First time, lots of questions.

[Corinthian]

Hello,

Sorry if I seem ignorant about everything, but I'm new to computers and I'm new to subarus. And the truth is you all intimidate me with all your brains and everything. So my situation/question, without sounding like a complete idiot, is that today I just got a '84 AWD Subaru GL for FREE! I thought I was getting someones trash, but its a cool car. Anyways I have been looking for a project car for a while now, and I need to know how to get more power out of this car. There are three factors that need to be taken into consideration when doing this. 1)Fun. 2)Money. 3)Difficulty. Basicly I'm not rich, I'm not a master fabricator, but I do want to go fast. The car already has 200k miles on it and needs some work, and I was thinking of buying a new engine for it. A better engine. And I was wondering about bolt patterns between the transmition and the engine. If say a 2.2L would bolt in where my 1.8L used to be? Can any one help me? Has anyone ever done this before? Or is there a funner, easier, cheaper option or should I give up and go back to my Civics? Please Help!?!

[Flowmastered87GL]

Well if you want to make your car a rocket, it will either take another engine, (transplant) which will most likely take some fab work. There adapter plates and stuff out there and they do work well, but you still need to make sure you have all the wiring harness and everything from the donor car.

 

Another option is to rebuild your current engine and put in a hot camshaft. Maybe you can up it from 76 or so HP up to around 125 or more! a Weber 32/36 carb will give more power too.

 

If the engine has good compression right now, I would suggest freeing up the exhaust and installing the weber carb for now. When you can save up some money try either swapping in another drivetrain, or rebuild the engine.

 

IF you are feeling adventurous maybe buy a wrecked WRX and take all its goodies and stick em in your car. For the least amount of fab though, just stick with a carb and exhaust, the move up... this car will never be a drag racer, though its a hell of a rally car.

[baccaruda]

i'd advise you to look in the Retrofitting forum and read about the 2.2 swaps occurring. I'm doing one myself and there is NO single step or procedure which is prohibitively difficult. the cost will depend on what kind of deal you can get on a donor engine/electrics. the whole thing is sort of tedious but if you think it makes sense, then you can probably handle it.

[Corinthian]

Thanks for the responses. I'm planing on doing a compression test early next week, so I guess I'll see how that goes. But If you guys know where I could find these adapter plates maybe I could also do some research in the engine swap direction. There are a lot of junkyards in my area. WRXs may be hard to come by, but Legacys and Imprezas probably not so hard. I know dragracer not likely, impressive good potential! And I've always had the dream of a car that looked like a beater and ran like a dream, I'm sure everyone does. I'll make sure to check out some of the other forums see if I can find anything on this poticular subject. Also is there a book or something that could help me with the wireing?

[s'ko]

Thanks for the responses. I'm planing on doing a compression test early next week, so I guess I'll see how that goes. But If you guys know where I could find these adapter plates maybe I could also do some research in the engine swap direction. There are a lot of junkyards in my area. WRXs may be hard to come by, but Legacys and Imprezas probably not so hard. I know dragracer not likely, impressive good potential! And I've always had the dream of a car that looked like a beater and ran like a dream, I'm sure everyone does. I'll make sure to check out some of the other forums see if I can find anything on this poticular subject. Also is there a book or something that could help me with the wireing?

 

First question is what do you plan to do with it? Like do you want to drive on the street mostly, do you want to off-road. etc.

 

Before we get into adapter plates is do you want to keep the dual range tranny. If not, then you don't have to worry about the adapter. You can use the whole driveline from the donor car. That way you have basically get an Legacy/Impreza w/a 80s body.

 

There really is no formal printed material about doing this swap, there are plenty of people on the board who have done it. Just spend some time in the Retrofitting forum and see who has completed the swap.

 

Good luck and congrats on your great find.

 

BW

[SuBrat84]

Ea81 or 82 Turbo.. or EJ22 Turbo.. .. the ea81 Turbo, harder to find would be a direct swap.. but you'd need the ecu too.. EJ22 Turbo isn't a direct fit but it's not too hard, from what I understand, to get the plates to match it up. the 2.2 T is the way to go if you want a "sleeper"!! The ea82t would be great though.. out of like an RX or XT (Turbo)...