Eh? The guys locally here who have subarus talk about "stage 3". I was pretty sure that's not a figment of my imagination. lol

I asked my friend w/the STI and none of those stages are set in stone but generally a turbo swap makes you stage 3.

 

i guess thats just word of mouth then..... they do have stg1-2 pretty much set in stone.... if a guy tells me hes stage 2 i pretty much know what mods hes running.....

 

My old WRX (before the STi) was a TurboXS stage 4. So TBE, injectors, upgraded intercooler, turbo swap and tune (along with a few other things). The "stages" are just marketing speak that different companies throw out there to designate different stages of modification.

My STi would have been stage 21532534623572 if I had named it anything else other than Frankenstein. haha

 

What ended up happening to that car, WRX?

 

just watch out for the stage 4 AGP turbo kits on the skittles.. they're not soo slow lol.

 

My first WRX I sold to someone I met through the Subie forums from Illinois I think. We still talk occasionally. His girlfriend bought it as her first manual car, which was obviously a bit of a handful so he bought it off of her and she got something else. I think he sold it to fund his V8 build of some kind, I can't remember exactly.

The STi is still being enjoyed by a friend of mine in my old college's car club. He bought it from me in VA and drove it across the country all the way to where he was stationed in Montana. He has tracked it, done some damage to it haha and throughly thrashed it good. It's probably in storage now because he's in the Air Force flying covert missions in Afghanistan the last I heard. Interestingly I talked to one of the mechanics at a Suby meet in VA a few years back and he asked me how the car was doing. I told him it was still holding up as far as I knew. The reason he asked was that the three other 2.8L builds that shop had done (my car was actually pretty rare at the time, I'd imagine there have been other people that have followed my lead by now on engine builds) had all self-destructed. I guess I either got lucky, or those people didn't put the investment into a proper tune and maintenance. When you build a block like that it's no longer like a normal car, there is a lot more that goes into its maintenance and upkeep to keep it reliable. I don't think a lot of people realize that when they go crazy on a build.

 

One of the locals just destroyed his motor (STI).
http://www.maecforum.com/engine-f4/w...wrong-t377.htm

They can get a set of forged rods/pistons for only $900 and the block for around a grand. Way cheaper than it would cost to fix mine if that happened.

 

nice wrx..... i gotta say though its rare to hear someone going that way you did with a suby...... most, if their goin to make the swap, end up with some kinda 20g... like a fp green, dominater, or just a 20g. or you get the guys that have gt30-35r rotated kits which are serious.... well thats what most of the swapped guys by me have... never even knew turboxs made a stage 4 kit and i had a turboxs tmic on my sti lol...... i was goin to go with a fp green, inject, and fmic on my sti but i decided to call it quits on the car..... sounds like your sti was a nice build though....

 

Nice! haha I miss my Subys. They were really great cars and they had an awesome community of enthusiasts. I bought my STi with UR's GT35R kit, and I recycled the entire kit after I built and bored the motor..except I had Phil from Element Tuning tune it with a Hydra standalone after the rebuild to make sure it lasted. It was costly bringing him down to MD but it was worth it. If you do a search for my posts on NASIOC you'll probably find a few threads of the before and after of the build, as well as dyno results. The motor itself had a lot of room left in it as far as power goes, I just got tired of dumping money into it and I didn't feel like throwing another 1.5k-2k into the fuel system to push 800+whp.

But yeah I spared no expense on that engine build. Honestly if I could have either car back I would take the old WRX. It was a really awesome, comfortable tuner car. Heated seats, stock factory sub under the seats, good sound system, sunroof, and plenty of usable torquey power.

 

haha damn wrx, you didnt mess around at all!...... most mildly tunned gt35r subys put down around 550awhp @ around 30psi but you deff went way farther then that... nice! yea, i miss my sti sometimes, it was a amazing machine. i meen for what i did to it and how i pushed it, it never gave up or gave me a prob... except after i dyno tuned it, the stock clutch went but thats just part of the game.... hey, got any pics? hahaha i have some of my old suby.... oh, i used to spend a ton of time on NASIOC... prob more then MF or s197forum...... what was your name on nasioc?