long travel Outbacks or making Subarus faster and more reliable offroad

[pontoontodd]

59 minutes ago, scalman said:

did you allready decided what you will do with 2001 outback ? lifts,shocks,  tires ? what for it will be used ? 

I have most of the parts for long travel suspension.  I am just waiting on a few machined parts.

I plan on putting smaller front brakes on it so I can use 15" alloy wheels.  I will use the same wheels and tires (215/75/15 Hankook MT) as my 99 Outback.

I want to make fabricated bumpers, 2" tall x 4" wide rectangular steel tubing to protect the lights.  Also has to have skid plates before I take it off road.

I'm afraid I might have to do the head gaskets before I take it off road too, the coolant boils over a little occasionally just driving it hard in town.  Never runs hot on the gauge though.

I'll also add a tablet mount for navigation and convert the high beams to HID (already have the kit).

Eventually I might change it to a manual trans but I want to see how the automatic works (with a cooler) and I want to leave it mostly stock for now.

I'll use it for trail riding, going to offroad parks, going on vacation.

Earliest I'll get started on it would be August, I won't have the time or money until then.  Considering the head gaskets, it will probably be a winter project.  Same with the 6MT/R180 swap into the 99.  Should probably do head gaskets on that one too.

[scalman]

great . is that long travel suspension be similar to what you have now on 99 ob ? all custom made ? you showed pics of that yet maybe ? 

[pontoontodd]

5 hours ago, scalman said:

great . is that long travel suspension be similar to what you have now on 99 ob ? all custom made ? you showed pics of that yet maybe ? 

The front struts will be about the same, I am going to make a small change.  Front control arms will be the same.

In the rear I'm going to start with the coilover shocks I used for the a-arm front suspension, they'll give me 10-11" of travel.  In the future I'll get longer bodies and shafts which should allow 13-14" of rear wheel travel.

[pontoontodd]

The 95 Outback headlight assemblies (bottom) are one piece and hold up much better than the two piece Outback and Impreza (top) headlights.  For some reason it seems like the adjusters don't rust in place either.

 

It is not a perfect fit but with some sheet metal removal I got it to fit on my 96 Impreza.  Wiring plugs into headlight bulb but I had to splice the running light wire.  Could splice the turn signal wire in too.

 

Got the radiator water neck TIG welded.

 

Put the radiator back in, it's not sitting all the way down in this picture but you can see that there is now some clearance between it and the valve cover.  I can slide my fingers between the hose and valve cover now.  The valve cover was touching the radiator hose before.

Since I had to drain the coolant to do that, I replaced the oil cooler gaskets and hoses and the valve cover gaskets.  The engine had been leaking oil badly when it sat overnight and now doesn't leak.

While I was doing that I discovered the driver's side engine mount had separated.  This might be why the valve cover had rubbed through the radiator hose after over a year with no problems.  This is the passenger side mount.  That split in the rubber goes most of the way through.  I might be able to rip it apart by hand.  The part that bolts to the engine is plastic but seemed undamaged on both sides.  I only found them for sale from Subaru so they were about $80 each, I think that's why I hadn't replaced them when we first did the swap.

 

Here you can see there is a tab that holds that steel plate in place.  I think all the rubber was worn off the old one, that plate just falls off.  On the new mount it's difficult to remove that plate.

 

The driver's side had separated completely and that tab is gone too.

Also replaced the left rear caliper on the 99 Outback.

 

We replaced the u-joint steering shaft in the Impreza, both u-joints were tight.

[pontoontodd]

We got mud in the air filter in the Impreza on the last trip so I wanted to change the intake.  I think the main problem is it was pulling air from right in front of the front tire and the plastic wheel well is long gone.  Figured I'd just get it to pull air from a high spot in the engine compartment, that should keep most of the water and mud out.  Also the intake after the filter is 3"+, the pipe before the filter was about 2.5".  I had this 3" exhaust bend lying around so I made a flange and welded it on.

 

Sanded a few of the ribs flush and bolted it on.  Riveted a piece of sheet aluminum to cover the original intake hole.  I also drilled out the drain hole to about 3/4", that always seemed to get plugged with mud.

 

I wanted it a couple inches below the hood so it had plenty of airflow. 

 

We ran a strap around a tree and pulled the radiator support forward.  It worked but I wound up ripping off part of the radiator support/tow bar mount.  It looked like it may have been cracked about halfway through where it broke.  I replaced it with 2" square.  Have to get better washers for where it bolts to the tie down point but I think it will hold.

 

Since the lower radiator mounts are gone or broken I made up this little sleeve to support the radiator with foam in between.

 

I drove to the carwash to blast out the condenser and radiator while the bumper is off.  Steering is much better now, car is running well.

Have to put some weld on the bumper brackets and bolt that back on, try to find a tire leak, secure a fender a little better, and a few other little things.  Cars are pretty much ready to go for the next UP trip later this month.

[scalman]

if i could ask something as you made lots stuff for cars suspension i was wondering why go for very expensive long travel version ? so no cheap or any other version like to take longer struts from other car , they could not fit right away but everything can be redone. is there any reason subarus cant use any other car struts in front and rear ?  like no longer struts then ours ? i mean where is problem to just cut out other car strut mounting points and weld new ones, make new top mountings 

shame subaru got so small support. did you saw renault/dacia duster model that is similar size as forester and its AWD as well with traction control and thy got both lockers and longer shocks for them. like 5cm longer so no need any strut spacers and stuff. poor subaru just have nothing. 

Edited July 4, 2018 by scalman

[pontoontodd]

On 7/4/2018 at 11:08 AM, scalman said:

if i could ask something as you made lots stuff for cars suspension i was wondering why go for very expensive long travel version ? so no cheap or any other version like to take longer struts from other car , they could not fit right away but everything can be redone. is there any reason subarus cant use any other car struts in front and rear ?  like no longer struts then ours ? i mean where is problem to just cut out other car strut mounting points and weld new ones, make new top mountings 

shame subaru got so small support. did you saw renault/dacia duster model that is similar size as forester and its AWD as well with traction control and thy got both lockers and longer shocks for them. like 5cm longer so no need any strut spacers and stuff. poor subaru just have nothing. 

Did you ever look at the X-trail or other struts?  I'm sure you could find something to give you more travel if you're willing to cut and weld.

The other reasons we built our own struts are that the standard replacement struts don't have much damping, the seals blow out, and the bodies bend.  If you're not driving hard that's not a problem.

[scalman]

yes you right i just cant go through harsh road on higher speed or i will be hearing loud metal bang noise everytime i hit something. thats so bad feeling . well i maaxed out mine stock struts now with no sway bars they articulate pretty well on going slow, im faster loosing power to go somewhere then i loose traction. i have too much traction and too weak power on wheels there. engine cant even turn wheels with auto. its just sits there and do nothing. your H6 should give you some more i guess and you love momentum too.  i would choose more power vs long travel. at least some +100hp that would be great. and manual with lower gear then normal dual range can give. 

Edited July 11, 2018 by scalman

[pontoontodd]

24 minutes ago, scalman said:

yes you right i just cant go through harsh road on higher speed or i will be hearing loud metal bang noise everytime i hit something. thats so bad feeling . well i maaxed out mine stock struts now with no sway bars they articulate pretty well on going slow, im faster loosing power to go somewhere then i loose traction. i have too much traction and too weak power on wheels there. engine cant even turn wheels with auto. its just sits there and do nothing. your H6 should give you some more i guess and you love momentum too.  i would choose more power vs long travel. at least some +100hp that would be great. and manual with lower gear then normal dual range can give. 

You would be amazed by the difference the 1.6 low range makes.  It's more than 60% better.  You get 60% more torque multiplication, which helps, but you're also running 60% higher RPM.  Imagine doing a hill at 2500RPM vs 1500RPM, the engine is making much more torque.  Perfect for what you're trying to do.  Unfortunately it seems like every time I pushed it at all it would break or get stuck in low range.  We've talked about rebuilding it and putting it in my friend's Forester with the stock engine and tires but even then we would be afraid it would get stuck in low range.  I have seen people put oil pumps on them to cool the low range but I would worry about that failing and dumping all the oil out of the trans.

Really for slow off roading you're better off with a Toyota or something else with a real low range, lockers, solid axles, bigger tires, etc.

[scalman]

yh problem that gearbox braking or stucking on low gear its not good thing. guess gearbox is not made to do that . so thats that

another thing is that thing you welded there is recovery point ? its strong enough so you could recover all car from mud and such by this ?

[pontoontodd]

15 minutes ago, scalman said:

yh problem that gearbox braking or stucking on low gear its not good thing. guess gearbox is not made to do that . so thats that

another thing is that thing you welded there is recovery point ? its strong enough so you could recover all car from mud and such by this ?

 

The tabs are for flat towing it with a tow bar.  We may find out how strong it is soon.  I plan on welding the front bumper and using that for recovery though.

[pontoontodd]

Since we ripped the front bumper off our friend's Impreza pulling him out of the swamp, I decided to weld the brackets to the front bumper of my Impreza.

 

You can see the one spot weld is already cracked/rusted apart.

 

We also messed with our CB radios a bit.  We have four CBs and tried them in three different cars and seemed to have about 200' of range with any combination.  Better than nothing but very disappointing.

 

We have our cars mostly ready for the next off road trip, so we took apart the dual range trans to see what had failed.  Not surprisingly the high range synchro / baulk ring was badly distorted.  The snapring that holds the hub in place had slid out of the groove, which seems very shallow.

 

Here you can see one of the spring clips that holds the pads had broken.  I don't know if that was cause or effect.  I'm not sure those clips are needed or even helpful since they would normally hold the selector ring in between gears.  In the case of the low range you'd either want it in high or low, not in between.  You can also see the hub fits on the smashed synchro ring, the hub was definitely sliding on the shaft.  At a minimum I plan on cutting the groove in the shaft deeper and getting a different snapring.

 

Also noticed the ring/flange on third gear that is probably supposed to keep you from shifting too far was broken. 

 

Anyone know where to get dual range synchro rings in the US?  I've gotten them from a company in Australia.

 

Other than that I made one control arm for the 2002 Outback.

Edited July 17, 2018 by pontoontodd

[scalman]

On 7/11/2018 at 11:16 PM, pontoontodd said:

 

would be great to see that new control arm. and how much you think travel you will get with your new setup , same as before ?

when i was looking at front suspension i kinda saw that it can travel still more then stock shock let it,  like about 10 cm more then stock shocks if only struts would be 10 cm longer, have more travel 

Edited July 17, 2018 by scalman

[pontoontodd]

On 7/17/2018 at 1:37 PM, scalman said:

 

would be great to see that new control arm. and how much you think travel you will get with your new setup , same as before ?

when i was looking at front suspension i kinda saw that it can travel still more then stock shock let it,  like about 10 cm more then stock shocks if only struts would be 10 cm longer, have more travel 

 

One arm fully welded, another one tack welded in the jig.  Front suspension will be about the same as the first two sets.  Going to make a few minor changes which should make things a little stronger.

 

In the rear I need to take more measurements.  I think I'm going to just get longer shafts and bodies for the shocks before I even put them on and try to get 13-14" of wheel travel.  I really should replace the head gaskets in that car before I take it off road so that's probably a winter project.

[scalman]

Very cool. So this design gives you more space for long struts to move there and doesnt hit anything. Very cool looking. Its strong enough for any hard beating?

[pontoontodd]

23 minutes ago, scalman said:

Very cool. So this design gives you more space for long struts to move there and doesnt hit anything. Very cool looking. Its strong enough for any hard beating?

These are almost identical to what I built for the other two cars.  They seem to hold up well, we've never bent or cracked one.  They move the spindle about an inch forward and an inch out on each side for more wheel travel and better tire clearance.

[pontoontodd]

Six of us drove up to Manistique on Saturday and found a motel where we could leave a couple cars for a few days. Wipers on the Outback were acting up, they would stick about halfway on the downstroke. Usually vibration or bumps would keep them going but not always. Even flipped up the wiper arms and it would still catch, possibly something in the linkage.  We started trail riding in three Subarus around 2PM EST.  After some hours of trail riding in the rain the Outback started misfiring occasionally, usually just at idle or low load/RPM. Generally headed east and wound up at I74 north of St. Ignace. Sault Ste Marie seemed cheaper to stay in than St Ignace and was in the direction we wanted to head so we went up there. They had a 350^th anniversary celebration that weekend so it took us a while to find a couple rooms.

Sunday morning we headed east a ways and got back on the trails. The first trails we hit were excellent just west of Bay Mills.  We headed up to Mission Hill and hiked the last mile or so to the top. Not a very good view, fire tower is gone.  At one point the Impreza got slightly stuck in the soft sand but with a few of us pushing he drove right out of it. We walked around a bit to make sure we didn't get ourselves stuck and found the top of a very steep and tall hillclimb. We could see down at least 100' from the top and there was a jog in the trail. When we got to the bottom we found the start of the hillclimb and could see up about 100' to a jog. According to the topo map it's 200-250' tall.  Probably the tallest steepest hillclimb I've ever seen anywhere. J decided to see what the Outback could do. I was mainly worried about sliding off the side on the way back down but he assured me we'd be fine. We made it up farther than I thought we would and came back down in a controlled fashion. We made our way to the opposite end of the trail R swamped his Forester on last year to find that it was graded and bone dry. Then we took a long west/north/east loop up to Whitefish point.  Picture is a few miles west of Whitefish point along Lake Superior.

Near the end we were on a very soft sandy trail near the lake and B got the Forester stuck. We were able to push him a little ways until he had momentum and drove the rest of the trail. Fortunately J had driven the Impreza off to the side to a firm spot and he was able to get a decent run and drive the trail without any issues. We stopped at Whitefish point for a little while to check it out, not the greatest view without going up in the lighthouse which we didn't want to spend the time and money on. We tried to take a fairly direct route to the bluff we found along lake Superior a couple years ago. Then we took the main gravel road to the lodge and made chicken tacos.

The owner stopped by in the morning and told us not to go on the east/west snowmobile trail just south of the lodge. Some couple from California had flown into Chicago, bought a new car, and drove it up to the UP. Their GPS told them to take the snowmobile trail from Tacquamenon Falls to Pictured Rocks (~70 miles). It eventually turns to two tire tracks with grass in the middle but they kept going. They came to a spot with a curve full of standing water. It's 150' long standing water that they couldn't see the other end of but they drove into it and got the car stuck.  The car had 1300 miles on it at that point.  So the family of four with their dog continued west on foot in the dark for six miles to highway 77 and flagged down a truck. He took them to a spot where they could get cell reception and a simple recovery was tried but they didn't have enough strap/rope/chain to reach 150' to the other end of the water. They got a ride to the nearest motel. The next day they had UP recovery extract it and tow it to the nearest town for $2200.

First thing we did Monday morning was head to the pond we swamped the Impreza in a month ago. We drove the trail leading to it with R in the lead in the Forester, me following in the Outback with cameras on both cars. Near the end there are a few groups of 4-5 dips/jumps that we were hitting much faster than the last time through. On one of the last ones R was several feet in the air sideways but saved it. They said it didn't seem bad in the car but I thought they might wind up in the trees. That separated his LR wheel well / strut tower again so we did the spare tire/2x6 fix again. We got to the pond to find it completely dry. There was a pit in the middle, if C had gone to one side or the other he probably would have been able to drive through. Then we headed southwest to the Driggs river road. The northern section is narrow and winding and fairly entertaining if you're not worrying about oncoming traffic. We stopped and ate lunch at one of the clearings along the river.

When we got to the southern section of the road they had graded all the jumps out of it. Then we headed over to Pictured Rocks and stopped in Munising for gas. Next we headed south to the super whoops near Rapid River. Our friends drove my Outback and the Forester, R and I followed in the Impreza since we'd done the super whoops before a few times with long travel and R hadn't driven the Impreza yet this year. They quickly disappeared. Then we drove to Jack's restaurant to have dinner. Near there were a cool metal sculpture shop and snowmobile museum that were both closed. We headed east on 2 and stopped at the big spring. It has been so dry up there the spring was barely flowing but it's still cool to see with the deep clear water and big fish. We drove back to Manistique. A few of our friends started back home and we stayed at the motel for the night.

Tuesday morning we did a big loop to the north and hit a few small jumps. Outback misfired most of the way home but didn't run hot. Kept getting a misfire cylinder #2 code and torque converter clutch code. Stopped north of Milwaukee, ate at a Mexican restaurant, and filled up with gas. Outback took 18 gallons despite reading half full. Forester took a total of nine quarts of oil by that point in the weekend. Between the engine, body, and gas tank starting to leak it's definitely time to part it out and start with a rust free car.

Overall a great weekend, probably 500 miles of trail riding.  No major breakdowns and only got stuck about a half dozen times and never for long.

Edited July 25, 2018 by pontoontodd

[scalman]

great trip. its amazing how you can drive on beach so near to sea there. we cant drive anywhere near sea or beach in our country. well i did it once in winter when noone saw haha. but its nogo areas here. 

[pontoontodd]

1 minute ago, scalman said:

great trip. its amazing how you can drive on beach so near to sea there. we cant drive anywhere near sea or beach in our country. well i did it once in winter when noone saw haha. but its nogo areas here. 

There is only one place I know of in Michigan where you can drive on the beach.  The beach there is tailings (gravel left over from mining).  It's already polluted so you can drive on it.  You can't drive on the beach in Michigan anywhere else I've been.  You're not even supposed to drive through rivers or streams up there and you rarely see stream crossings on trails even though there are a lot of rivers and streams.

You can drive on the beach along the ocean in the US in some places.

[scalman]

another thing if i may ask. so you saw 2001 outback air intake and what you think of it ? it goes straight from front so any water it should suck to filter i would think yes ? you will use there snorkel or maybe some other design there ? im really scared to go trough deeper waters with that design air intake, so is there only one solution snorkel ? like you made some design for impreza, maybe something coud be done for those outbacks that dont need full snorkel , or like temporary soft snorkel just for water trips and then you back to normal on roads. 

[pontoontodd]

1 hour ago, scalman said:

another thing if i may ask. so you saw 2001 outback air intake and what you think of it ? it goes straight from front so any water it should suck to filter i would think yes ? you will use there snorkel or maybe some other design there ? im really scared to go trough deeper waters with that design air intake, so is there only one solution snorkel ? like you made some design for impreza, maybe something coud be done for those outbacks that dont need full snorkel , or like temporary soft snorkel just for water trips and then you back to normal on roads. 

I would probably keep it stock at first.  The H6 has the air filter mounted in front of the wheel well like the MAF EJ cars.  With the MAF EJ cars the filter gets wet and kills the engine but it's far enough from the throttle that not much gets in the engine.  Just replace the filter and start it back up.  Eventually I would probably put in a centrifugal filter like the one I have now from a Chevy van.

Your car has the filter by the throttle, right?  It seems like with that design when the filter gets wet water gets in the engine.  You should definitely make up some kind of snorkel.

[pontoontodd]

I figured out why the Outback wipers were catching. One of the links was rubbing on the sheet metal cowl behind the wiper motor. There was a plastic clip in the middle of that the link was catching on. I popped that out and the link was still rubbing on the sheet metal. I tried prying the sheet metal up with much success but did pop the link off the wiper motor, which is a real pain to get back on.

 

While doing that I noticed the cowl on the driver's side was cracked.

 

I took the driver's side fender off because the wiper hose had fallen down and I wanted to bend the bottom of the fender away from the tire. When I took it off I discovered the sheet metal was completely separated again where I had seam welded it.

 

We were able to use the come along from the door hinges to the front bumper to mostly close the gap and I welded it completely top to bottom this time and in a bunch of other spots and hit it with some spray paint.

 

The next day I took the battery out of the 1999 Outback to replace the #2 coil pack and spark plug. Before I got to those I noticed the fuel injector plug looked a little loose. I plugged it in a few times and it only occasionally latched. I plugged it in a bunch more times to clean off any corrosion on the pins and made sure it was latched. Put the battery back in and it runs great now. I probably didn't get that plugged in all the way when I did the valve cover gaskets a month ago and then it came loose while we were trail riding.

I cleaned out the back seat area so I could put down a piece of insulation above the muffler since a garbage bag I'd put back there melted to my backpack last weekend. While I was doing that I noticed the seat belt buckle was melted to the floor. Got that all cleaned up and cut a piece of 2” foam aluminum backed insulation to sit above the muffler.

Checked the rear diff fluid, rear wheel bearings and brake pads on the 1999 Outback.

 

I had checked the air filter on the Impreza and it was a little dusty but had no mud on it this time so the new intake seems like an improvement. I also figured out the AC fuse was blown, it was only 10A so I put in a 15A. That seems to power all the AC relays in the fusebox. So the fan is back to running with the ignition on, I cleaned up that wiring a little too. My friend got the hood prop working, it's been sitting in the back of the car for about six years. He also got the brake light and wiper on the hatch working, I'm not sure if those have ever worked since I bought the car. Looks like someone had swapped the hatch and just cut and spliced the wires rather than trying to find the harness plug. Most of the wires were broken or almost broken.  The Impreza might be in better shape now than it was at the start of the year.

 

Then we did some mock up on the 2001 Outback rear suspension. Looks like I need a longer shock shaft and body and a drop bracket for the bottom shock mount, then we can get about 12” of travel. While I'm at it I'm going to put 7/8” shock shafts, glands, and bigger bearing ends on the shocks. The smaller bearings seem to wear out fast. I might just get new shocks and sell these old ones rather than replacing 75% of the parts and having a pile of parts that are not worth much. Limitation in bump is something binding and the bump plate on the arm almost hitting the one on the frame (stock bump stop removed). Limitation in droop is the upper link hitting the subframe. Eventually, especially if the stock links don't hold up, we may make longer lateral links for more travel and a little wider track.

Dug around for springs but the only ones I have that are long enough are too soft for the multilink.

[slammo]

Will using longer lateral links in the rear require modification of the trailing arms or axle?

Edited August 3, 2018 by slammo

[pontoontodd]

1 hour ago, slammo said:

Will using longer lateral links in the rear require modification of the trailing arms or axle?

Hopefully they could be about an inch longer while still using the stock trailing arms and CV axles.  Something to measure later.  The top link is short, an extra inch on that would go a long ways.

[scalman]

Did those gen outback cant use any other subaru or other cars links that ate longer and just fits in? So only way are those lile whiteline and similar names? When i did MOT they where looking hard do i have some modifications on links. I guess if i would have aftermarket ones they wouldnt like that. 

Edited August 3, 2018 by scalman