I've owned the car for a while now, and one of the things that had been irritating me was that I was starting to accumulate wires from various projects running all over the place, and it was starting to piss off my OCD. Couple that with the fact that there are some more projects that I have planned which will introduce even more wires, and I decided that before I do anything else, I should get [...]
Full Disclosure: Essex Parts Services offered me a friendly discount on this AP Racing Big Brake kit in exchange for the promise of a thorough review of my experience with the product. They wanted an unbiased review, and that's what this is. Big brakes. Everyone loves big brakes. Everyone wants big brakes. It seems even the OEMs are fascinated with big brakes these days. The horsepower wars have been raging for several years now, and [...]
It's that time again! Once again, for those who are unaware, I follow a modified service interval for my oil changes. Rather than Subaru's recommended 6,000 mile interval, I've been doing 10,000 mile intervals. This is made possible by the use of AMSOIL Signature Series 0W-20 oil, which is rated for 25,000 mile interval oil changes under "normal use," and 15,000 mile changes under "severe use." Considering my use case (autocross, ice racing, Chicago [...]
If you've been wanting to do this modification, but just haven't gotten around to it yet, do yourself a favor and go order a set right now. I had been meaning to do this ever since I purchased the car, but I was lazy and had other priorities. Then after my most recent ice racing adventure, I grazed a snow bank, causing no damage to my car other than snapping one of the clips [...]
I will start this post off by stating that I am not the sort of person who drives around honking my horn left-and-right at every person who does something stupid, or looks at me funny. I hate those kinds of people. I'm of the opinion that a horn is a last-resort device to avoid a collision, or alert another driver to an immediate danger. It is not to be used to voice your displeasure, [...]
A year ago I bought some Raceseng Camber Plates for my car to allow me to get some extra camber adjustability out of the front suspension. What I received were some functional parts that were machined to a level of such perfection and beauty, that I wasn't sure whether I should install them on the car, or mount them on my living room wall as "art." Needless to say, I was very happy with that [...]
Keen-eyed readers will notice that the vehicle in the lead image above is not my BRZ. That's because it's the loaner Crosstrek I had the pleasure of driving around in for a few days as a result of my first major repair. It's a bit of an unusual one for the relatively low mileage that my car has: a brand new transmission. So what happened? Well, many months, and many thousands of miles ago, [...]
One of the first modifications I did when I purchased my BRZ was to do a full LED retrofit for all of the existing non-LED bulbs both inside and out. That is, all of them except the fog lights. All of the other bulbs I replaced are bulbs designed to be seen by others. This means beam pattern isn't quite as important, and swapping to an LED won't do any harm so long as it is [...]
Well I've finally gotten around to it. I know, I know, it's long overdue. A new exhaust seems to be pretty much the first thing that everyone does these days, but autocross necessitated some other modifications first. Also, to be perfectly honest, I was a bit hesitant. I feel like the odd-one-out in the car scene, because unlike most folks, I don't want a super loud exhaust on my car. If it was a [...]
When I brought my car in to have the throw-out bearing replaced a few months ago, I completely forgot to inform them that I did not want the complimentary car wash that comes with all dealership service visits. As a result, my car was washed, and two years of careful avoidance of brushes was lost in an instant. I do not fault the dealership for this, as this is just an "industry standard" these days, [...]