Aluminum koyo replacement from subiedepot, I had time so the shipping wasn’t an issue

[Chantastic]

Great to see a different Subaru build going! :thumbsup:

[finboy]

Rim question, opinions on either?

[ExtraSlow]

Very nice choices both. 7 spoke has a slight edge in my mind. Looks vaguely stronger.

[blitz]

Agreed, 7 spoke.

[A2VR6]

Im a sucker for 10+ spoke rims... Especially they look like OEM+ since they are similar to the BBS' that the STI's run.

[Twin_Cam_Turbo]

I prefer the twelve spoke wheels, especially on Subarus.

[bjstare]

+2 for 12 spoke. I think they look way better on that car.

[90_Shelby]

+2 for 12 spoke. I think they look way better on that car.

:thumbsup:

[D'z Nutz]

I prefer the 12, but only marginally more. I don't think you can go wrong with either one.

[taemo]

I prefer the 7 spoke myself, but maybe it is also the bronze color vs silver on a blue subaru.

[beyond_ban]

As mentioned, both suit the car and look great so it is a win-win. That being said, i prefer the 12 spoke. More difficult to clean, but look lighter and less "clunky".

[Darkane]

12 < 7.

[SkiBum5.0]

Vote for 12 spoke. The other ones remind me of early-2000’s go-to wheel for the ricer Civic - Motegi MR7.

[finboy]

Small update, stock airbag looked like something out of the 80’s, and I wanted a central tach. I found a jdm forester cluster for $140 shipped, then paid $150 to have the odometer set to match the old cluster. I also found a guy selling a wrx steering wheel, so I grabbed that for the bag.

Old and busted:
90992

New hotness:
90993

[finboy]

I finally started to de-sti my car. Previous owners plastered the car in sti and xti badges. The car is not an STi, so no need for false advertising. First to go was the xti badge on the grill, I had to cut out some excess plastic that was used to hold badges in. I still have a badge to remove from the rear (I need a forester badge), and when I swap the wheels there will be no more external signs. The only two that *should* remain are on the intercooler and the jdm cluster (because I wanted a central tach)

While I was in there, I also opted to swap the fog lights that a previous owner drilled into the rad support. In fairness it looks close to factory, but the metal is quite thin and it has more movement than I’d like. Rather than remove the old ones and be stuck with two holes that are very visible, I grabbed some Hellas from amazon and wired them in. I will likely never use them as I have the adjustable headlights, but I’m happy with how it turned out considering the alternative.

91529

[finboy]

Preview for next year, forged bbs goodness

94627

[finboy]

Well, sold this in October for about what I had into purchase price plus mods, thank god for covid because I drove it for the price of insurance and (lots of) gas. Timing couldn’t have been better, talk about a cluster fuck.

https://www.thedrive.com/news/cobb-locked-out-key-tuning-features-due-to-emissions-heres-why-tuners-are-furious

Let’s go Brandon

[Sentry]

Yeah it's bad, real low blow to the tuning industry and I fear its gonna get worse before it gets better.

[90_Shelby]

On the other hand, cutting out cats and rolling coal seems unnecessary when modifying street cars, but I also wouldn’t be a fan if we had mandatory emissions testing on our vehicles.

Regarding flex fuel for E85, why is that such a no-no for emissions on Subaru’s or in general? Didn’t this trend start from factory engineered GM flex fuel vehicles which was brought in to save the environment?

[finboy]

On the other hand, cutting out cats and rolling coal seems unnecessary when modifying street cars, but I also wouldn’t be a fan if we had mandatory emissions testing on our vehicles.

Regarding flex fuel for E85, why is that such a no-no for emissions on Subaru’s or in general? Didn’t this trend start from factory engineered GM flex fuel vehicles which was brought in to save the environment?

There are a lot of open questions on what will be allowed by Cobb, some are questioning if turning up the boost last factory cut or upgrading turbo will be allowed. Add to that the dogshit efficiency the ej25 gets, and the number of “fixes” required to pass emissions from the factory you get an understanding for why the access port was so popular.

Prime example:
TGV delete - factory tgv’s were prone to leaking, and were big money (over a grand?) to replace one bank. They were only there for cold start, and could be deleted with no performance effect on the car.
Air pup - notorious fail point on the ej, and made a real mess of the engine bay with extra tubing required due to the boxer design. Expensive from the factory, no performance loss from deleting.
Catted up pipe - early wrx’s had a cat before the turbo, imagine what fun that is when it breaks up, commonly deleted ite, as it wasn’t even used in 04+ cars

E85 is an interesting one, Cobb charged something like 700+usd for their sensor (silly given how many factory cars have them), and it tapped into the power signal from the bone stated tgv harness. Cobb had to drop these entirely, and aren’t offering customers refunds for their $700 paper weights which won’t be supported by future software updates which tuners HAVE to take (can’t tune without internet hook up and the update is auto-pushed).

[LilDrunkenSmurf]

This is why I tuned mine on opensource.

[90_Shelby]

There are a lot of open questions on what will be allowed by Cobb, some are questioning if turning up the boost last factory cut or upgrading turbo will be allowed. Add to that the dogshit efficiency the ej25 gets, and the number of “fixes” required to pass emissions from the factory you get an understanding for why the access port was so popular.

Prime example:
TGV delete - factory tgv’s were prone to leaking, and were big money (over a grand?) to replace one bank. They were only there for cold start, and could be deleted with no performance effect on the car.
Air pup - notorious fail point on the ej, and made a real mess of the engine bay with extra tubing required due to the boxer design. Expensive from the factory, no performance loss from deleting.
Catted up pipe - early wrx’s had a cat before the turbo, imagine what fun that is when it breaks up, commonly deleted ite, as it wasn’t even used in 04+ cars

E85 is an interesting one, Cobb charged something like 700+usd for their sensor (silly given how many factory cars have them), and it tapped into the power signal from the bone stated tgv harness. Cobb had to drop these entirely, and aren’t offering customers refunds for their $700 paper weights which won’t be supported by future software updates which tuners HAVE to take (can’t tune without internet hook up and the update is auto-pushed).

Catted Up pipe, wild, I wasn't aware this was a thing.

[finboy]

Catted Up pipe, wild, I wasn't aware this was a thing.

When I worked on my Subaru I couldn’t help but think it was a car not limited by accountants, but rather by engineers who couldn’t cut it at Toyota/Honda and were quick to say “I *think* that will get it through warranty”

[Sentry]

Subarus are great if you fix their dozen or so shortcomings. :D

[finboy]

Subarus are great if you fix their dozen or so shortcomings. :D

If radium/iag/killer b started working for Subaru they would be great :burnout::burnout:

I will note, I only ran into an intermittent misfire error code but that was due to a light flywheel. But Sentry is right, if you don’t fix some “no shit Sherlock” design problems you can find yourself buying a new $5k short block, or replacing a transmission for another $5k, or rustproofing areas that obviously should have been done from the factory.