RE: Spotted: Subaru Legacy rally car

[soad]

Nice find, if a tad expensive. Love those wheels.
Going to spend couple hours watching old rally footage on youtube.

[teacake]

The Mk I Legacy Turbo is the best car I've ever owned. For a while I had a brace of Legacies, and I'm considering getting going back to them when I next change. The Turbo is the red one in the picture, and was still going strong at 190k miles when I sold it. Lovely cars.

[ShedDriver]

I lived in NZ for 2004/2005 and they were everywhere at the time. Kiwi's love them. Here's my 91 wagon


The perfect way to see New Zealand! I wish I'd brought it back with me.

[SteRB5138]

I Loved the early 90's Legacys, great sound as well. Here is a photo from the Richard Burns Memorial day in 2010.

[Chris Harris]

SteRB5138 said:

I Loved the early 90's Legacys, great sound as well. Here is a photo from the Richard Burns Memorial day in 2010.

That looks stunning.

[epom]

I see one of these regularly enough, looks ropey enough but so so plain, then it moves.... is it possible these sound even better than the impreza ??

[555 Paul]

epom said:

I see one of these regularly enough, looks ropey enough but so so plain, then it moves.... is it possible these sound even better than the impreza ??

Same engine and exhaust as the Impreza so sound is down to the individual exhaust system. I loved mine

[Snowlife]

I spent a few summers in New Zealand too.
Started with a '91 gx wagon. Moved on to a '93 GT wagon, such fun in the mountains & bullet-proof as long & as you change the cam belt opten enough, even with the twin-turbo. Both had done nearly 260,000 kms when sold.

<img src="http://a1.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/263_49117695439_571490439_3290592_2819_n.jpg" alt="Beautiful Sunset" />

[teacake]

Snowlife said:

I spent a few summers in New Zealand too.
Started with a '91 gx wagon. Moved on to a '93 GT wagon, such fun in the mountains & bullet-proof as long & as you change the cam belt opten enough, even with the twin-turbo. Both had done nearly 260,000 kms when sold.

I think the non-turbo was non-interference, so bullet-proof that way too.

Edit: the three in the picture I posted above had more than half a million miles (800,000km) between them by the time they moved on to their next owners

Edited by teacake on Friday 2nd March 00:54

[Snowlife]

messed up the pics
1991 Legacy GX 2.0 NA

1993 Legacy GT 2.0 Twin-Turbo

[Snowlife]

Oh and the GX was the New Zealand edition, so it had the high/low range manual 'box. With snow tyres & a few sets of chains it was lit"rally" unstopable even in 40cm snow.

[GravelBen]

Great thread!

article said:

...1992 group tests

Did you have to wait that long for them? They were making them in '89 and had been rallying (much slower) 4wd turbo Leones since '83.

I had a '90 Legacy VZ - JDM 2.0NA 4cam, 150bhp and loved using all 7750rpm.

[teacake]

GravelBen said:

Did you have to wait that long for them? They were making them in '89 and had been rallying (much slower) 4wd turbo Leones since '83.

I had a '90 Legacy VZ - JDM 2.0NA 4cam, 150bhp and loved using all 7750rpm.

I seem to recall that a 1.8 turbo with something like 165bhp was tested by a UK mag around 1990ish, but we mainly got the 2.0 turbo with 197bhp from '91-'94, and that was the last time a turbo version of the Legacy was officially imported.

[Serin]

I went to look at a Legacy GT (the auto one, rather than manual) that a friend of mine was selling the other day, body work was a little tired, but it went like a train!



Even though it had a brand new WOF (the NZ MoT) and was all of 500pounds I had to decline, as I don't have space for 3 cars

[GravelBen]

teacake said:

I seem to recall that a 1.8 turbo with something like 165bhp was tested by a UK mag around 1990ish, but we mainly got the 2.0 turbo with 197bhp from '91-'94, and that was the last time a turbo version of the Legacy was officially imported.

1.8 165bhp would probably be a Leone RXII, predecessor to the Legacy. Unless the UK got a 1.8 turbo Legacy that nobody else did. Think the yanks had a 160hp 2.2 turbo so you never know.



By 93 (Gen.2 Legacy came out late 93 IIRC) I think the NZ and JDM spec Legacy RS was up to 220bhp from the original 200, along with a few special versions like the RS-R and RS-RA. Then of course the later versions are 280bhp manual/260 auto but a bit off topic.

They also broke a few records along the way:

said:

The original Legacy speed record was set between January 2 and January 21, 1989, with three Japanese-spec turbocharged RS sedans at the Arizona Test Center outside of Phoenix, Arizona. It broke the 100,000 km FIA World Land Endurance Record by maintaining an average speed of 138.780 mph (223.345 km/h) for 447 hours, 44 minutes and 9.887 seconds, or 18.5 days. Pit stops were made every two hours with a driver change and refueling, while tire changes were made at 96 hour intervals, or every 13,400 miles (21,600 km) driven.

Edited by GravelBen on Friday 2nd March 08:10

[teacake]

GravelBen said:

1.8 165bhp would probably be a Leone RXII, predecessor to the Legacy. Unless the UK got a 1.8 turbo Legacy that nobody else did. Think the yanks had a 160hp 2.2 turbo so you never know.

Pretty sure it was a Legacy. I've got the single-page article kicking around here somewhere, which I picked up off fleabay as a souvenir when I had my car. The article showed a white salooon against a desert background and I remember being surprised that the engine wasn't the 2-litre. What I'm not sure of is whether the 1.8 that was reviewed ever actually made it to the UK or whether it got overtaken (both literally and figuratively) by the 2.0.

[GravelBen]

Another vid:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2jiBF2mGxdw&fea...

[ShedDriver]

I miss nailing up The Remarkables Road in Queenstown, 12km of gravel switchbacks, with no barriers! Legacy GT wagon, the NZ ski car of choice!

Edited by ShedDriver on Friday 2nd March 22:24

[GravelBen]

Have to agree, Remarks road is good fun! Gets a bit corrugated at times though, makes me think about getting a set of 16" wheels for the GTB.

[Snowlife]

Remarks is such a great road, I miss driving it evry day for work. You can understand why every other car in Queenstown is a subaru.
17's do make it rather bumpy when it gets dry, was much better in the GX on 15's tho (but much slower)