a newer member with the name of mongol something or other real name evan ordered his 2002 suby 2.5 engine yesturday. the motor is a 60 K mile engine for 1600 complete including the harness, exhaust mainfold, ecu ie everything. he looked locally but they wanted 2800 for everything. the only down fall is the shipping from kali to maryland ran him 285.

basicly he puts 300 to 400 miles a week on his car and wants more power better gas milage than his raby parts 2056.

the funny part is after i gave him a test run and he says his 2056 with about 120 hp feels like a dog. the great part was when i gave his GF a ride she did not but giggle and said he does not need that much hp

we east coast 914ers are taking over and i am forming a subculture of suby conversions , with a few seeds thrown around the country ie Tony

Scott, I think the Scooby is very cool! I think it's a much cooler conversion than a SBC... I know a lot of guys LOVE their SBC conversion, and they DO make SICK power!! but I just think it's cool that the suby still SOUNDs like a type 4, the 901 is still used, not abused. I especially like the Radiator in the engine bay.. makes things very clean.

though i have not seen nor ridden in a v8 or v6 conversion, i have seen and ridden in scotts car. it just makes sense to me and is a very slick install. gobs of power and great gas mileage. scott says he is going to put together a kit here in the near future for this conversion. i may have to start piecing this thing together bit by bit. a little here and there and the wife will never notice!

very cool. an extra point for you east-coasters.... and sadly, it looks like we've lost a conversion on the west side. fiid's project is in the classifieds

So should a Subaru conversion be called a Sub-version? Scott, I definately consider you to be a Sub-versive element....

I just wanted to get this stuff going, it was only a matter of time.

Eric

Good work Scott!!! More suby conversions means a bigger knowledge base.


I really think this will catch on. How can it not? Cheap, reliable, lots of power, lighter than a stock engine, maintains the boxer engine configuration, parts becoming available from Scott and Renegade... No need to put in high torque axles, or CV joints, or mess with gear ratios in the transmission, lots of aftermarket performance parts, etc. etc. etc.

-Tony

QUOTE (nebreitling @ Jul 6 2005, 12:51 PM)

fiid's project is in the classifieds

Ah crap. Fiid was on my "Top 3 cool projects" list.

-Ben M.

does anyone have some pics of a suby conversion? I have been dying to see one. I have seen some sick motors for the sand, and have been curious if it would work in the rust bucket.

here ya go, engine bay shot

QUOTE (TonyAKAVW @ Jul 6 2005, 01:22 PM)

reliable

How is a new engine with all custom wiring and mounting more reliable then what vw came up with many moons ago? Dont get me wrong, the conversion is sweet, and Ive been in Scott's car, but I just dont see how reliability is a perk of the conversion. Last time I saw a sube, there were LOTS of wires all over the place. A subaru engine may be reliabile in a car with an OBD2 sensor and a chassis thats designed to fit, but all custom parts worry me for reliability.

i under stand you opinion matt, but my car is running obd2. as well as it is all stock parts that can go bad. the alt, radiator, all sensors, the throttle, the icv all stock and stock driven but the stock ecu. how many people here would drive there 914 cross country twice. the only things that have gone wrong on my car are stock 914 stuff, like the fuel pump relay and the tranny.

i can get every part on the engine locally from my flaps, or any of the parts yards. go try to find a ecu, mps, decel valve for a 914 locally anywhere in this country

I'm not ready to give up on my Type IV, but the subby motor should be just as reliable as anything else one could throw in the car if done right....the key phrase is "done right"

the hard parts for the conversion (such as adapter plate, motor mount) should never give you trouble unless you hacked something together or abused the piss out of the car....

I will agree that the electrical could be a nightmare if done poorly, just look at a stock 914 with some of the DAPO electrical repairs???

now with the addition of a cooling system and the need for water, you do have a few more items that can cause problems down the road (leaking radiator, faulty water pump)...

the key thing is to document everything used for the conversion, so when something does need to be replaced (coolant hose), you have the correct part number to ask for, same with knowing excatly what year and model your engine is from so that it'll be easier to get a replacement part

my hacked dumb assed current owner wiring looks bad right now but it will only get better

QUOTE (scott thacher @ Jul 6 2005, 05:59 PM)

here ya go, engine bay shot

was there much body mod to do or was it all in the engine bay? .......Now honestly how bad was it to pull off?

QUOTE (Mueller @ Jul 6 2005, 03:20 PM)

I will agree that the electrical could be a nightmare if done poorly, just look at a stock 914 with some of the DAPO electrical repairs???

Thats probably my biggest concern. If the wiring is not done properly, it would be a mess.. and if something goes wrong, good luck trying to trace it. If there were a plug and play adapter or something, it would be really sweet and I bet this conversion would take off.

no body cutting at all, just removed the engine shelf to clean up and give a little more space. i could do it again in 50 hours or so from scratch

Reliable is of course what you make of it... But the engine does have a lot to do with it of course. I was thinking of building up a 2056 or a 2270 before I decided to go with the Subaru engine and all the talk of the lifters and cams having issues, heads with cracks etc. got me nervous. 914 engines also require regular valve adjustments, etc. etc. There's nothing wrong with type 4s, or with V8s or whatever. A subaru engine will for the most part last a very long time with little to no maintenence and thats where the reliability issue comes in.

Reliability in a conversion is a function of build quality. If you know what you are doing and do it right, it will be reliable. There are an awful lot of every kind of conversion that have been done poorly and reliability is correspondingly low.

Wiring up a Subaru engine is definitely not a weekend project. There's a LOT to it, and its the single most complex part of the conversion, but it IS doable. I've been working on the wiring design for my conversion for about three weeks (a few hours here and there) and I've still got a long ways to go.

-Tony

QUOTE

If there were a plug and play adapter or something, it would be really sweet and I bet this conversion would take off.

hey scott, another product idea....

i saw you ripping through those schematics in the dark like me through a dr seuss book. do it man!

QUOTE (scott thacher @ Jul 6 2005, 06:28 PM)

no body cutting at all, just removed the engine shelf to clean up and give a little more space. i could do it again in 50 hours or so from scratch

I may have to start looking in the corners of these little salvage and wrecker yards.......I wanted to run one of the ea82 1.8s in the magic bus. It had a 1.8 rabbit 8v in it now so I may just see if there are ANY performance parts for the sube out there......The ea82's were tough as nail but didn't make much HP. Not enough to justify the conversion, anyway

A plug and play wiring adapter would be great, but because there are many differences in the model years in terms of sensors, locations, ECUs, etc., it would be hard to make a generic one. I'm considering however making up some printed circuit boards which would replace the stock relay board and provide simulation of the unused sensors for the Subaru ECU. It will hopefully take out some of the complexity of doing a conversion, but not all of it.

-Tony

But if someone took the "best" engine for the 914, say the EJ20t out of a wrx, with the most plentiful supply and made that adapter, those looking for just a subaru conversion wouldnt have to worry about what block. If you're a renegade and want to do an ej20tt or an ej25t or something you can do your own wiring, but Im willing to bet most people are looking for a subaru engine conversion, not a specific engine.

Well, the EJ20t even has differences in the model years. They are probably not big enough that a common board couldn't be made however. Its probalby a good idea actually. Make a board for the WRX motor and one for the 2.5 (which has a SOHC and DOHC version and many differences in the model years as well).

more subaru the engine ej20t will fit with NO body mods whatsoever, engine and gearbox will also go, disengaging the rear drive clutchpack which are electronically controlled and placing a welch plug into the the rear output stops the oil problem ,
i hope that somone in the us builds a kit for these soon so the mounting is made simple for the average joe.
we have done two diffrent wiring styles one was a graft of an aftermarket ecu to the suby engine loom this was on a 94 model the other has been a complete ecu flying loom which comes with its own sensors on an 05 sti corsa bitumen motor and six speed cost of computer is approx aus$1600 and comes with hand controller also maybe this is an option that tony could look at.
my biggest consern is the drive shafts any ideas ,we have a hybrid 914suby setup but strength ???????

We just worked on a 400+ hp suby powered sand car that spanks $100k+ LS6 V8 powered cars all day long. Owner said it was approaching 500hp, lots of money to get there though.

my need of info on possible shaft theories is of importance to my end result.
[QUOTE] Owner said it was approaching 500hp, lots of money to get there though
i was looking at a site here and they are getting almost 500 hp at the wheels from an ej20 in a subaru brumby ute see it at tony rigoli performance (trp) they are now moving on to the us scene, the modifications they are doing is nuts

Add me to the list. In the last week I bought an EJ20T Subaru motor, the Kennedy adaptor kit, and their stage 2 clutch assembly.

I am in the process of liquidating all my type 4 stuff. The more I though about it the less I liked spending lots of time and money for 120Hp at the most from my 2L type 4. With the Subaru I will get 227hp stock and the block can handle more on the stock internals with some modifications.

I can't wait for the rush of 227hp in a 2200lb car.

Eric

i have heard that the cat before the turbo when bypassed adds like 20 hp. i dont know if suby ever changed the design to do away with it thou

The catless uppipe does add some HP, not a super lot but some. Aftermarket uppipes with larger diameters and better designs tend to do a bit more. There have been a few issues with the pre-turbo cat causing premature turbo failures due to pieces of the cat material being sucked into the turbo (the 2006 subaru turbo motors are no longer using the pre-turbo cat and are instead using a pump-type emissions system).

Right now there are alot of companies putting out 400-550whp kits for WRX's and STI's but that stuff does get quite expensive (its said for over 400whp you need internal work done... forged pistons and such, better heads, cams, etc.). The good news about all this is the sheer number of options that simply were not availible 4 or 5 years ago (even 2 years ago). Another plus with this means there are ALOT of OEM parts floating around, so if you choose say a EJ20T you can find an STI intercooler, injectors, even the stock STI turbo for very little and have yourself a ~300hp motor without too much effort.

If you really want to do this on a small budget, I just had a friend who found one of the early 90's legacy turbo's at a pick n' pull and he bought the whole motor/etc. out of there for like $200. The ej22t actually has probably the best shortblock subaru ever made. The heads are SOHC and not worth mentioning, but even with that block you can use an old TD05-16g from one of the JDM EJ20G motors (which can be had for ~$300) and a WRX/STI intercooler along with some engine management and again have a ~300hp subie motor for next to nothing.

As far as whether a 914 tranny can handle all that, I have no idea. Transmissions are the weak point in Subarus too but for different reasons (AWD = Grip, Grip + Massive TQ = Blown stock tranny). Axles havent been too much of an issue for subaru transmissions though, but my thinking is that if you kept the power within reasonable limits and not too much initial torque from the motor maybe the axles will hold up? Im sure it would be an easier motor to deal with in that reguards compaired to some of the V8's that people have used.