thinking about giving my 04 wrx a lift this winter. what would i do? can i just install some 04 forrester struts and springs and in the back add the trailing arm bracket as well. not looking to go crazy. tires already lift it a bit but looking for a bit more
Why would be a better question to ask. I have to drive threw 3-4 miles of un-plowed roads all winter and my car gets threw great. What purpose would lifting get you, you might get an inch or two. if you cant threw 10" of snow stock 11" is going to be the same. The issue I have found is that the front bumper is too low and almost acts like a plow catching and pulling your car around the road.
You can get away with throwing on the Outback/Forester longer struts/springs but the geometry will not be correct. As you mentioned the trailing arm brackets are one of many parts involved with the correct Outback/Forester chassis lift. There are 30mm spacers on the front/rear/transmission/diff x-members and associated mounting hardware, rear control arm bushings, shift rod/stay-bar/rear bushing, prop-shaft carrier, heat shield spacers, steering rack coupler and column. Personally I would leave it as is, if you are running a lowered setup maybe go back to stock for winter?
I should note this is true for 96-99 Legacy (00+ went double wishbone in the rear) and I believe up until 07 on the Forester. While you could use some parts from the legacy, most of them would have to come from the GD generation forester.
its not getting stuck its the bumper. i broke the bottom of my old one last winter. plus it looks pretty bad ass
I thought I shattered mine during that last big storm we had when I hit the left overs from a plow at 50.
I'm assuming your WRX is a sedan....based on your avatar. Since the GD sedan is wider, I think the forester struts will be a hair different, which will effect your camber a bit. It should still be within the range of the front camber bolts, but you'll probably want some for the rear. The rear trailing arm brackets are only a cosmetic part. Without it, the extra angle on the trailing arms will pull the rear wheel forward, but will not really effect the geometry at all. Certainly not worth it just for a winter setup.
I have a '04 WRX Wagon and I'm actually going to be doing the very same thing this winter. Just got my Forester struts (KYB GR-2's from the VERY pathetic RockAuto who are MF'ing bastards). I have XT springs and trailing arm brackets coming from sub-gen-parts dot com as well as some extra bolts. I still need to order some aftermarket camber bolts for the rear which I'll be doing shortly. Of concern is the possible need for longer swaybar endlinks in the front and a bracket to lower the mounts in the rear; but I'm waiting until I get the install going before worrying about those things. A big difficulty in this whole lifting thing is there are so many different ways to do it. I was hoping for a step by step plan but it's just not out there. I did the best research I could, came up with my plan and will carry it out to the best of my ability but I'm sure I'm going to get surprised. The spacers Threshld1 mentioned may or may not be required; I'm going without them for now. We'll see how things work. Head over to dirtyimpreza dot com and start reading. Also, you really need to decide on which tire size you want as that will affect how much lift you need. One guy fit on a 205/75R15 (+42 wheel I think) on a wagon without a lift. Claims it doesn't rub. I'm going for 215/75R15 BFG AT's on Braid Winrace TA's. Really good looking wheels that I need to wait 3.5 months to get. Good luck and it'd be fun to tear ass around in the snow once we get them finished up. Steve
I also thought about putting back my OB suspension for the winter. But too lazy to to swap out suspension. Snow tires should get me through most big storms. Only problem is when those damn plow trucks plow 8 foot snow barriers on my driveway. Even the OB suspension wont help then.
