2003 - BP5 Subaru Legacy GT-B

[dontfearmegypsy]

Hi,

Looking to change car soon and have seen a few of the above mentioned Subaru Legacy's.

Are there any commons issues or faults to look out for on these? Whats the maintenance like also?

Cheers

[Konan]

Maintainence isn't really any worse than a domestic Subaru. Simple enough to work on. Most services are cheap but the major ones (cambelt, sparks, fluids) make up for it as they're labourious. JDM specific parts are well catered for by a parts dealer who do OEM Subaru bits a lot cheaper than Subaru.

Stock map needs at least 99 octane fuel. The engines arn't all forged and run higher copression than most EJs, so they're sensetive to poor fuel. Either be prepared to run Shell V Power (or momentum) or get it mapped. Also worth investing a few quid in a bluetooth reader so you can health check it on occasion.

Usual hunger for bits of suspension. Bushes at the back of the lower arms always rip (stick a poly in just that part) and knocky drop links arn't uncommon. Not expensive or hard to change tho. Original spec Bilstein shocks can be a wait if you need those.

[dontfearmegypsy]

Thanks for the info much appreciated!

Being a complete Subaru newbie, I see alot of ads(mainly imprezas) of engines being rebuilt etc is this down to poor maintenance/car being ragged constantly or just a typical "Subaru" thing?

[Konan]

dontfearmegypsy said:

Thanks for the info much appreciated!

Being a complete Subaru newbie, I see alot of ads(mainly imprezas) of engines being rebuilt etc is this down to poor maintenance/car being ragged constantly or just a typical "Subaru" thing?

Yes and no.

It's widely accepted that the 2.5 engines in stock form arn't all that cracking. If you're seeing a spares/repairs add with one of those, it's probably piston issues. But you're looking at a 2.0 here so don't worry about that bit.

Subaru engines don't have many 'inherant faults' as such, and will run reliably for big miles, but you need to be attentive to a few things. Ignore these, and you'll possibly be rewarded with some very nasty banging sounds and bits of metal where they shouldn't be.

You're looking at a JDM GTB car, so EJ20X or Y. You have to be a little more careful with these as they're higher compression and the stock map is for 100 octane.

1) No bad fuel. The engine is ali, bearings are small and parts are not all forged. You can't ignore a bit of det like you might on a cast iron turbo motor! Have it mapped to UK fuel or, at least, have learning tables checked for recorded knock after some use. Mine's OK on 99 shell, but I've still pulled a degree of timing at the very top end.

2) Watch the oil and pump. They're very sensitive to any issue in the oil system. People talk about 3K changes, although I do mine at 5K as I do reasonably high milage and don't drive hard. Any pressure issues, the bottom end will spin things.

3) Don't 'bolt on' tune. The ECU is well supported for remapping and has a good level of control - things like boost controllers are asking for it.

I've put 150,000 miles on EJ20 engines in one form or another - stock WRX, Legacy GT, 300 horse WRX on track - and not had an issue. But I've also seen a few examples online of people getting unlucky with a rod through the block. My personal take is that if one is going to let go - it'll do it in style, and a few cars out there will have been driven hard, on 95 fuel with no specialist care (like making sure the MAF/Lambda sensors are happy) and they will go pop.

Before I buy - I do tend to plug into the ECU and check to see if it's pulling timing badly. Went to see one with a friend and it was a sick sick car - but you could kind of tell from the general state of everything else it was a dog.... it snapped an aux belt on the test drive!