The Hulk!

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New obxt! by Eric Ferris, on Flickr

Just picked up this outback xt from texas. Its matte green, fast, and will soon be a beast on and off road!

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In an attempt to get rid of extreme shifter slop, today I replaced the tranny mount, crossmember bushings, front and rear shift bushings, shift linkage/joint, and installed a short shift lever. Hardened group-n pieces and polyurethane for all but the linkage joint. And still a bunch of slop!! After searching a bit I realized some dummy used a bolt and nut through the linkage joint where a spring pin should have been.

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Throwout bearing started making noise, so now it has a new clutch and flywheel. Radiator has also been replaced, along with aluminum front control arms. Stiffer excel-g dampers for a 2nd gen went on with new mounts and rallitek springs. STi catless up-pipe was installed along with a cobb ap stage 1 tune. The car has been so much fun to drive.

Unfortunately it recently had an overheating episode that was solved by putting in a new OE thermostat and radiator cap. And now suddenly there is a hesitation with >70% throttle application. I tried cleaning the maf but no help. 2 days later the center stack electronics are going haywire. I'm going to start checking grounds. I suck at electronics so hopefully I won't have to bring it in to have that addressed. Once that stuff is resolved I plan on adding swaybars and a downpipe....though it may be awhile since the rx-8 is more likely to get attention these days.

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After having a timing belt service done and a few leaks fixed, last weekend the car lost a quart of oil in about 1.5 tanks of gas. It's always had a variable oil consumption issue but it wasn't horrible and I was hoping once the leaks were fixed it would be "normal". I'm guessing it's got ringland failure and will need a new block at some point in the near future. So now I'm trying to decide on fixing it, or just getting a new car that will be significantly more expensive but at least have a warranty. The only reaslistic one that ticks all necessary boxes of awd, stick, wagon, adequate power, and acceptable ground clearance is the new golf alltrack. Which I test drove and was underwhelmed, though the one I drove was an auto. Dilemma.

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Drove it to disney last week with no issues, power is still good. I installed an air/oil separator and grp n pitch mount before leaving. Oil consumption was about a quart per 500 miles. I'm going to get a new forester with the 6mt. Steering ratio is 14.0:1 which sounds crazy. Haven't driven one yet, though yesterday I got in a '15 xt which felt good but slower than I was expecting. I need to stop screwing around with the daily until I can get the rx-8 sorted. If anyone wants this, let me know. It might be a week or two before I can get an ad up.

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I've been reading up on Rotella and it seems that a lot of Subaru guys are using that in their cars to deal with consumption problems. I'm sure you already knew that though.....

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Thanks. I've been using rotella for years. Even in the miata.

I just put the car up on a local suby forum for $4850 obo. Hopefully I can shoot some photos this weekend and get it up on craigslist.

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That's why I was researching it. I was thinking about using it in my NB. You gonna get back in a Miata?

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You gonna get back in a Miata?

I'm sure some day I will, but in the meantime I am loving the rx8.