I am pretty sure those are stock VW buss (100mm CV's) axles the flanges are the ones I made for the group buys.

WOW!
Fantastic job.
Makes me want to grind out all my welds and start over.
Now, I can look forward to the day my Porsche transaxle disintegrates.
Thanks for rewriting the manual.

Amazing subaru build! One of the best if not the best engineering wise I have ever seen.. If your man at 1340 wants to offer a kit to a WRX wannabe in the UK let me know

one of my all-time favorites.

can you break down the cost.

engine/trans?

all fab, material, labor (ballpark) ?

misc?

thanks
jim

Many question! What yr sti did you pick and why? Does your stand alone ecu make everything work ( sti heads/valves). Does it have an immobilizer? Could would have used the stock ecu? Does the wrx trans control the speedo? I got a say that this is perfectly what I want. Now I just gotta get the money!

Sweetness. Great to see the newest thinking in the Suby conversions, which is in my opinion, the best option for 914 IC engine conversions.

I have missed way too many AX races this year...started strong and now off track due to lots of work. Honestly, if you set up your 914 for the best AX time, you loose that road safety factor. Understeer in the mountains is way safer than too much oversteer! With all that juice, creating throttle oversteer should not be a problem.

woops, double post, delete me
this website never loads my posts right

I want one

Sorry I haven't been around lately, lots of things have happened. Got downsized, started a new company, got it off the ground and then almost immediately wadded up a new motorcycle. Am still recovering, one of those life gets in the way things. I've been getting a lot of personal messages about the build. I've tried to respond to all but probably haven't done it quickly or well. Sorry, been really busy.

As a progress update I don't expect to be in California as often in the future so drove the car back to Texas. No drama, the thing's excellent on the superslab. Hot, humid, and not as many curves in the roads back here, so need to finish the A/C. Bummer. We went through the Falken Azenis so now into some Kumho Ecsta XS's, hoping for a little more DOT grip. Don't want to flare it.

I don't know what else to say. It just runs, runs great, and you can't seem beat it hard enough to make it notice. I was pretty sure my kids would find its limits, but they didn't, and that's from a $600 Craigslist motor. And that may be the coolest thing. It's not an antique, so if I ever break this sucker I know there are cheap and easy replacements nearby. I was keeping an eye out for an STI motor to put in the corner of the garage as a spare, but don't really see the need any more.

Anyway let me know if I can tell you anything else, or help in any way.

Paul sure sorry to hear about your crash, hopefully not too serious. I hope your recovery is quick and you can get on with life. You've been a huge help to me and my project and provided some fantastic 914-suby inspiration. Look forward to seeing some more videos in the future!

simply WOW!

Fantastic. Very impressive indeed.

Where did you get the red bushings?



-Britain

Has anyone considered fabricating & selling the cradle mounts to run the wrx motor & trans in the 914?

I am going to do this conversion, but I do not have the skills/equipment to tackle the cradle.


Maybe someone already does this?

Any hints from you master fabricators out there?

I have built two already and could build you another if need be. I know I need to build at least one more. Mine have been built for the FWD Legacy gear boxes, so the WRX will require a little different arrangement. I don't have one of those on hand.

you could look at mine

I guess step one is acquire the engine & trans package, then find a fabricator here on the forum or locally to fabricate one.

It would be quite easy for one of the folks running WRX engine/trans packages, to make a drawing with dimensions for others attempting this conversion.

What a great build and car.

I have never been much of a Porscharu fan as most of them result in a serious compromise that I am unwilling to take, but this one is beautiful!

Very well done.

Yes,
If I ever get the time (the swap is currently in position 3 on my list of stuff to do) I will have mounts and jigs made and will start producing them.
Steve

Hey - I resemble that remark

Steve,

That's great!!

I see that you are local bay area as well

Just got back from an after-dinner blast through the back roads north of Houston, just plain excellent. Just clicked over 5000 miles on the transmission part of the conversion without needing a thing. Nothing. No thing, not even a bolt that needed to be tightened. It had some 4000 miles on the engine swap before we did the transmission, and the only problem we've had was a snapped CV joint at the drag strip when the kids put on some slicks, trying to get it into the 12's. So that's 9000 miles of Subaru power without a hiccup... and everyone who's driven it has beaten the hell out of it. I'm still hugely impressed and couldn't be more pleased. What a car. Well done, Porsche.

Good to hear she's still going strong. I've got almost 1000 miles on mine, way too much fun. Hope to see your car in person someday.

Are you using a cable or hydraulic clutch? If hydraulic, how did you set up the peddles? If cable, how did you attach the cable at the TO fork.

I used Tilton pedals to get a hydraulic M/C (read the whole thread, it's described with photos). Only down side is that using the smallest available Howe M/C's I still have too much pedal pressure (Carrera front calipers, 914 front on the rear), so I'm looking to convert to calipers with bigger pistons.

Check Brittain's thread HERE where he addressed that. I know I also saw someone who used an early Subaru transaxle with the clutch cable... that's right it was Sawtooth's thread HERE

In my thread and those other two you'll see different ways of mounting the transaxle and all the other little things you need to do. It's nice that there are enough of these now that you can compare and choose the way you prefer to do things. For example I got custom adapter flanges made by Porscharu HERE. I don't know if he has any left, but if not you can get more from Bremar in Australia (fast shipping) or get Swayaway to cut some Subaru splines into 914 (or maybe even 944) axles. There are several threads here about using the outer 944 stub axles and CV joints, probably a good idea if you're going racing.

You'll be REALLY happy with the conversion, the improvement is ridiculous.

.

Now I'm using a later non turbo trans from a 2001 forester, which also uses a clutch cable. I used a heavy push-pull cable and mounted a bulkhead in the front of the tunnel. It works and feels fantastic. Like dbcooper said, lots of subaru options these days.

Hi newbie here,
I've been following Jeff's work on ShopTalkForum.com, and really inspired me to do the Subaru conversion, expecially I had so many parts to my 914 were missing: engine, transaxle, all the cooling tins, FI stuff plus more. (Long story over 10 years, don't want to talk about it; some people you meet along a way in your life just don't seem to be what they are)

Anyway,
Originally, I was sourcing a JDM WRX EJ20 motor/gearbox combo; hoping to get 200+ish Hp to the rear wheels, but ended up the motor to be the 98' JDM WRX STi RA V4 motor with vf22 turbo (rated 280ps, and possibly up to 300chp stock? ) with the Sti gear box TY752vbcaa (4.44 FD)
A little more than what I intended to do, but extra hp is nice?
The only thing I'm really worried about is the old Subaru Gear box, can it handle the amount of torque was originally set for awd, now to a 2wd?

And question on the origianl Air to Air IC you had, did you have major issue of not cooling the air sufficient enough? Will it hurt the turbo or over heating it?
I was thinking to do just the air to air right now (rather than the water to air) to save some more plumbing (fabrication) and weight.

Currently it's in a Fab shop getting de-rust and metal work done; since I can't weld.
The front will ahve a 87' 911 Carerra suspension with Aluminum cross member.
I'll have the front 986 Boxster caliper with 24mm Carerra rotors
and the rears will be 986 Boxster caliper with 20mm 911 venter rotor with E-brakes.
The car will have 4-6 point rollcage with bars to stiffen to the front and rear struts area.
Both front hood and rear lids will be fiberglass, and so will the front and rear bumpers. I also have 2 used NASCAR fiberglass doors (i'll have customized lexane windows mounted)
Not sure on the pedal assembly? either with Tilton (expensive) or a wilwood.
The original gas tank removed and will have a either a 17 or 19 gallon Aluminum fuel cell put in the trunk area. My radiator will tilt forward on top and have a hood vent cut out.

Now the final tough question is the suspension and spring rates (front & back) for handling road & track use, I'm not into or have tried Auto-X.
I like stiff suspension and I thought if there is more Hp, then rear spring rate would go up to push the wheels to the ground??
1) So, I was thinking of getting rear springs at 250#?
2) Large 32mm Front swaybar from Tangerine?
3) Rebuild my Front 87' 911 Carerra torsion bars with 21.5mm? Or any suggestions?
4) do I really need a rear swaybar now for a road track/ street car?


I too, also like to keep it narrow look.
I have a set of 15" phone dials from 85' 944 7"-wide, 23.3mm offsets.
I was thinking of putting 205-60-15 tires on all 4 or could it be possible to have 205-60-15 on the rear and 205-50-15 to the front. (would that be a problem with offset (height) of tires front and back?


BTW, I'll have AC in the car, only comfort thing for me here in Hotlanta! Pretty much everythign stripped inside the car other than the dash panel and all instruments.

I really need to sort out my suspensions modification if anyone could help? I'm not familiar with mid-engine cars and how they handle.
Any other suggestion or any mistake on my list mentioned will be appretiated!
Thanks!

If you intend to be on a race track 80-100%, those spring rates could work, although the front rates seems overkill and may push with 250 lb rears.
Street/track 914's do quite well with a softer set-up, and a nice front anti-roll bar.
A rear AR bar adds tuning, but most folks find it is not needed.
Rear adjustable spring perches that take the readily-available 2-2.5" springs are a great investment. They add lots of options and are required for a good corner-balance.
Visit the Paddock forum here to find more detailed discussions on racing suspension set-ups

First off thanks for a great thread with fantastic pics to help get me motivated!

Can you tell me what sump you're using?

The motor you have is the well known ej20k. (I had one swapped in my 99 2.5rs) These motors are very highly tuned and MUST have at least 93 octane if you want it to live at all. They are known for losing rod bearings because people run them on 91 octane and bounce off the 8200 redline. I would highly recommend going through the motor before you install it (they have a fairly high failure rate compared to other jdm motors such as the ej20g, h,r, 205 and 207.) They are amazing little motors as long as you get a good tune on it using a standalone such as apexi power fc, or vipetec.
As far as the transmission you will be fine using it in a FWD configuration. They are very stout little transmissions. Being a STi RA theres a good chance it will have DCCD as well. You obviously dont need it since you are not going awd but it is worth good money to someone else.
I would recommend a front mount intercooler if possible. The biggest problem with no having a efficient IC is that your knock count will go through the roof and kill your motor pumping that hot air in there. Feel free to PM me if you need wiring diagrams, Places to get parts, or what ever. I am new to 924's but have ALOT of Subaru experience

OP Very nice build I just picked up a 72 and have a ej20r twin turbo sitting in the corner of the shop waiting to go in

You're in Las Cruces? These days I'm spending most of my life in El Paso hotels.

Hey Jeff, I see you're reading this topic too. How's things?

Yep Las Cruces
El Paso Hotels sounds like a horrible way to spend any of your life haha

If you ever in Las Cruces we should get a beer ! I am picking up my first 914 in Albq. NM tomorrow

the shop that did the work on this project is thirteen 40 or 40 thirteen in Modesto? I tried to google something and came up empty. Since they did such a nice job on this one is it something they do now?

You didn't get my PM? It's 40-Thirteen in Modesto, but it's really one guy who works in the Bay Area and evenings and weekends does projects he thinks would be cool. The 914 was a one-off, just to do it. Right now he's finishing an LS1 Volvo 244 (http://forums.turbobricks.com/showthread.php?t=222596).



Google 55superbeetle to see some of his other projects. His name's Jeff and you can probably contact him that way, or PM your e-mail and I'll give it to him. .

.

Quick question: Ever think of using a Boxster shifter/cables?

http://bit.ly/1gWnZIK

If those cable lengths are close, that may be a real easy setup.

I understand you have some control with the DCCD but I've no experience with them.

If it's really a pure clutch type LSD rather than a TBD then it's gonna suck at AX unless the breakaway torque is pretty darned low. How low it should be depends on the rest of the suspension and driving style.

The clutches make it want to go straight on both accel AND decel. The TBD goes open on decel.

Who knows the DCCD settings well enough to report on 'em, and will it work with a 2WD?

Looked at this thread again after a llong time and see I can update this part. My son did run the car again at an official event, did a best of 13.006 at 109 mph. That run was mid-afternoon on a 100 degree day so they expected an easy 12 in the evening with cooler temperatures Unfortunately for that evening run they put on a borrowed pair of slicks and immediately broke an axle. Since I don't drag race that means that 13.006 is the fastest this car will ever go, but it's tantalizingly close to being a 12 second car. Not bad for a car that wasn't even built to drag race.

Acceleration is the purest measure of horsepower short of a dyno. That ET is seven tenths of a second faster than the previous fastest 13.7, but we know there was no more horsepower. In fact the engine, tires, exhaust and every other part of the car were exactly the same, the only change was to switch out the 901 for the Subaru transmission. For a lot of reasons for sure, but that transmission change, in itself, made the car significant faster. Food for thought.

do you have pictures of what the kit for the transmission contains to block off the rear output shaft?

Also, is there a cradle diagram out there on the internet somewhere?

Just starting to talk with my son about this......

Rich

Rich, the "kit" is just a small sleeve. That and you remove a few parts. One you can resale for $250.00+. You will need a piece of 1/8 aluminum to make a block off plate for the rear of the transmission. This piece's dimensions are transferred (scribed) off the old rear plate. That is a 20 min job. The cradle is about $150 in materials + a $99 tube bender @ HF. It's a Hell of a lot harder than buying one of Ian's cradles but I enjoy building and I have a tube bender left over. The shifter will run about $200 if you make your own with an MR2 used shifter and a set of cables and ends. It's pretty well documented in some of the recent Suby threads.

The 109 trap is the real number there. Thats quite a good number!

Absolutely knock my socks off gorgeous. beyond words beautiful

Are you using Howe Racing G3 Masters, and what sizes did you use? If you used the 3/4" how does the clutch pedal feel since your using the stock Subaru slave?

Needed to re-read the thread, found it in an earlier post
"I used Tilton pedals to get a hydraulic M/C (read the whole thread, it's described with photos). Only down side is that using the smallest available Howe M/C's I still have too much pedal pressure (Carrera front calipers, 914 front on the rear), so I'm looking to convert to calipers with bigger pistons."

Yes, I'm tall and the Howe were the shortest m/c's, getting cluster the furthest forward. Both are 3/4". The clutch is fine, perfect even, but the brake gives way too much pedal pressure. It's driveable, and I guess some people like a harder pedal, but I come from sportbikes and prefer more feel. I've thought about sleeving the brake master, but have a full set of 951 calipers that I can use that would probably both upgrade the brakes (Carrera vented discs) and give a better pedal. It's on the to-do list. Not high on the list, but on it.

As a heads-up though, we converted my son's car last year and instead of a new cluster we used a bracket made by 76-914 that let us keep the stock pedal cluster. It's a simple and very elegant solution that uses a stock (and cheap!) Civic clutch master alongside the stock brake master. The stock clutch cable hook was converted from a cable puller into a clevis and pusher. Look that up, I think he posted a drawing with dimensions, just flat stock. Works great and highly recommended.

Sounds like something I could use.

I'm 6'2" so I am a little large in the 914, my biggest issue is with the pedals, as I hope my 12 Double wides fit. And don't get hung up on the pedals.

And yes 76-914s pedal system is great. I guess I could go that route, again I sold mine, it used a Willwood M/C. I was looking for a better pedal, and not having to build MC stiffening plate for the car. I also really hate the 914/911 MC, the fluid input leaves and the plastic lines drive me nuts. Once its in it is great, getting it in and sealed while in the car, pain in the

DB thank you for your input, greatly appreciated. Have you tried changing the pedal ratio on the Tilton's ? 3/4 inch = 19.050mm so I can't see that making the pedal overall stiff, I have run a 19mm with Carrera Calipers front and rear, and never had a pedal modulation issue your describing.

You'll fit. I'm a bit taller and am totally comfortable in the car. Also 12's but only single wide, and the Tilton's fit me great. About pedal pressure don't forget the Tilton brake pedal is trying to compress two m/c's, not just one. I've looked at changing the pivot point, but the Tilton plungers run in cast bosses, so not easy to move. Doing that would also change the stroke, which is close to perfect right now, so the only logical thing is to change the m/c bore. Unfortunately Howe doesn't make a smaller one so I'm stuck. Interesting thing is that I have my son's car here, also a 914/WRX but with the adapted 914 cluster, so I can do a direct comparison between the two. I'm thinking about removing the Tilton's from my car and converting the stock like his. It really is better.

Same thing on the shifter. My son has the same MR2 shifter and cables, but his uses the linkage with the bell crank. My cable that rotates the shaft is longer and curves around for a direct shot at that bracket, so there's no bell crank, nothing mechanical in the linkage. In a direct comparison between the two, mine shifts lots nicer than his, both light years better than stock. In fairness we chose all all off-the-shelf components so we could convert his 901 to the Subaru transmission in one weekend, to get it done before his HOA even noticed. I say we, but he actually did all the work. I'm old so I supervise.

I don't know anyone else who has two almost identical cars to compare side-by-side like that, but it's enlightening. It's not just in-theory but theory compared with practice. As more and more of these cars get converted I think we're all looking over each other's shoulders and evolving things to be simpler and better. And that's good for all of us.

Okay well thank you again, made for an interesting discussion.

IIRC, I somewhat copied your holder because of 1 reason Paul. No moving parts. KISS. It is still as smooth as day 1.

Gotta bump this thread DB kept up the updates and saved a lot of time for new attempts at this. There are so many good ideas here and on brittons thread and most all of the ideas are in one place. I realized reviewing this stuff how much has slipped away from me, especially the suby tranny differences on britton't thread. I hope it all gets done or I will have a lot of parts that only I know where to put them or how they go. I gotta find a air to water cooler yet. the one thing I missed was the length of db's long rotating cable. maybe nine or eleven feet but boy eleven seems awful long. might just have to wait on that till I mount the shifter his tranny might not be exactly where Ian's cradle puts the tranny. I like DB's cradle as it mounts solid to the body and gives more strength to the body and then mounts the motor and tranny in rubber and urethane, gotta work on Ian's mount some, I do like the idea of getting the tranny out by itself though. I'm doing cardio therapy but after 6 weeks I'm not sure it is worth it, I get winded at the weirdest times. Guns under the ac are easier projects when it is 101 outside. I bet I hold the record time for the longest parts collector on the 914/suby/911suspension here.