L1's Garage

I actually thought he built a few of those cars, but it appears he’s just been working on the one car for quit a wile. But as you said he seems to do good work and his engine work looks clean.

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The long build is the best.

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Apparitly you can drive go carts around Japan’s streets.

Kinda wanna go now.

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I’ve been wanting to go, but this makes me want to go even more, and build a shifter kart while I’m there to get me around… quickly.

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Are these the ones you mean? Or are these just covers?

edit: never mind, they have pins, they’re just plastic covers.

I think Subaru calls them side sills, everybody else including Subaru techs call them rocker panels.

A quick search is showing a part 51449FE060 for the outer half of the right side rocker panel. If going for new OEM style parts there are four pieces in total for a complete replacement, outer and inner panels (“sills”) for both the left and right sides. They ain’t cheap though, like $400 per side for new OEM parts.

At work right now, so I can’t look too much.

that’s okay. Thanks. I’ll probably see what the local scrapyard can come up with for now and if push comes to shove I’ll use just plain sheet metal. Looks like it’s not the whole thing that needs replacing, just the bottom half. if I can sort that out somehow I should be in less terrible shape.

The problem with that is he could get a non running car for that much (probably less), and swap his drivetrain into that shell.

I have found a bugeye shell I could swap the parts over to but I’d need a closer look at it to check that it’s free of any structural rust. I would also have to check with my parental figures because this would mean effectively having two cars in their backyard… Need to check my options.

Edit: Not gonna happen this time around. The front end is worse than the one I have.

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Yeah, cutting from a scrapped car is probably the best route. Luckily there were plenty of second gen Imprezas made, so you should be able to pull from bug eyes, blob eyes, and hawk eyes. I think the wagons had the same rocker panels too, so even more cars to get stuff from.

If you have to go the sheet metal route I have seen people slide steel tubes/rectangles into the holes, weld those in, then weld sheet metal over those. More weight, but also strengthens that section of the car a little.

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Assuming the shell isn’t rusted to shit and back. New England road salt winters are rough on cars.

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This is probably what I’ll do. I have people I meet with regularly who can weld, etc so I’ll see if I can pick their brains and practice a bit before going to town on the impreza.

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I don’t know how close your relationships are with your family up here, but I’d keep an eye on Idaho’s market since Subarus are so common here, and we use sand for our winter’s roads not salt, so I’d think you could find a pretty clean one.

I didn’t see anything to fit what you need right now though.

We use salt…

Probably has something to do with having the largest salt mine in the US right down the road

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What? I’ve never seen salt. Hmm NVM then @KemoKa73 I could be ill-informed.

It’s fine. The sacred relic of old, the Angle Grinder shall reveal all.

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no lol I meant where I live in WNY.

It depends on how cold. Someplaces get sand because it’s more standing water, others get salt because it’s ice on the road.

Ahh, I didn’t have time to look it up, but I was like first time I’ve heard of any salt mine.

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