L1's Garage

I wouldn’t go below 93 on an sti if you handed me $1000 in cash. You run the wrong octane in a subi and you can kiss your engine goodbye.

From the 2016 owner’s manual. Can use 91 on an STI with no detriment other than reduced performance.

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Must’ve put a built in tune for the newer models… regardless if it has any sort of tune or mods on it that ability is gone but then you should have an access port which will let you retard the timing so… meh.

Welcome my furry friend!

Dead set on a Subaru?

Doesnt have to be a wrx. It will probably end up being a stock Impreza. Where I live, like every third or fourth car is a Subaru and everyone swears by them. The most criticism i’ve heard of them is that they rust (every car rusts here). The imprezas also have an aesthetic that I really like.

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Subarus and Toyotas rust the least of any car. Have you seen under mine in an earlier post? it’s a freaking 12 year old car barely any rust.

I heard Volvo’s have impeccable rust protection, but that was from a fellow Volvo enthusiast, so take it with a grain of salt. I’ll have to look under mine here shortly.

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I see 80’s volvos still rolling around here in Ohio sometimes so I can believe it.

Mine’s a 99. I’m in Idaho, so are winter’s can get ridiculous, but I’ve only seen them put sand on the roads not salt.
However my car was in an accident 2 winter’s ago, so I took a picture of exposed metal from that accident.
Actually never even cared to examine this wound tell now.


I couldn’t see rust anywhere, so I thought it might be aluminum like the later models, but a magnet sticks.

No rest behind the front wheels either (can’t see the back ones. Plastic fender liner)

couple under chassis pictures


I’m pleasantly surprised, but I just now put two and two together. It is a Swedish car and with their winters I guess you’d expect great rust protection.

At least in New England Subarus will rust on the rear quarter, along the rocker panels (esp. the pinch weld area), and the front quarters. Rear subframe can get pretty bad too, although regular washing will usually make it last a long time. The strut towers can get destroyed too, but it’s relatively uncommon. Things have gotten better though, the third gen Imprezas don’t rust as bad as the earlier ones, and the fourth gen Imprezas started to come with undercoating in some areas.

Usual spots circled in red.

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my rear passenger where you have circled rusted a bit got it repaired recently.

Yeah its pretty shocking to see these generations of Subaru´s rust that badly.
But yeah Mazda is also dealing with the same problems with the 3 and 6.
Hence even Mercedes with the C-class and BMW E46 have rust issues.
Its kinda weird that manny cars produced from 2000 to 2008 not seem to have a great anti rust threatment.
if compair this with something like an Audi A4 or A6 from late 1996 to 1999’s, those dont really rust.
Because they are galvernised.

Yeah, that’s usually the first place that will start to rust.

My dad was a Subaru Master Technician for a decade or something and he said that if there was ever rust on a Subaru that wasn’t caused by an accident it was pretty much always in that spot. It’s pretty sad since mechanically the cars would be fun for several hundred thousand miles (he had several with over 300K come through his bay), but after a point they’d become so rusted they wouldn’t pass inspection and it simply wasn’t worth it to do that much body work on them.

I’ve never really seen them rust other than that spot.

I had a 2002 Mitsu Eclipse Spyder GT. Absolutely loved it. But since it was the Spyder it was the convertable. I can guarantee that is the first and last convertible I will ever own. Got it with 60k miles on it. It was a 5 speed manual. I absolutely loved it. but apparently one of my spark plugs broke in the block and screwed up the cylinder and the piston. At that point it had 230k miles on it, the top was leaking, it smelled nothing but the mildew, the trunk was actually leaking also. Ended up trading it in for a 2009 Chevy Cobalt. It’s a nice little car and it gets me from point A to point B. It has the premium Pioneer sound system in it but I’m going to eventually make it into a MORE premium sound system. lol

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Even Volvo´s rust pretty extreme now days.
Seen a Volvo XC60 from year 2010 with serious structural rust damage on at the back end.
A car that never has had any damage.

Subaru has gotten much better with their recent cars. The 2013 Impreza I’m getting has undercoating on the rocker panels and other places straight from the factory and some parts underneath have been made of different materials which should help. Only took the company 19 years and three generations to figure that out.

Yeah newer Subaru´s those Hatchback models are probablly build better.

I wish I had a picture of my brother’s Impreza. His is an '04 and the rockers are pretty much gone on both sides and the rear quarters are in very poor shape pretty much from where they meet the rockers all the way to about a foot from the edge of the taillight.

Runs great though and has ~240,000 miles on it.

Yeah i´m still on the hunt for a nice decent and reliable car.
But its pretty hard to find something that is reasonable priced.

I have concidered a Mitsubitsi Lancer from 2006.
But uphere i mostlly only find the sport wagons,
which are also okayish i think, but most of them dont have a tow hook.
Mitsubitsi seems to be pretty reliable for the most part.

But i´m not too sure yet what i´m going to do.
I’m currentlly driving my dads Merc mostlly, which is a great car.
But not really cool and trendy enough :smiley: