A Project...

General talk about the Subaru Baja.

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Scoobytrash
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A Project...

Post by Scoobytrash »

My name is Todd and I am Scoobytrash. As well as Biker trash. I have had a few Harleys and currently still have an 07 Softail Nightrain. I have been an avid Jeeper for over twenty years.... until 2 years ago. I took a 2017 WRX for a test drive with my wife. She bought one. 2 Months later I trade my lifted and locked 2006 TJ and 2009 3/4 ton Dodge truck in an a WR Blue WRX. Now I really do not like having only one vehicle each so I started looking for a viable 3rd vehicle. Needed something that I could drive fairly easy, like AWD very much, something that will not kill me on fuel, and could haul a few things. I find a 2004 Baja Turbo.Now I have my 3rd vehicle all is well.

I am a teacher at a local high school (welding) and get to talking to my auto collision teacher and... we come up with an idea. Every year we take our kids to a show called the Piston Powered Auto-Rama, put on by Summit Racing at the Cleveland IX Center. We are going to have our Senior class do a collaboration project and build this Baja. The scarcity of them makes them noticeable. Not many people take them to an extreme. We intend to do just that.

I feel that I should mention that the auto collision teacher also owns his own custom shop. I have gone over there and welded a few things for him that require structural welding and he knows that I did that for years prior to coming to the school. We are going to put a 4" lift kit on the Baja, 31x12.50 Bogger tires, carve out the fender wells, create a custom roof rack that will hold light bars and pod lights, and create mounts that will hold two spare tires as Boggers are directional. As time passes I will put pictures up as we complete bits and pieces of the project. I will also take before and after pics with the car parked at the same spot.
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Guacamole
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Re: A Project...

Post by Guacamole »

4in lift AND those tires???
FINALLY, A BAJA MONSTER TRUCK [smilie=hellyeah.gif]
Keep us posted, looking forward to this!
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ZUBAJA
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Re: A Project...

Post by ZUBAJA »

You got MY attention. I'll be watching. Making your own lift, or buying a kit? Dennis
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Re: A Project...

Post by Scoobytrash »

I will be purchasing it from SJR ... thinking that they are in Washington. I will be having a meeting Monday morning to hash out all of the deatails and try to get this thing started ASAP.
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kamesama980
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Re: A Project...

Post by kamesama980 »

Here's some preliminary work to chew on and stoke the fires of imagination
viewtopic.php?f=2&t=2973
-Russell
"You don't get to judge me for how I fix what you break"
03 sport 5mt
05 turbo 5mt vf39 and other STI bits, 3" turbo-back
Scoobytrash
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Re: A Project...

Post by Scoobytrash »

Alright... funding is in place and we are moving forward. On my side I have already ordered the lift kit from SJR as well as putting in a PO for new struts at all four corners. Monday I will be putting in a steel order to begin the custom cargo rack. I will also be putting in the order for 6 rims and tires as I will need two spares because Boggers are directional. I have come up with a plan that will put the tires at the front of the bed on each side.

On the body shop side my partner has come up with a colour scheme that I think will work out fantastic. The lower portion that is silver right now will be colour matched bronze to the rims that are we are getting. The top half will be a blue... I think World Rally Blue would be appropriate. There are also rings on the rims that will be painted the same blue so as to tie everything together.

As soon as I figure out how to send pictures from the iPad, that the school forces me to use, to the Macbook that I do not mind using, I will be able to start posting pics. Our intention is to take some before pics in one location that is very easy to get the car back into the same exact spot, so that we can highlight just how much of a difference there is. I have also talked to the shop that we are getting the rims and tires from and they suggested that we get renderings done so that he can submit them to various different manufacturing companies, to perhaps get a sponsor to send this car to SEMA. I jokingly suggested Kicker and he said that he would be really good with that and that they would put a disgusting stereo in the car and "Tubies" on the roll cage. Marine grade speakers that will force everyone around the car to listen to my music... I wonder how bad people would be messed up when Beethoven 9th symphony 4th movement " Ode to Joy" slides right into Disturbed or Megadeth.

On a side note... Since I am new to all of this posting type stuff (I have ZERO Social Media, no twitter, no facebook, no myspace... none at all) do I just upload pictures via the attachments at the bottom of box here or do I need to have like photobucket host them?
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Guacamole
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Re: A Project...

Post by Guacamole »

For pictures you can do either. Posting them via attachments will have a big white boundary and always will be at the end of your post (see the very bottom picture for example)
If you know HTML you can also click "Place inline" after the upload is complete and you can manually set where the picture will appear in your post, which will look like this:
6953462subaru-stx-08.jpg
6953462subaru-stx-08.jpg (434.8 KiB) Viewed 8625 times
Also if you know HTML you can copy/paste the URL using the image commands:
image_commands.JPG
image_commands.JPG (8.94 KiB) Viewed 8625 times
(I can't type them in the post otherwise it'll think I'm posting an image) and host your pics on a 3rd-party website and just link to them that way, it will then display in the post. I wouldn't use photobucket as they just nuked their own platform and forced everyone to "upgrade" if they want 3rd-party sharing. I don't use social media either so I can't recommend an alternative other than a file-hosting site, or create your own website like I did through one of the various free hosting sites (Wix, Wordpress, Neocities, etc) and host your images there (as I did with my signature).

P.S. if you're wondering, the pics are of the Subaru STX- the Baja prototype
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6388843subaru-stx-06.jpg
6388843subaru-stx-06.jpg (284.58 KiB) Viewed 8625 times
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Scoobytrash
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Re: A Project...

Post by Scoobytrash »

Thank you Guacamole, much appreciated.

First parts in are the 1.25" Wheel spacers that change the bolt pattern from 5x100 to 5x4.5... all so that I could push the tires out far enough to clear the struts as well as making it easier to find rims that are 16x8 with a -6mm offset. I had to look that up to figure out that it was equal to a 3.75" backspacing.

Coming from the Jeep world I have a fairly good amount of general knowledge about vehicles as well as specific knowledge about CJ, YJ, TJ, XJ, ZJ, & MJ Jeeps. Most everything as far as measurements go on them are all in imperial. Import cars are naturally metric, so there is a bit of a learning curve about how some things are measured. Backspacing and offset was one of those things. On a side note, the out of the ten Jeeps I have owned, 7 of them had a 5x4.5 bolt pattern. I was floored to find out that my 2017 WRX has a 5x114.3 bolt pattern. This struck me as a really odd number, because... why would they do that? Looked it up, and... it is 5x4.5 ... I am like, why not just call it that?!?

We are waiting to get a quote back from KEG... they do renderings for many people that take cars to SEMA. So we are looking forward to what they are going to put together for us.
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Re: A Project...

Post by Scoobytrash »

We have paid for Keg Media renderings so those should be in hand within about 3 weeks or so. Hoping that this will be able to convince a speaker company to get on board like Kicker or Rockford to sponsor us and perhaps get this car to SEMA.

I have taken several photos pre-lift for side by sides to show the difference pre and post lift. Lift kit will be getting installed starting in a week and a half. I have lifted many a Jeep but never something like this. I need to get a steering shaft extension (Piece of tube steel that I will cut the shaft, lengthen it and re-weld it) to complete this lift. Then we can put the rims and tires on.
Baja pre lift.jpeg
Baja pre lift.jpeg (1023.4 KiB) Viewed 8493 times
Rims and tires came in and it was fairly funny hauling 6 rims and tires over to the shop I am putting the lift kit on at. I will admit that I was giggling like a little school girl when I got 5 of them in the bed and one in the back seat... need 6 because they are 31x12.50 Super Swamper Boggers and are directional. I will include a photo of that as well.
Rims and tires.jpeg
Rims and tires.jpeg (96.47 KiB) Viewed 8493 times
I have run these type of tires before, on my CJ-5. It was fantastic to roll around on 35X16.00 Boggers... but man, do they make a serious road howling. After these are on the Baja, no more road trips.
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Re: A Project...

Post by Scoobytrash »

Well, it has been some time and a few things have changed. I have installed the 4" lift on the Baja... let me tell you how much fun that was! No instructions, no indications of what goes where, nothing about anything that has to be modified after the kit is up. SJR did tell me that I would have to extend the steering shaft and did send me a picture of a different lift with some labels that kinda corresponded to my kit. I was able to eventually get it all together but here are the mods that had to be done to make the kit work:
1: release pitchstop and make a weld in bracket that will hold the pitchstop securely... I have access to a shop and steel, not a big deal
2:Use a 4# beater (sledge hammer to non-Ironworkers) to make room in the inner fender wells for the top spring cap to rotate.
3:Extend steering bracket by 2.75" to allow steering coupler to be long enough
4:Rotate top radiator hose to allow coolant passage and replace lower hose with a 12" flex line from Napa... worked like a charm.
5:Replace air duct from filter box as the motor dropping made that duct unusable. Summit Racing had a flex duct... worked great.
6:Upgraded engine drop bracket bolts from 10mm to 12mm and from grade 5 to grade 8 (Metric equiv. of course)
7:Cut brake line brackets from body and weld tabs on lower on unibody (front and rear I think)
8:Removed a drain gutter from under the bed as it was in the way of some thing... IDR what though.
20190626_121338.jpg
20190626_121338.jpg (6.15 MiB) Viewed 8398 times
That is the lift done with factory tires on it.
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Re: A Project...

Post by Scoobytrash »

These are pics with the boggers on it... might have to trim a little bit of plastic out and a slew of metal... lol
20190619_142844.jpg
20190619_142844.jpg (3.55 MiB) Viewed 8399 times
This is full droop in the front
20190619_143552.jpg
20190619_143552.jpg (3.14 MiB) Viewed 8399 times
And this is what ride height would be at... all good going straight... not so much for turning as of right now.
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Re: A Project...

Post by Scoobytrash »

Now the back has a bit more of an issue. At droop all is well.
20190620_140800.jpg
20190620_140800.jpg (3.24 MiB) Viewed 8399 times
At ride height.... grinding the front of the wheel well. A bit of trimming required.
20190620_140819.jpg
20190620_140819.jpg (3.27 MiB) Viewed 8399 times
ZUBAJA
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Re: A Project...

Post by ZUBAJA »

Dennis' mod quote: "If you change something, you will have to change something else too". That said, it's looking awesome. This may very well become the king of the Bajas. Dennis
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Re: A Project...

Post by Scoobytrash »

ZUBAJA wrote: Fri Jun 28, 2019 3:03 am Dennis' mod quote: "If you change something, you will have to change something else too". That said, it's looking awesome. This may very well become the king of the Bajas. Dennis
Not even going to lie... I am going to call it that from now on. ZUBAJA, you have given the car it's official title. Thank you.
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Re: A Project...

Post by Scoobytrash »

It has been a little while and school is back in session. We are beginning to cut steel for the cargo rack and will be welding that out fairly soon. We also have to build some bracketry for the bed that will hold the two spares that this build will require. I have finally gotten the rendering done and it looks much better than I imagined.
It was originally going to be WR Blue for the top part and bronze for the lower part... however, the school I teach at was a purely vocational school and this is fairly close to the colours of the old school (Timken High School). We are now the Career Tech side of McKinley High School and the colours of the school are red and black. My boss pointed it out and thought that it would be more appropriate to go with the current school colours. After I got the recoloured rendering... I agree. The red will be a paint code taken from a Mazda MX-5 (46V? I think), which it a tri-coat ( whatever that means... not a paint guy, so it sounds like it could be more complicated) and the black will be a metallic flake... should look fairly good. Here is the rendering. Great job by the guys at KEG Media... outstanding work I think.
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subaru-baja turbo print.jpg
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