MattC 's 99 postal that delivers

[MattC]

Ok here we go. This is the build thread for my 99 postal wagon. I bought it for 300 dollars from a mail carrier, she was driving drunk and grazed a telephone pole. She trashed the car fairly good, I had to replace the right fender, corner light, hood, bumper cover, right front door, right mirror,and there is still alot of minor damage still. The car ran bad and had a cel on ,I ran the code and replaced a knock sensor. It still was running poorly and i eventually traced it to a bad duty A solenoid.about this time my patience ran out. having never owned a Subaru I decided to do a tranny swap, that turned out to be a task as I soon found out you need to match the rear diff to the tranny. Oh brother.....

One thing lead to another and I soon found a BE5 rsk front cup sitting in my garage.I got it from Foregin engines and was really happy with it. So I decided that if I was gonna do this I was gonna do it right. I stripped the clip of EVERYTHING and began my swap.

Under the hood complete swap over zero 99 parts under hood
577
Stock ej208 rev d
5 speed with be slave cylinder STI stainless clutch lines
swapped over ABS pump and ABS lines
Master cylinder and brake booster
re wire windshield motor
i replaced and swapped every single little tab and clip. I literally threw nothing away and kept nothing from the 99

Instead of doing a merge I decided to swap over then entire wiring of the car. I was fortunate to get the full harness with the clip . So it was nothing to repin and reroute what I did and did not need. This my friends is where I entered the rabbit hole. To use the wiring, I needed to use the gauges and the climate control, to do that I needed the dash , to use that I needed the heater core , and to do that I needed the crash bar. So guess what. I now have and entire fully functional 2004 dash in a 1999 . Well shit now my doors wont close... well guess I will just swap in the 04 jdm panels this wasn't to terrible difficult i just had to re route the control rods and make new mounting points for the handles.

So now everything forward of the B pillars is swapped over the third gen. I have the rears and will be swapping those over before too long.

With the swap of the abs system i needed to address the weak-sauce brakes of the postal. I swapped in the master cylinder and brake booster from the clip and swapped over the fronts to a set up from an 04 Forester xt and the rears to disc from a 99 Forester. I also had to swap over to a different e brake cable. this allowed me to have the tone rings from the abs and I used the sensors from the clip. I had to swap in different axles I used Legacys in the front and WRX in the rear.the car is now complete and I am starting to do some cosmetic stuff to it.

I have waiting to go on.
JDM fogs
Chargespeed grill
Syms Wing
Ganadors
GTB mudguards
GT lip kit
JDM side markers

I have a decent set of B4 rims on it and I have a functional hood with a JDM spitter. I had to swap over to HID because of the head light wiring on the B4 is different then the postal. I have a really nice wood momo steering wheel and so bitchen JDM legacy floor mats.

PIC to come as soon as I get a minute.578 579580581
.

[MattC]

http://i203.photobucket.com/albums/aa18/mattsplat72/image.jpg22.jpg (http://s203.photobucket.com/user/mattsplat72/media/image.jpg22.jpg.html)

The First Day with my little helper
http://i203.photobucket.com/albums/aa18/mattsplat72/20075AB4-B99F-4B3B-B6FA-EDC796DFC9A7.jpg (http://s203.photobucket.com/user/mattsplat72/media/20075AB4-B99F-4B3B-B6FA-EDC796DFC9A7.jpg.html)

front end fixed
http://i203.photobucket.com/albums/aa18/mattsplat72/image.jpg21.jpg (http://s203.photobucket.com/user/mattsplat72/media/image.jpg21.jpg.html)

[MattC]

More yo come

[98legwag]

So you swapped the dash from the BE5 front cut too?

[CaleDeRoo]

So you swapped the dash from the BE5 front cut too?

And front door panels. I'd love to see what work went into the front and rear door panel swaps.

[MattC]

Full interior switch over, are the pics not working? I am doing this from my tablet so it my not be working. The panels were not difficult . I bought a shitty one from the junk yard and drilled out the snap plugs, made a carb board templet and transferred the mounting locations to the doors. I had a set of doors from a 3rd gen that Robin Caldwell gave me to strip the hardware from and to use as a visual aid. The hardest part was wiring the cords the JDM body harness has the window controls divorced from the main cord . I had to use a multimeter to assess function and repin accordingly. The only thing left to get working if the auto lock feature . I have a fob from an STI that I need to take the time to program.

[foohfooh]

Uh nice work mat. You win at cars.

Like ive never seen anything of this caliber. I mean dash swap/engine on usdm na car to usdm turbo car. Thats been done before but rarely. I think usdm na lhd to jdm turbo lhd is a first for me

[98Outbackdream]

:occasion5: Congrats on your build progress, I'll be sure to keep an eye on this, it's very interesting and makes me want a 1st gen even more just as a project car and just daily my 2nd gen.

[meepers]

Uh nice work mat. You win at cars.

Like ive never seen anything of this caliber. I mean dash swap/engine on usdm na car to usdm turbo car. Thats been done before but rarely. I think usdm na lhd to jdm turbo lhd is a first for me

Damn I wish my build thread for my 93 Civic build still had the photos working. I turned a CX Hatch with NO A/C from the factory into a RHD, Supercharged GSR powered monster with FACTORY sunroof and power everything. And.... with the help of my friends, I had everything but the wiring done in less then a month.

and it took me years just to turbo my damn Legacy.... lol. Getting old sucks.

Your car looks great, I miss my darn RHD car. I find it is much more comfortable to drive, and feels more natural. And I always want to punch the morons who tell you that you cant use drive thrus anymore, because apparently not everyone has the ability to LEAN OVER 6 inches to hand the person money..... The only part that I did not care for is left hand turns in heavy traffic when you cant see past the the lifted Suburban in the the oncoming left turn lane.

[Michelle]

Awesome, awesome work so far! I can't wait to see what you do next with this.


Your car looks great, I miss my darn RHD car. I find it is much more comfortable to drive, and feels more natural. And I always want to punch the morons who tell you that you cant use drive thrus anymore, because apparently not everyone has the ability to LEAN OVER 6 inches to hand the person money..... The only part that I did not care for is left hand turns in heavy traffic when you cant see past the the lifted Suburban in the the oncoming left turn lane.

Drive-throughs are not an option for me in my postal wagon, being 5-feet small. Life is hard.

[Dead91silvia]

About time you got on here! =)

[meepers]

Awesome, awesome work so far! I can't wait to see what you do next with this.



Drive-throughs are not an option for me in my postal wagon, being 5-feet small. Life is hard.

597

Bam! I am a problem solver!

[Hinyo]

So you mean you deliver mail in this thing? lol

nice ride!!!! and WELCOME!!!! if no one else has said so. Cant wait to see what else you do!!!

[dynonacht]

this thing is dope!

[MattC]

Thanks , nah I don't deliver mail . I am a tool maker at Boeing. I am going to be wiring in a camera into the headlight on the left and have it wired into the rear view mirror so I can see around cars to turn left.

[shoguy]

This car is amazing! I love the idea of fully building a postal into the turbo LHD JDM machine. I have been toying with the idea of swapping a 3rd Gen dash into my 98. The better layout and more cup holders would be a lot better. The crash bar, dash and door panels didn't need much modification other than the door rods?

[MattC]

I dont know if it was a typo , but I dont have a Left Hand Drive car, it is a non converted RHD car.

The crash bar needed very very minor modification. In this picture you can see the BE mount in the car. I had to hog out the bolt holes a few MM . I used the center bolt holes for the radio surrond and an index to make sure the crash bar was aligned on the X axis. The heater core lines lined up perfectly and the AC lines are about 20 mm off .
http://i203.photobucket.com/albums/aa18/mattsplat72/image.jpg5.jpg (http://s203.photobucket.com/user/mattsplat72/media/image.jpg5.jpg.html)
The clutch and brake pedals are a direct fit.
http://i203.photobucket.com/albums/aa18/mattsplat72/image.jpg8.jpg (http://s203.photobucket.com/user/mattsplat72/media/image.jpg8.jpg.html)
I had to swap over the BE steering column to match the wiring and the rack in the sub frame that had the provisions for the downpipes. I also had to swap over the rear heater underseat venting to match the heatercore.
http://i203.photobucket.com/albums/aa18/mattsplat72/image.jpg7.jpg (http://s203.photobucket.com/user/mattsplat72/media/image.jpg7.jpg.html)
Here is the fully mounted and functuional BE door panel, I had to take USDM door harness and flip them and repin them.
http://i203.photobucket.com/albums/aa18/mattsplat72/EEF9F332-E62D-43A4-9D14-C2B8DA23921B.jpg (http://s203.photobucket.com/user/mattsplat72/media/EEF9F332-E62D-43A4-9D14-C2B8DA23921B.jpg.html)

[86bratman]

I'm quite shocked over the fitment of the 3rd gen door panels and dash. Seriously looks like it was made that way.

[CaleDeRoo]

That looks incredible.

[shoguy]

Ahh, my bad, meant RHD JDM machine, it was an early morning. So for doing a LHD USDM 2nd to 3rd gen swap pretty much need heater box, dash and crash bar, and wiring. I am thinking since the rack and column already match, if anything would be needed to swap with those, hopefully just change the switches and other bits and external pieces on the column.

[fwa2500]

Awesome work! That thing is looking awesome.

[MattC]

Thanks everyone, well today I replaced the inner tie rods which were shot. I also designed a double din plate in Catia to hold two 52mm defi gagues. It should be printing right now and I should have it on Monday. It will go under my single din radio in the double din opening.

Shoguy, trust me . You need everything. It is a 100% switch over. When I say everything I mean even the clips, brackets, wiring , linkage, sensors. Every thing. So unless you have a complete donor. I wouldn't do it. For example you know the black abs underwear vents. They have to be swapped over to fit properly. Unless you don't want heat in the back. I am not trying to convince you not to. By all means do it. Just be prepared to do it all the way , otherwise you are not gonna be happy

[rkrenicki]

By all means do it. Just be prepared to do it all the way , otherwise you are not gonna be happy

Words to live by, my friend.

[MattC]

Been busy at work lately,

I did replace the inner ties rods. I had to get 2010 legacy ones that matches the 16mmx 1.5 of the rack. I also have Headlights on the way and got JDM tails from Red85Celica. Starting to sort out the aero now that she has about 500 miles on her and four kills

Two civics, a tiburon, and a bitchen Camaro...

[MattC]

Oh an I forgot the Double Din Gauge holder
646

[Michelle]

I'm reviving this thread because I was thinking about this car the other day and how much I want my wagon to be like this one when it grows up! Also, anyone who hasn't seen this before should know that it exists. Bravo once more on an awesome job done to this Postal Wagon!