Hello all. My name is Clayton and I just picked up my first Subaru yesterday. It's a '99 Legacy GT with 105,000 on it. I was and still am a bit nervous about it as its my first non domestic, my first awd car, and my first Subaru. Fortunately I know they're great cars. The guy I bought the car from put it up on Craigslist and I jumped on it right away. It's in great shape for its age. As for me, I'm in school for auto service tech. I have the rest of this year and then next year. I've lived in Duluth all my life. I'm also not new to car forums. I used to own a mystique so I'm a member of contour.org. Here are the pictures from the ad. This is exactly how the car looked the day I bought it. The dirty one is when I got her to school yesterday.
Clayton , that's a great looking leggy. I hope you really enjoyed it in the fresh snow today, like I enjoyed mine. Welcome to the forum.
I too owned a mistake of a contour back when I was a high schoolin'. glad to see you got a nice looking leggy. Congrats with your purchase and welcome to MNsubaru!
Thanks guys. As much as people hate them, I have to say that I really liked my Mystique. It had the 2.5 Duratec and a five speed in it. That car was very clean when I owned it too. I think I miss that the most out of the vehicles I've owned. I am loving the Legacy so far. I think the thing I like most is that I feel like I'm driving a substantial car and not a tin can, like most cars feel like. I've driven trucks for most of my life so cars always feel strange. Right now the only things I really want to do with it are find some formed rugged weather floor mats that have a lip on them so water and salt don't get all over the good mats and carpeting, and possibly some over sized mudflaps. The snow tires he put on there seem to be a bit wider than the factory size and tend to throw everything up the side of the body. I'd prefer to keep the body as nice as possible for as long as possible. Right now the car is completely stock other than the Sony head unit I bought and put in it today. Other than that, I've been pushing the idea of getting a set of projector headlights for it around in my head. I may want to get a set of brighter bulbs for my fogs soon too. Time will tell. I usually find things I want to change within the first month or so. Hah!
As for rugged weather floor mats, I bought the ones they sell at Sam's Club for my SUV. $20 bucks for two fronts and two rears area mats. They have the higher lip you speak of to keep the water in. Nice heavy duty inexpensive mats. Welcome!
If your interested, h.i.d bulbs for your headlights and fogs, check out ddm tuning. I've had four sets from them and I've had good luck with life of the bulbs and quality of the ballasts. Some say they think they are cheaper, but I'd rather pay about 70 dollars than 140. Pretty easy plug and play kits. I have 10k hids in my 09 wrx and they are way brighter with the stock projector housings.
Well my worry and nervousness are gone now. I was able to get it into the shop at school yesterday and onto a lift to check it out good underneath. The underside is nearly as pretty as the body. Looking at the exhaust makes me want to put a MUCH large one on it. This is what I woke up to this morning. The temptations I come across when going to the grocery store.. And this is what she looked like after some fun on a couple dirt roads in the country. Sorry about the huge pictures. I forget how big they are when I take them with my phone.
Who cares? It's your thread triple post them if you'd like.. But anyway nice car. And welcome. Maybe one of these days I'll make my own intro thread...
The General snows are on it right now. When the snow goes away, I plan on picking up some steelies and swapping the generals onto those so I'm not swapping tires all the time. Thanks! She certainly is a beauty. I'm glad the couple that had it took such care of her. My gain I guess.
Oh yeah, about the floor liners. The two good ones I have heard about are Husky: http://www.huskyliners.com/product-detail/?category=18 Weathertech http://www.weathertech.com/subaru/1999/legacy/floor-mats-all-weather/bodystyle/sedan/
I think the Weathertechs are the ones that someone told me are made based off of a laser scan of the subject vehicle. However, from the pictures, they don't look very fitted. They don't seem to have a part that covers the dead-peddle either. As I use the dead-peddle all the time and don't want winter water/slush to flow down onto the factory mats and carpeting, I'm not sure these would work. If I was more handy with such things, I'd try to make some myself. Hah!
I have weather techs, just got them actually, they are ehhh they fit what they are covering well, but they don't cover the dead peddle, I haven't noticed anything running down into the floor yet though. My complaints about them would have to be that they are very slick/slippery and sqeaky, the worst part I think is that the mat overlaps the release for the fuel door lock dealio which makes it kind of tough to grab the lever.
Is there any possibility of modifying them slightly to NOT cover the latches? I'm still trying to find custom fitted flaps for it too but I'm having no luck. I know I shouldn't expect much when my car is fifteen years old, but I'm hoping there's something out there. Hah!
I'm sure with a utility knife you can modify anything... Although I'm not going to rush into hacking away at a 90$ set if floor mats that list at 140 or something. (I have a hook up at a dealership) it's also not completely covered, I just have to bend my finger a little differently to grab the latch and I'm lazy sometimes so I bitch. As for flaps... Ben seems to know a lot about fitement. Otherwise I'd say just rally armor basics or classics idk the difference but I know they are universal. Or try rokblokz they have some for the 00-03 but I don't know how much different your 99 is from those.
IIRC, the Husky ones are supposedly a lot better than the weathertech ones....at least I think that was the consensus for the Fusion. They do cover the dead pedal completely and work their way up the sides a lot more.
Thanks! Yes, I realized that after the fact. Usually I'm a grammar natzi. Lately though I've been having issues.
Hmm. I'll have to look at both and see what I think. Though, the WT ones are about $100 on their site. I just see my regular mats and carpeting getting full of crap.
xluben but I have no idea if he will know about your era mudflaps, I just have seen him give a lot of fitement advice or whatever you want to call it. I can snap some pictures of the weather techs if you'd like... Or if you agree not to rape and murder me I could show you in person..
Weathertechs are nice floormats and seem to be a hot commodity around here once they hit the FS threads. My lady has a set of them in her car and they work wonders for keeping dirt and sand off the carpet in the vehicle. I hope to find myself with a pair of these with my wrx.
Bahaha! Well, I can admit that I'm a creep. Fortunately I'm not THAT much of a creep. You live in the area as well? I do have to say that everyone I've seen that has them loves them. I know I'm being overly anal about it. It's just that this is the nicest(in best shape) car or truck that I've ever owned and I'd prefer to keep her that way. Perhaps I will bite the bullet and get a set of the WTs.
Oh Jesus I should have looked at your location before I offered. No, I'm nowhere near Duluth, ever.. I'm in the twin cities.
Hah! Trust me, you don't want to be. It's nice to visit and that's about it. It's hard to get anywhere in this town unless you're into medical or tourism attractions.
Not even very much tourism stuff.. Woo hoo I've seen the lift bridge about a dozen times.! Other than the stuff in that little area of Duluth I don't know of really any other tourism stuff. I'd like to make a trip up the north shore in the summer time though I think that would be a nice drive! But about the weather techs.. I'll check out my moms floors under them tomorrow, she's had hers in for 2 winters now and I don't think she does much cleaning of the interior if her car..
Nice car. My first car was a 1997 legacy gt. I drove 100k on it and sold it at 205k for 3k. Subaru maintains their value quite well. One main worry is your headgaskets. These motors are prone to HG failure.
