rkrenicki's 2017 BN9 Premium Eyesight - 2021-03-29 - Wife's New Car

[rkrenicki]

So, due to a very sudden death in the family, my wife has inherited a new car. Due to the emotional attachment to the car, no mods will be done to it beyond possibly the radio. This will be more of a maintenance log, and not a "build thread".

[rkrenicki]

Nothing has happened with this car yet, but I did convince my wife to let me change the radio out since she really wants Carplay. The 2018+ models all have Carplay, but the radios are made by Harmon instead of Fujitsu Ten. Most of the Harmon radios require an external amplifier under the seat, except for the base 6.2" radio in 2018, and the Non-Premium Navigation unit in 2019.

I originally ordered the 2018 base radio, but the vendor sent me a 2018 Nav unit instead.. so after returning that, I bought the 2019 Nav unit. The 2018+ Legacy/Outback also has a different steering wheel so I needed to get my hands on one of those as well for the radio buttons. Luckily the steering wheel is shared with a bunch of other 2017+ models.

I have not yet received the steering wheel, the GPS antenna module, nor the correct buttons for the radio w/bluetooth controls and eyesight... but the radio itself is here. I set it up on the workbench to make sure that it worked and would output sound without an external amp.

[thenines']

Not the way you want to get back into a Leggy again-but, it's a good looking ride-late relative had good taste.

[rkrenicki]

The radio swap turned into a much bigger project than I originally expected. The 2018/2019 radio is taller than the earlier 2015-2017 models, so it has a different HVAC controls. Turns out that the HVAC controls have a completely incompatible signaling protocol which required a swap of the HVAC Control module. The steering wheel controls are also different between the two halves of the generation as well.

In the end, I had to swap the following parts:
Radio (Nav w/o External Amplifier)
HVAC Controls
HVAC Control Unit
Steering Wheel
GPS Antenna module

It looks like I also need to swap the USB socket and the cable in order to get Carplay to function properly, but I can do those later on. In the meantime, just about everything is working now including the navigation.

Old radio and HVAC (in mid-removal)


New radio and HVAC:

[rkrenicki]

The vanity plate for this car has arrived. I came up with the idea of the initials of who bought the car, plus the word Legacy. Both since it is on a Subaru Legacy, and for the memory (legacy) of the person.




Now we just need to come up with a clever name for the Impreza.. it is the only car with a normal plate at this point.

[rkrenicki]

Nothing too major, but I ended up replacing the battery the other day. This model falls under the recall for the high battery consumption, but we have never really run into any major issues with dead batteries. It was still the original battery as far as I can tell, unless my sister-in-law had it replaced at the dealer at some point... but assuming it was still original, Id say that 6 years is a fairly reasonable lifetime.

[ryu_haneda]

Thanks for the update

[rkrenicki]

Still just regular maintenance on this car. It is going to hit 60k here pretty soon, so I think I will need to do a drain/fill of the CVT in the near future to keep ahead of that.

[rkrenicki]

Because of the upcoming vehicle lineup change at Casa de rkrenicki, this car got a radio upgrade. The 2019-20 Legacy/Outback radios have a bit of a defect where the screen will delaminate over time, causing them to become uncontrollable. Because I swapped the original radio out for one of those 2019 models, I knew it was a matter of time before I would need to deal with that.

Since I had pulled the Kenwood DMX907S from the Forester along with its iDatalink integration kit and the SiriusXM radio that carries a lifetime subscription, I figured now was a good a time as any to swap out the radio and in turn will mean I won't have to pay for Sirius for her any longer. I already had the headunit, Sirius radio, and iDatalink, so I just needed the Maestro harnesses and the install kit. I included those parts in my last order from Crutchfield and put it all in the other day.

In other unrelated news, the car was involved in a literal "Fender Bender" while it was parked at my wifes work. One of the students just did not turn enough when pulling into the parking spot and hit the passenger side fender. We have been going back and forth with their insurance company, and hope to have it sorted out soon. I will likely fix it myself as the damage is only on the fender, plus a handful of scuffs where the bumper connects to the fender. I have already found a fender of the correct color nearby, and I think the scuffs on the plastic will buff out.

[rkrenicki]

Maintenance week! The car just rolled over 60k so I had the CVT Flush done at the dealer, where they noted that the rear brakes were dangerously low. They know that I do (most of) my own work, so they did not try to upsell the job but rather told me that it needed to be done ASAP. I hopped on Rockauto and ordered a full set of rotors and pads since there had been some minor pulsing in the front brakes from uneven pad deposits or a warped rotor. I had not done the rear brakes on a model with an electric parking brake yet, so it was interesting figuring that out.

While I was working on it, I also replaced the spark plugs since they were due at 60k. The spark plug job itself was quite straightforward and not a complete pain in the butt like the DOHC EJ motors, the only stupid problem I ran into was removing the battery tray on the drivers side. I have no idea why it has 6 heavy duty bolts holding it down, 2 of which are on the side of the frame rail only about an inch from the engine. Taking that tray out took longer than doing the plugs. Both air filters were replaced as well, the only thing I have left to do is the brake fluid change, but I cannot seem to find my big syringe to extract the fluid from the reservoir. I will probably end up doing it next week once I locate/replace that.

[rkrenicki]

So, the Metra installation kit I got from Crutchfield has been.. suboptimal. The radio sits back at least a full 1/2" behind the front of the panel, and it has a hard angle to accomplish this. As such, it ends up blocking the left edge of the screen. I decided to try the Scosche version, and I must say it is leaps and bounds better. The unit is mounted further out, has a nice beveled trim that is matte black instead of shiny piano black.. and best of all, has metal mounting brackets instead of the plastic ones that Metra used.

This is how it looked with the Metra kit:



This is the Scosche kit:

[Reason]

Way better for sure.