After being gone out of country for a couple of years, my brother was heading back to the states and wanted to get back into the track game. With previous cars being the Subaru WRX and EVO VIII, he wanted to do a car that he could beat the piss out of on the track, and still drive it to work and on the streets. After much searching, he came across this used but great condition Subaru Impreza 2.5RS. The car had only about 60,000 miles and a pretty clean interior and body. So we picked the car up for $6800 and started work.
With the long term goal being a STI motor swap and completely prepped for track, we wanted to first begin with outfitting the car for local DE events at Buttonwillow Raceway and Willow Springs Raceway in California. Our first step was to get rid of those seasonal tires and heavy stock wheels. We outfitted the car with some Enkei RPF1 in 17×7. The 1 piece cast wheel is a direct fit for the Subaru body. It is very lightweight and is used quite often on track cars from Mazda to Mitsubishi’s. Next we wanted a multi-purpose tire that would handle well on the track but last for spirited driving on the streets. So we hooked up with Toyo and mounted some 225/45/17 Toyo T1R tires. The Toyo T1R tread pattern is designed for high speed, aggressive driving with a relatively long wear cycle. Total price, about $1300.
With the shoes completed, the brakes were next. The stock brakes definitely cannot handle lap after lap driving. They needed to be replaced and without killing the budget. So we connected with Rotora who offers a 4piston caliper upgrade for the front. The 4 piston caliper works with the stock rotors but includes a set of steel braided lines and Axxis Ultimate Pads. The caliper offers much stronger clamping force and down the road, we can switch to slotted or drilled rotors. The rear we also added the Agency Power steel braided brake lines and replaced the stock fluid with Motul RBF600 synthetic DOT4 brake fluid. Total price, about $1000.
The biggest improvement on this car is the suspension upgrade from KSport. KSport offers several different types of coilovers and their premier line is the Pro Kontrol kits. The 36way adjustable dampening coilover includes front camber plates for easy at the track adjustment and solid rear pillowball mounts. The coilovers are also height adjustable. We set the ride height at about a 1.25 inch drop to sit nicely right above the tires. The installation of the coilovers takes about 4 hours to setup properly. Once installed and aligned, the difference in handling is quite improved. Before the car had a ton of pitch and dive as well as body roll in corners. The KSport coilovers really gave the car a good stance. Some people say the KSport are to stiff, but with the dampening adjusted properly, they felt nice and smooth on the street. Total price, about $1300.
So in total we spent about $3600 to transform this car from being a stocker to a balanced weekend track car. We added some other style tid bits like the P1 style front lip spoiler, Agency Power battery tie down, and 5zigen blue lug nuts. Coming up next we will be installing some Status Seats, custom Agency Power titanium muffler exhaust, and other suspension bits. You can view all the pictures of this install here – https://www.vividracing.com/forums/gallery/showimage.php?i=10784
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