The BlueBaru CX Racing Turbo Rebuild

[spicyricecake]

Man another FRS bumper on a rally blue BRZ. This is gonna be good

[TurboBRZ]

Originally Posted by D_Thissen

Love the FRS bumper in WRB. Will you be using the BRZ headlights?

Yes sir, the stock BRZ HID headlights and fog lights + the FR-S turn signals (aftermarket) with daytime running lamps. I agree with you - man that FR-S bumper in WRB looks awesome.

[TurboBRZ]

First and foremost I have to give a huge thank you to Platinum Paint and Body in Fort Lauderdale, FL. From start to finish these people were amazing to work with, as honest as I've ever met, and they do a phenomenal job for a great price. I couldn't be happier with the work they've done thus far and highly recommend them to anyone in the Miami/Dade/Broward area.

Also a big shout out to AAA who towed my car for free thanks to their awesome membership service... Saves me so much money every year!

I picked up the car today and it looks amazing. For $2k I got the firewall and apron pulled, some major dents removed from the rocker panels and doors, the hood, engine bay and under fenders painted in base coat, an extra rubberized coat to the outer fender well, additional seam sealer, plus painting the hood, bumper, fenders and blending in the doors and rear quarter panels after spraying the rocker panels with PPG paint. The price also includes a wet sand and buff plus wax that I will bring it back for in 30-45 days after the paint has cured.

And just for the hell of it, I had them spray the engine subframe in World Rally Blue with the rest of the engine bay - my own personal flair on this car. After all, it is the Bluebaru...

Now she is back in the garage where she belongs, ready to have her heart dropped back in. Time to get to work!

[swarb]

Originally Posted by TurboBRZ

The panels were shot with PPG paint with clear coat (like the factory), and by the time it is done you won't be able to tell it was ever in a wreck.

You can tell because the paint will be better than the original.

[TurboBRZ]

I had a few extra minutes to relax after lunch and thought I'd update you with where I'm at.

Last night I began the engine installation and got it into the mounts with most of the electrical hooked up. This morning I mounted the transmission and then took a lunch break.

I'm going to be connecting the drive-shaft, exhaust hoses, etc... and installing the oil cooler and fuel pump today if I have enough time.

[TurboBRZ]

So that took a little longer than expected... I tried getting the FMIC installed with the headlights removed - yeah, don't do that. No matter what I tried I couldn't get the headlights in... So that was a few wasted hours.

To anyone that gets this kit - leave the headlights in and install the intercooler piping through those tiny little holes that are literally the size of the pipe. It will save you some time and hassle.

The blitz intake filter I bought is too big, so I have the C4 on order to replace the crappy filter that came with the kit.

I gotta go to the dealer tomorrow and get some gear oil that spilled from the transmission and a new crush seal for the oil drain so I can fill er up with oil. I put in almost 2 gallons of Subaru coolant today and will do the rest when the car fires up.

Oil cooler is installed on the passenger side front with a nice little cooling fan I have yet to wire in. I'm considering having it kick on with the radiator cooling fans, I would simply need to wire a relay for it. I will likely put in a secondary switch as well that lets me turn it on inside when I'm at the track.

All parts used to rebuild this car were genuine Subaru, down to the impact beam on the bumper. I don't like to leave stuff like this out.

Still left to do: re-install the lower dash, clean interior, install Innovate SC-2 gauge/hardware, install Deatschwerks fuel pump and connect the vacuum lines on the engine. Bleed brakes, bleed clutch slave, fill oil, fill transmission, and finish filling the coolant.

Oh yeah, my transmission mount was really banged up, so I gotta do that to once it gets in on Tuesday. Here are the last of the "build" photos. Thanks for following along!

[avishenoy1]

Wow, looks amazing!

[P3tras]

I need oil cooler as well! Yesterday I had first track day and 0W20 oil overheats in seconds. In 3 laps (~9km or 5.5mile) oil reaches temps above 120 degrees Celsius or ~250F.

[TurboBRZ]

Originally Posted by P3tras

I need oil cooler as well! Yesterday I had first track day and 0W20 oil overheats in seconds. In 3 laps (~9km or 5.5mile) oil reaches temps above 120 degrees Celsius or ~250F.

I'm using 5w30 synthetic - it's what comes standard in the WRX turbo motors. I figured the oil cooler may not be enough in itself, so I bought the cooling fan in case I need a bit extra. The last thing I want is to be burning oil with a turbo.

[TurboBRZ]

For what it's worth - I tried firing up the car and it wouldn't start unless I sprayed carb cleaner into the intake piping. Through help from another member on a different thread it was determined that the cause of my issue was installing the 4bar MAP sensor before the car had been taken in to the tuner. Once replaced with the factory MAP sensor it started up.

[superleggera]

this is awesome, great work man. I really cant wait to see it finished.

[AG3NT_5CARFAC3]

Awesome build thread how does it feel to drive the car?

[TurboBRZ]

Update - so initially the car wouldn't start due to the new MAP sensor being installed, and then after swapping it with the stock one I could get it to idle after a while of feathering the throttle, but it took some trying. This was due to the MAF being in a larger tube than the stock one and needing to be re-calibrated/tuned.

So I disconnected the MAF to put the engine into limp mode and it started right up and idles perfect... only problem is I now have two leaks sprung from this stock-replacement radiator I got. So I contacted the company to get a refund and bought a Koyo that should be here in about a week. I am ordering up some slim 12" cooling fans for the Koyo as there is hardly any space with that turbo in there.

On a side note the wastegate on this turbo kit is dumping exhaust out the dump tube at idle... whether it is connected to a vacuum line or not. I contacted CX Racing and they are reimbursing my $50 for the wastegate. I went ahead and bought a 38mm TIAL replacement with a .5bar spring.

The guy who will be tuning the car also commented on these blow off valves that came with my kit and sell by the hundreds on ebay, saying that they are prone to leaking like the wastegate. So I went ahead and ordered up a Greddy FX BOV that should be here in about 3-4 days. What started out as a pretty crappy/cheap turbo kit is now turning out to be halfway decent.

Now I gotta rip everything back apart and get this thing back together again before my rebuild inspection on the 5th... I won't be able to drive it legally until the 3rd of August when I get my temp tag.

[TurboBRZ]

When I was going to put my transmission back in last week the mount just wasn't lining up - so I took it off to see if it had been tweaked in the accident, and sure enough it had.



So I ordered up a reinforced transmission mount from Megan Racing (left) which has a lot more bushing material than the factory mount. The only problem is my transmission still won't shift into 2nd gear

I have the Perrin bushing for the rear part of the transmission/shifter that should arrive soon, and if that doesn't solve the problem it means I have to dump another $2k into this car! $850 for a transmission + $1000 for clutch and flywheel as I'm not taking this trans off a 3rd time to do it, and whatever other little things are found... I've given this car a lot of love, I'm just waiting for her to love me back.