Lilchopshop’s Subaru Conversion Project, Making it up as I go Options

[Lilchopshop]

Hi All,
My name is Aaron. I've been lurking on this site for years, learning from all of you who are kind enough to share your projects and the challenges that go along with them. In an attempt to keep me motivated on my project and as a way to create a place for me to ask questions as they come up (which they will, frequently), I decided it was time to start a proper build thread. I’m not a novice when it comes to tools, fabricating and most things automotive, but I’ve never attempted an engine swap before, and most things electrical tend to stress me out. That being said, I love a good challenge and I’m not afraid to fail.

I purchased this car in February of 2020, just before Covid lockdown. I got off to a pretty good start repairing the rust and trying to make a solid chassis for what I thought was going to be a stock-ish restoration (some of that work documented here: http://www.914world.com/bbs2/index.php?sho...ty+jack+points). Then, after watching all the great engine-swap builds on this site, I changed my mind. I knew I wanted more horsepower, but I couldn’t justify the cost of an air-cooled Porsche 6-cyl and I didn’t want to lose the trunk to a big V8. For a while, I was considering keeping the original engine from the car and using a tunable fuel injection package, but for the total cost, the bang for the buck just didn’t seem there. So, I settled on the Suby engine. After some research and some purchasing mistakes, I ended up buying a 2002 legacy outback donor vehicle with an EG25 engine. I harvested the engine, the ECU and whatever else seemed valuable. After selling off the old Porsche engine, transmission, all of the FI components and the saleable parts from the donor Subaru, I probably ended up in the black, financially.

Since buying the car in 2020, I’ve gotten pulled away by many other, more important projects, so I’ve only been able to do little stints of work on the car. I’m optimistic this time, that I will be able to finally dedicate some quality time this winter and hopefully make some real headway. I haven’t been great at documenting the little things I’ve done on the car in the last 2 years, so I’ll start this thread off with some of the things I did actually get pictures of and a summary of where I’m at now.

The day we met:
The first attempt at a Suby Engine (EJ22):
The second attempt (complete donor vehicle):
My crazy, home-built cable shift linkage:
My home-built engine cradle:
Shifter from a boxter (slightly modified):
Some suspension ear reinforcement:

[Lilchopshop]

Well, a year went by since my last post… good thing I don’t have a deadline for this build! Over the last couple of months, I have been able to spend some more time on the car. Here are some progress pictures.

To get back into things and to test out my new welder, I thought I’d try making a shortened oil pan. I know these can be bought, but I wanted the exercise and I knew a homemade version would be cheaper. Started by cutting up a spare to see how things looked.

First I thought I’d try to keep the original bottom section with the drain plug, but it seemed like it was going to be too hard to join the parts back together and get it to look good like this.


So I decided I would make a new, flatter bottom and I cut up the brand new pan I bought from Amazon. I made my own transition section to retain some of the volume. I also shortened the pick-up tube.




Then, after a lot of forming, welding, grinding, checking for leaks, re-welding and more grinding, I ended up with this. I bought a low profile drain plug because the stock plug stuck down farther than I wanted. I measured the volume of the finished product and it’s about 1/2 quart less than the stock pan. That doesn’t seem like a huge problem to me, but I’m willing to listen to opinions from others.