Thinking of buying a Catalunya and was looking for some advice. The car is a `97 Impreza Catalunya with 40,000miles on the clock and in very good condition, full service history the works. What I was wondering is firstly does approx £9350 sound like a good figure for this car? Secondly is there anything that I should be looking out for on this car that might go wrong etc? Finally does anyone have one and what do they think of it?

Cheers.

not much help but a mate of a mate has one and he'll be at Trax on the 0-60 strip if you're going you can have a chat with him

I've got one, think it's great. The only differences between the Catalunya and any other MY97 are cosmetic. So all the normal checks will apply (piston slap). Check out the SIDC website for all the info on them.

Because there are only 200 of them some bits you won't be able to get from a breakers. The seats spring to immediatley to mind. Make sure it has the little plastic bottle top with number on it.

If you want to know anything more just shout.

Bobfog,
Cheers for the post but I`m afraid that it`s a bit of a drive from where I stay, I live in Aberdeen!!!!Thanks anyway.

Brown baron,
Thanks as well for the post the info was much appreciated. I might have to give you a e-mail with some questions if you don`t mind?

Thanks guys.

Blair, i think TikTok has one

you can try a post on this thread

http://www.scoobynet.co.uk/bbs/thread.asp?threadid=127758

Hi Blairc,

I owned Catalunya no. 185 for three years from new, and it was great.

It did suffer from the piston slap problem, but a new short engine fixed that. As long as this work has been done (may just
involve a new piston on some cars), then there are no other major problems.

As for the price, it does sound high. When I returned my Cat
to the lease company, I got offered a buy price of £10500. This
was for a 3 year old car, with 58,000 miles on the clock (back
in August 2000).

Personally, I wouldn't pay more than £7500-£8000 for it.

Andy.

Blair,

I suggest you cross post in Scotland. There is, at least, one other Aberdonian Cat owner who goes there regularly (Ricco ?).

I had #187 (I think) and it was a great car. Swapped it for an E6 but have now reverted to an Impreza. :)

As a matter of interest, where is it ? (Sunnyhill ?)

BB says it all really. The only thing I'd add is that if you haven't owned a black car before - you're in for a surprise if you like to keep your motor looking clean. :D

Are you going to Knockers on Sunday ? - if so gizza nudge (blue STi UK with Scoobynet sticker). Also, if you need a lift down, leave a message here and I'll give you a phone number. :)

Oh, one other point ... I'd check if it is stock or has mods (purely to be straight with your insurance company).

Thanks to everyone who has replied to my post, you guys have helped me out a lot.

Foot Tapper - Cheers for that, it`s good to get a couple of pics of a cat in real life.

Bagpuss - Thanks for the info, what do you mean by "but a new short engine fixed that"? I also had a look at parkers car guide, they recommended a price of about 10K for a car with this mileage and condition. Is that a load of BS?

Numptie - I am definately going to be going to Knockie on Sunday (weather permitting - what am I saying of course it`s going to be raining!!!) Will keep an eye out for you and maybe come over and pick your brains if you don`t mind? Will also cross post in Scotland.

Again thanks boyz for the help and anymore info would be much appreciated.

Numptie's right about the colour, it's impossible to keep clean. But it looks superb just after it's been polished.

I reckon the price is about right for N.E. Scotland :cool:

I know what you guys mean about having a black car, I`ve got one just now and it`s a mare to keep clean!
Again thanks and i`ll hopefuly be seeing some of your Scoobs at KH on sunday.

Hi Blairc,

When my Cat starting suffering from piston slap, Subaru hadn't
come up with the replacement piston kit to fix the problem, so
they changed the whole engine instead. It was torture having to
run the car in again ;)

With regards to price, I am only going on what I've seen similar
cars go for recently. To give an example, my company has recently
disposed of a number of lease Imprezas, which were all newer
and went for less money.

e.g. Red MY99 Turbo, PPP, 42,000 miles, FSH went for £9000.

Kind of makes the Catalunya look expensive, even for a special
edition.

The only person who knows if the car is worth the money is you.
If you're happy to pay the price, then go for it, but I still
think it's overpriced given the current market conditions.

Andy.

Andy (bagpuss),

OK I understand now (D`oh)! I can see where you are coming from regarding the price, the scoob market seems to be going through a drop in prices just now. It`s all food for thought!

Have a good weekend everyone and I will catch up with you all on Monday.

Only just noticed this thread (acutally, mate istting next to me saw it). I also own a cat. Adn Numptie is right, keeping it clean is a bugger. Cleaned mine yesterday, polished it too, got dirty by this morning's rain.

Whats piston slap? I've got problems with mine currently. What does piston slap do? how can you tell if you've got it?
Mine seemingly misfires, as far as we can make out, am having it loked at but garage booked till October.


Brown Baron - "The only differences between the Catalunya and any other MY97 are cosmetic" - I thought that the Catalunya had a revised turbo and detailed engine modifications (whatever that means), making it higher bhp than standard my97's and its 0-60 somewhat quicker.

Paul

The Cat was basically a tarted up MY97.

The MY97 got the upgraded turbo, revised inlet pipework etc over the MY96 before it which saw the low down torque imrprove and tubo lag reduce. No increase in power though.

For details of mine see

http://www.iwoc.co.uk/catalunya.html

I liked it because it was a very rare colour and they only made 200 of them. I always thought the carbon fibre dial surround was neat. Apart from that I quickly upgraded the 15in wheels to 17in and the black/red seats were no where as good as those that were found in the Terzo a year later or the RB5 after that.

Steve

Here is mine, it's number 18. Got it from T&C about 20 months ago and it's fantatstic:D. It is essentaily a MY97 with cosmetic mods, Carbon dash, posh seats, air con etc.

From standard mines had Blitz exhaust, morettes, Bailey Dump Valve, STI V Spoiler, 17" rims, boost gauge, to name but a few mods;).

You can e-mail me as per profile if you want to meet up and take a look, i was down at KH today so you could have had a look then if i'd known what you looked like:eek:

http://upload.turbosport.co.uk/getpi...5033928035.JPG

http://upload.turbosport.co.uk/getpi...4445684612.JPG

Pics are pretty poor quality but you get the idea.

I owned No.27 until last week. I was offered more than £10K as a trade in on my Cat 97R with 46K miles.

No complaints, loved the car but she had to go.

Only mod I had done was to fit 16" wheels instead of the standard 15".

Den

ricco - lovely spoiler! I want one :)
Bailey dump valve? I keep thinking about getting a dump valve, was it worth it?
Mines number 16. and the only mods done are 16 inch wheels and a magnex backbox, oh and i've prayed bits and pieces inside the car red (gear knob, door handles, ash tray etc) to go with the black and red seats.

All the cars on here make mine look very un-beefy :(
Do you have any ideas what the bhp was on the standard Cat? i've heard 215, i've also heard 260. Was also told the 0-60 was 5.2s, is this correct?

Hi Lads,

I have number 99 !!!

I've had mine since July 2001 and bought it with 44K miles on the clock (now has 63K !!) from a Subaru main dealer for £12,500 with a 1-year warranty.
Only thing that has really gone wrong was a faulty MAF and a leaking rear shocker. Both of which were replace under warranty without hassle. Apart from the usual wear and tear like brake disc and pad. The cat has been a fine motor.
I am tempted to trade it in for a newer Scooby MY99/MY00.
Only mods mine has is SS back box/17" Gold Speedlines/Bigger spoiler.

Cheers

Gary.

p.s. I will try and get a pic of it soon.

tiktok - power output was the same as a standard MY97 208bhp@5600rpm (400rpm lower than MY96). Max torque was 214lbft@4000rpm (13lb ft increase and 800rpm lower than MY96). 0-62mph was now quoted by Subaru as 6.4sec but magazines invariably got much quicker.

See http://www.iwoc.co.uk/my97.html for further details.

Steve

Thought I'd join in on the Catalunya thread! :)

Here's mine...
http://upload.turbosport.co.uk/getpi...1447712597.jpg

Tiktok,

Spoiler is an STI V one from DRMotorsport. I love the Dump Valve, although i do get the p1ss taken out of me by the guys at work saying that it sounds like a bus:eek::eek:

Performance wise, the car's official figure is 208BHP but many people claim that a standard MY97 puts out more like 230 - 240 BHP:D:D:D. As of MY98 / MY99 (Cant't remember which) the official figure changed to 215BHP and this was thought of as a much more acurate figure for the newer cars.

Checkout http://dyno.scoobynet.co.uk/PEindex/uk.htm and look for some MY97's without any mods...

Not too sure about the 0 - 60 times, i think that offically it was just over 6 seconds for a MY97:eek: but many magazines rated it as low 5's... I don't know for sure so flame suit on;)

Hope some of this info helps;)

Crawf8 were you at KH on Sunday, think i saw your car:D

Hi Ricco,

No I wasn't at KH on Sunday, so it wasn't me you saw. I wanted to go but in the end couldn't make it. It sounds like it was a good day, I'm sorry I had to miss it. :(

Nice car BTW ;)

Crawf.