Has Anyone Retrofitted a Better Cupholder into their Second Gen?

[OBiOne]

After two years of screwing around with that stock cupholder, I've had it. I find it annoying, and it's something that should have been incredibly easy for Subaru to get right. Unfortunately, they did not. So now, I'm trying to come up with a solution.

Right now, I think it would be easiest to take a cupholder from another car, cut it to fit, paint it to match, and then put it either next to my e-brake or in front of the shifter.

I've looked over the WRX Center Console swap, and I wonder if there is a better way. If anyone has done this, I'd like to see what you've done.

Thanks Guys.

[unsullied_spy]

The factory cup holders aren't made for the jugs we drink out of here in the states. They hold up fine with smaller cups but when you go full 'Merica on them they don't work real well. Swapping your center console is the easiest and cleanest way to do it, otherwise there's always those ones that hang over your door panel (tacky, but they work).

[OBiOne]

Honestly, I'm not looking to go full America with my drinks. I'd just like to be able to have a drink that doesn't block my Heater controls. I'm actually thinking now of yanking one from another car and making fit the bin in the console.

I'm thinking of making it a tray that sits flat on top, but easily removable, so that I can still store stuff in my bin if I want. I'll see what I can come up with.

My ultimate goal is to make something that looks fairly factory.

[CaleDeRoo]

I saw this on Ebay. First I've seen. Doubt they made any for LHD cars though.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/JDM-Subaru-Legacy-OEM-Option-Dash-Top-Storage-Tray-Drink-Holder-Liberty-BD5-BG9-/281924121345?hash=item41a3fcb301:g:CWsAAOSwuYVWoaR5&vxp=mtr

https://sl-i.net/FORUM/images/imported/2016/03/sl1600-1.jpg

[Muse]

doesn't look like it would hold onto much. That, plus, being a JDM part, it's probably still only gonna hold can-sized driks.

[Cooper197]

I had always thought about trying to fiberglass a cupholder into the lower portion of the door panels like some cars have. I measured it out and thought it would work, but ultimately sold the Subaru before I could ever try it.

[digdug18]

Just mod your center console with a cup holder or two, it's really simple to do.

[Strykr]

Just mod your center console with a cup holder or two, it's really simple to do.

Care to explain what you mean or give an example?

[digdug18]

Care to explain what you mean or give an example?

I'm happy to explain in detail. Honestly though the hardest part is finding a donor cup holder that has all the features that you like.

By features I mean:

One Cup Holder
Two Cup Holder
Rubber thingy in the bottom to assist in easier cleaning
Soda Can size, or LARGE CUP size


Then trim the cup holder to fit the space provided, ideally you would want the donor to fit into the plastic, so that it flows and would appear to be stock.

There are a couple different ways to attach the cup holder to the center section, if that's where you want to attach it to;

The easiest and crappiest IMHO, is just using screws and angle brackets, this can be covered by body filler and the like, but the flexing over time will make the body filler crack and remove itself. Flexing caused by the hot/cold cycles of the car itself, as well as whatever you place into the cupholder. You can use gasket adhesive or something that adheres better to plastic, but you'll find a similar result over time.

The nicest looking will be possibly the most expensive, would be using 3M plastic adhesives. They can repair any kind of plastic material, or one material to another material. Such as this aspect, or grafting one bumper onto another bumper or the like.

Link to a 3M pdf on a flexible non-structural repair, including steps (http://multimedia.3m.com/mws/media/1084639O/flexible-patch-non-structural-bumper-repair.pdf)

After you have affixed it, waited the period for it to dry, I'd suggest mixing a paintable match and painting the cup holder to match the rest of the car.

I searched for the center sections at the junk yard this weekend, but all the consoles were pulled which is odd, yet a complete leather interior was still in a car, go figure. When I find one, I'll be happy to make a complete write-up on how to do so. Albeit with pictures.

[zcrow]

After two years of screwing around with that stock cupholder, I've had it. I find it annoying, and it's something that should have been incredibly easy for Subaru to get right. Unfortunately, they did not. So now, I'm trying to come up with a solution.

Right now, I think it would be easiest to take a cupholder from another car, cut it to fit, paint it to match, and then put it either next to my e-brake or in front of the shifter.

I've looked over the WRX Center Console swap, and I wonder if there is a better way. If anyone has done this, I'd like to see what you've done.

Thanks Guys.

Here is what I ended up doing and am loving it. Took out the old cup holder and cut to fit a piece of plywood to fit into the slot. I screwed the plywood into the original cup mount. The tricky part is cutting the front facing surface of the wood to that it is parallel to the centre cluster (radio, storage cubbies, etc.). I would strongly suggest that you make a prototype out of wood first. The two vertical arms of the inverted U rest against the side trim, left and right of where the radio is. It is slightly rounded so the in/out placement, and the angle of the support plywood need to match up so that there is 3 points of contact. I then got a metal fabricator to make a inverted U shaped piece of 1/4" steel, with two short mounts on the back of it that fit over the piece of plywood. Cost me $50. There are two hidden screw holes in the bottom of the lower mount that can screw into the plywood. The plywood in turn is held in by the original cupholder mount frame. On both of the vertical arms of the U, two screw holes were drilled and threaded that match up with water bottle cages used on bicycles. I ended up using some plastic, adjustable water bottle holders and so far they have been able to accommodate pretty much anything I want to throw at them. I tried some metal ones but found that they were noisy on rough roads, if you use any type of metal water bottle or cup. You need to be aware of a couple things. Make sure that the width of the inverted U just clears the radio and isn't too wide. I believe mine are about 1" wide. You don't want to the bottle/cup to get too close to the ignition, nor do you want to hit the windshield wiper switch when you insert and take out your cup/bottle. Mine is just right. So now I have a very heavy duty, dual bottle holder that is metal. Which means that I can also use the horizontal part of the inverted U to magnetically mount a cell phone holder, clock, pen.... many things. Some pictures might help.

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[Go Mifune]

Good out of the box thinking!