The call of C'thulhu

[Turkish]

Hey look! Phase 2 arrived! Reverse lights and fog lights, won't be installing the fog light bulbs until the fog lights get installed obviously... but will definitely be installing the reverse bulbs tonight. I will try and figure out how I will capture pictures of the before and after, but I think I may forgo those for now as I am just one person... I may find some ingenuity though!

[Turkish]

Got the reverse lights installed right as the sun was going down. Pics of the before and after. Installation was a little interesting, I think I may have snapped one of the bulb enclosure things by twisting it too far. If I have problems, I may be springing for a replacement. That said, I am definitely in love with the increased visibility.

Before:



After (Stage 2):

[SirBrass]

So, besides a fixation on lovecraftian horrors, why C'thulhu? Anything you plan to do to the car to make her more c'thulhu-ish?

I do hope you plan to piss off many edler gods with your build

[Turkish]

Well, the initial inspiration was that with my first sports car, it would consume my dreams and waking thoughts. Which it does. Also, it unleashes plenty of chaos on the street, particularly from other drivers rubber necking. I actually chose the name after EVERYONE asked me what I was going to name it, is it a boy or a girl, etc.

Edit: never really answered your first question, I plan on going with a Blue/black color scheme and will slowly but surely get there. I am leaning more heavily towards New Idea #1 from post #23 for the headlight "blackout".

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[SirBrass]

With a name like that, though you have to at least do demon eyes... ;-)

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[Turkish]

Originally Posted by SirBrass

With a name like that, though you have to at least do demon eyes... ;-)

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Oh I plan to, I'm thinking blue led's tied to the drl's. Red doesn't fit the scheme.

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[Turkish]

Well, would you look at that. I may be 10 miles early, but I do think I am broken in. Time to make the pavement cry.

[Turkish]

Well, I got back from my vacation last night and I was greeted with a most wonderful sight at my doorstep, a box with UPS stickers! Can you guess what was inside? Well, I hate suspense so here is what was inside!





Here are some pics comparing the PERRIN tips to the USDM OEM tips.




And here is the final pic, I will probably tinker with the fine tuning of placement and all that over the next few weeks or so.



Overall, I am pretty impressed with how much of an improvement over stock these add to the cosmetic appeal of the car. Oh and sorry for the crappy smart phone pics, my camera is buried in my luggage somewhere and I didn't have the patience to search for it quite yet.

Thanks to @FT-86 SpeedFactory for shipping these out, they tend to get back ordered so if you're interested in these, you may have to wait a bit. I had to wait about a month for mine.

[Turkish]

Just ordered amber stage 2 LED front blinkers, red stage 2 rear blinkers, and the LED flasher relay from @Diode Dynamics for phase 3, and possibly the final phase of LED bulb swap. I am waiting to see how the OEM bulbs look in conjunction with the white fog bulbs I ordered previously; fog lights get installed with a few other things that I was waiting on my dealer to get in while I was on vacay! Yay for something always being on the horizon!

A hint for further in the future, my next mod after finishing the LED bulbs will most likely be either the catted UEL headers from @FT-86 SpeedFactory or Enkei RPF1 with Michelin PSS. Yay performance modifications!

Correction: most likely my next purchase will be mudflaps as those are pretty much a requirement for central Texas.

[MysteryMachine]

Which mud flaps are you getting? I didn't think they were a requirement here - until i drove the brz in the rain (which it actually does in Austin unlike other parts of texas). All the sand and crap that blows onto the road between rains then gets splattered all over the car - and caked on sand is quite scary to try to wash off. (I think my next upgrade purchase will need to be a pressure washer!) I am not a huge fan of the OEM or the Rally Armor which seem to be the 2 available for this car. I am looking for something more subdued than either of those - please let me know if you've seen other options.

Thanks for the before / after reverse pics. I've been looking at doing that but I didn't trust the marketing pics from the LED dealers. Also good call on LED Fogs - the stock BRZ ones look weird because you have the very nice bright white headlights with the high intensity and the LEDs but the stock fogs are normal bulb which looks weak and warm colored. I wish they would have either gone with actual yellow fogs or done LED from the beginning. Also trunk light looks great - you sold me. Do you find the cabin LED too bright when coming in from the dark?

[Turkish]

Originally Posted by MysteryMachine

Which mud flaps are you getting? I didn't think they were a requirement here - until i drove the brz in the rain (which it actually does in Austin unlike other parts of texas). All the sand and crap that blows onto the road between rains then gets splattered all over the car - and caked on sand is quite scary to try to wash off. (I think my next upgrade purchase will need to be a pressure washer!) I am not a huge fan of the OEM or the Rally Armor which seem to be the 2 available for this car. I am looking for something more subdued than either of those - please let me know if you've seen other options.

Thanks for the before / after reverse pics. I've been looking at doing that but I didn't trust the marketing pics from the LED dealers. Also good call on LED Fogs - the stock BRZ ones look weird because you have the very nice bright white headlights with the high intensity and the LEDs but the stock fogs are normal bulb which looks weak and warm colored. I wish they would have either gone with actual yellow fogs or done LED from the beginning. Also trunk light looks great - you sold me. Do you find the cabin LED too bright when coming in from the dark?

I haven't seen any other options yet, but I kind of like the rally armor between the options of oem and rally armor with the color matching text. I'll be looking a lot more extensively after I get a couple large bills paid in the next couple weeks. I have seen the black with red text on a red frs and thought it looked sporty and the lines looked a lot nicer in person (my own opinion). I got the middle of the road brightness for the cabin and I love it, I think the stage 3 (same as the trunk LED i have) would be too bright. At night I can see everything in my cabin and read notes or a map if I need to, obviously not while driving. Stage 1 might be nice too, but I was not happy with the stock bulb which didn't really help me see anything inside the cabin at night. Also, the car gradually turns on the cabin light so it is not a BAM and you're blind thing either.

[JS + BRZ]

That Perrin exhaust tip looks pretty legit. haha

Looks good man.

[Husker BRZ]

I love the way the Perrin tips look! I was wanting to do the same thing on mine seeing as how I probably won't be getting the Perrin exhaust anytime soon, I was thinking this was a great alternative. That being said I haven't messed with exhaust on a car before so how hard was it to swap out the OEM tips to the Perrin?

Thanks for any info in advance!

[Turkish]

Originally Posted by Husker BRZ

I love the way the Perrin tips look! I was wanting to do the same thing on mine seeing as how I probably won't be getting the Perrin exhaust anytime soon, I was thinking this was a great alternative. That being said I haven't messed with exhaust on a car before so how hard was it to swap out the OEM tips to the Perrin?

Thanks for any info in advance!

Have some penetrating oil on hand, as corrosion will make the bolts stick. Each tip had one bolt on the bottom, but I didn't need to jack the car up to access it, although it would have made it more comfortable. Honestly, the hardest part is getting the new tips aligned correctly. I need to readjust a tiny bit, but I may leave it unless other people mention something when they see it lol.

I believe I used a 12mm socket to remove the oem tips and 13mm for the Perrin, or it may have been 11mm and 12mm respectively? The nut on the Perrin clamp was 1mm larger than the bolt on the oem tip.