In 2000 I was just about at that point where you make terrible decisions. I decided that I wanted to buy a new car. Terrible idea, but it was an idea all the same. In 2000 the Sport Compact Car was King and if you wanted a cheap fun car that could be tinkered with and would always run and wasn't a Camaro or Mustang you had very limited options. You had the Honda Civic Si. Boring, everyone had one, about as good looking as a piece of drywall. Nissan had some decent Sentra's, but they were overpriced for what they were. Again, boring cars.
Then, I saw and heard this drive by.
The Subaru Impreza 2.5rs. Those fog lights! Hood vents AND a functional hood scoop? Madness! How did this car even exist? The only thing I knew about Subaru is the Legacy Outback wagon had a cool commercial with Paul Hogan. And the sound! Like a old British fighter jet, thrumming along not quite like a four cylinder should.
So I went into obsessive compulsive mode and started absorbing information on the 2.5rs. All wheel drive. Two door and four door. As usual, Japan got the good ones. Over there they had a model that was the foundation of something that I was about to fall in love with almost as much as the car.....Rally.
With my new found obsession not only did I have a new motor sport that (at the time) was hard to find and fairly exclusive in America, I had a team to root for. Nascar and F1 were always fairly boring to me. Sure, the Nascar guys were fast in a straight line and turning in one direction. Sure Ferrari and the F1 cars were fast on a closed circuit. Subaru though..... They were fast in the woods, on the pavement, on ice, on snow. It didn't matter where they drove they were fast, and more importantly they were precise.
So, as any dumb kid does, I go to my local Subaru dealer picturing myself flying sideways down some wooded back road (keep in mind I lived at least 50 miles from any real trees.) and find out that there is no way I can afford one. Probably for the best though because a year later I see this.
A new Subaru Rally Car! This means there is a new chassis, and for the first time ever we would be getting the turbocharged WRX model in America!
So the new WRX comes, and it's great. So great that at least 3 times I go to try and buy one, but usually as the pen was getting pulled out to sign something would happen. They didn't like m trade in, or most commonly I would find a sub-$1000 car. That went on for almost 10 years, until about a month ago.
Allow me to introduce the most important WRX model..... MY WRX.
It's a 2002 Impreza WRX Sedan. Black, 5-speed. AWD standard. Great mechanical condition, and I got it for less than the price of a used 2.5rs Coupe.
It needed some love for sure. New tires, new windshield. New battery. Look at those fog lights! And the functional hood scoop feeding an intercooler!
The interior is nice, but the radio was shot. Already fixed that too. I mounted the Alpine that I was going to put in the Datsun, and made a custom cell phone mount. I ran the charging cabe through the dash so it's hidden behind the radio now.
It needs a new wing, which I hope to have soon and some cleaning/paint touch up work but all in all I love it. There is something very magical about getting in the car you've wanted your entire adult life. Sure, there are other dream cars and the Datsun is one of them. But there aren't very many dream cars you can load the wife and kid into and head up to the snow and have a blast in.
So what does the mean for the Datsun? My old daily driver, the 2000 528i 5-Speed is for sale and when it does sell, I will have some funding for the 260z. Hopefully I can knock out some of the bigger purchases to keep me wrenching a while like our entire powertrain.
Sometimes I might post about WRX projects on here. If you don't care, you can skip them, but I'm still going to post them.
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