My wife's Subaru XT Turbo

[Karhu]

This is 1986 Subaru XT I bought as a engagement gift to my current wife in year 2010. At last at year 2013 I began to renovate. It took 2,5 months. Body was badly rusty but the engineering was mainly in good shape. In odometer is about 150 000 km. Air suspension works great. Only thing that is missing, is electric antenna, and i'm looking for that. I've also thought about installing the cruise control system if I'll find parts.

 

[Scooner]

Now that's a good woman haha, a keeper.

[EW@sh]

http://www.mttechsuba.com/used-subaru-loyale-parts/1985-1994-loyale/

 

They have a power antenna in stock, I believe.

[-tombba-]

http://www.mttechsuba.com/used-subaru-loyale-parts/1985-1994-loyale/

 

They have a power antenna in stock, I believe.

 

Might have but it's ot that easy to find it in Finland. Might be loads of money to spend into just shipping and taxes and maybe some custom payments too if ordered from there.

[Karhu]

http://www.mttechsuba.com/used-subaru-loyale-parts/1985-1994-loyale/

 

They have a power antenna in stock, I believe.

 

I sent them an e-mail. They don't have any of listed products which I was interested, like power antenna or digital instrument cluster stuff.

[zukiru]

Looking good!

[Karhu]

I'll show you some pictures of the renovation.
Click for larger pictures.

At morning of the starting date:



At evening:



My wife helped me to remove the parts.

The gray XT is for parts. I bought a third one during the project:

(Also for parts, but it's reparable)




Car raised on the grill:



Found "some" rust...

 

 

Edit: I tried to add more pictures, but they disappeared. I'll try again later.

Edited March 27, 2014 by Karhu

[idosubaru]

there's an XT specific forum too - subaruxt.com, almost all the members there are members here but some frequent that board and aren't really on here very often. might find an XT antenna over there i'd imagine.  some folks have simply fitted alternate aftermarket antennas too that don't retract.

[Karhu]

I know Subaruxt.com, but if it's not prohibited, i'll show car project here. I have not yet signed up to the XT forum.

After seeing the damages, I became depressed. But I decided to finish the job and put the car back on the road!

The following pictures show step by step how I fixed one of the worst rusted places, driver's side floor.

Here it Starts. Cutted off mostly of damaged areas.


New frame...





Piece by piece...


This was little bit difficult to produce and weld it on place.


Almost ready

[Karhu]

Other repairs...


Painted with rust-stop primer. Rear crossmember came from my other parts car, painted it and most of the undercar parts too, before reinstalling.


And more rust repairs... Remember that this was my first bigger car renovation.


This one area came from gray XT...

First layer of underbody coating and reconditioned parts installed back on the places.


Front fenders was pretty rusted:

 

During this project, my welding skills were improved.

[Karhu]

First test drive with summer tires and first snow became. The next day was a vehicle inspection whose passed without notices.
 

Hub caps painted with body color, for winter wheels


And this is what it looks like now:
 

                    
                        
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[Karhu]

I found a power antenna from a local junkyard. Also the cruise control parts I can get from there when I visit next time. I first need to ascertain which components are needed.