Buying a Subaru Impreza WRX - advice?
 

Hello guys! :) I am new in the forum, however I am a fan of Subaru since I am a child and I believe that now is the moment to achieve my dream and buy one. Due to my financial abilities at the moment /I'm a student/ I can afford to buy the blobeye WRX but what I have discovered after a few calls is that most of these cars have 6-7 owners, although mileage is quite attractive at 72k to 85k or something in that region. I also had a viewing of a hawkeye WRX saloon for £3,600 with 8 owners and 39,000 miles but it was registered as a cat D and then a cat C so I walked away as the boot was not repaired well in my opinion.

I'd like to ask what can you advise me when buying an Impreza, the maximum I can afford is £3,500, ideally I am searching for a blue saloon with the sti spoiler :) Shall I stay away from cars with so many owners as all sellers /they of course want to sell the car/ say good things about the car they are selling.

Thanks in advance and I will appreciate it if you could share some opinions :)

Performance cars can change hands often, I wouldn't put me off but I would ensure I had checked the car to my standard. With multiple owners, paperwork is key,don't take people's word for things such as cambelts/ servicing, if the car is clean and the papetwork stands up then go for it

Hi, thanks for your answer :) I am quite interested in two cars at the moment, both of them blue with nice wheels on and high spoilers, exactly what I am looking for however, one of them is with 7 previous owners /81k miles/, hpi clear but the report is from 2010, and the guy told me he lost the service book however, he found it later and he was not sure when the cambelt was last changed. The other one is on 72k miles and the guy is its 6th owner, but he told me the car was recently serviced and he has full service history as well so is it a common practice to request photos of the service books before even going for a viewing?

Timing belts and a service are easy,after recent experiences I'd be asking to do a compression/leak down test before buying any Subaru.

Could you please elaborate on that, how could you do it if you are alone and somewhere at a completely unknown place and the car and seller stood in front of you saying it is perfectly fine and will get you anywhere?

Bought my impreza from hurst cars (or worst cars as a now call him) and he said the same,2 bent inlet valves and worn bores were the true condition.
Bought a replacement engine from a trader and it's got serious cylinder leakage too.
A simple compression text takes minutes and will save you the cost of the car if it shows there's a problem,you wouldn't have much change from 3k to rebuild a worn engine.
You can get a tester off eBay for £10 and they are simple to use,if you can change a spark plug and start a car then you can do a compression test.

Welcome, nice to see another Worcester area member :thumb:

Rule of thumb, the less owners the better. After all, you treat your long term skirt better than you do the sort you meet down the pub. A car is no different.

Oh and blobeye is a better bet engine reliability wise than a 2.5 hawkeye

Thanks for welcoming me Steve and for the answers guys :)

Chocador, could you send a link of this device, just to know which one to buy exactly. But in order to change a spark plug, I will need the needed tool for that, I've done it on my previous car, a Rover 216 Coupe with the Honda engine and on my mum's Honda bus as far as I know, it is very hard work to do it on a boxer engine. I've heard that you have to remove many things to get to the spark plugs, which lie somewhere below, so how I am supposed to do that test on a viewing?

I wouldn't be put off by the number of owners, I have a blob sti 53 plate I think I'm the 5th or 6th owner. The car is regularly serviced. I think the servicing is the key issue with a high performance car. There r plenty of wrxs out there, just get it checked over properly first. Good luck

When you say check it properly, what are the key things with Imprezas. As Chocador already told us, the compression tester is a useful tool, however what is the proper compression of these engines as I am not quite technical. The other thing is, I am not sure if the seller will allow to touch his car with such tools :? So what are the main things that you guys look at when you are viewing these cars?

a compression test may be a difficult thing to do if you have never worked on an impreza, and given the circumstances of being at someones house looking round there car ect....

best bet is get someone who know there stuff when it comes to viewing. a well train ear. and someone who knows impreza should be able to tell if it running well IMHO

a good test drive should reveal alot to. any smoke on boost. coolant spraying from overflow ect. ect......

there is always a risk on buying a second hand car. but dont be put off by amount of owners. mine has 9 and is fantastic

You're the first person I've seen say a bad word about Hurst. Did you not try to resolve it?

I'l be the second then, I was a genuine buyer with cash in pocket to burn and didn't bother getting back to me. Went elsewhere in the end.

My problem is, I don't know anyone who can come with me. I live in England from 3 years now and actually I know a rally driver from my town as I am also a rally driver /funny I should say that but I am not technical haha/, he's got a ex-works Celica ST185 Gr. A but he is tooo busy to come with me anywhere, so I have to go alone and hope that the car I am potentially buying is alright..

These cars tend to change hands a lot because people buy them and realise how much fuel they use and how much they cost to run, with good tyres costing £100 each, decent brake pads start around £100 brake discs around £150, so if you buy one that needs tyres and brakes sorting you can easily spend another £6/700. Fill the tank £60/70 drive it fast ish a few times and your looking at 200 miles take it real easy and you'll get 250/280 miles to the tank. compared to a lot of cars they are expensive to own especially if you don't know how to work on them yourself.

I think your looking at the wrong car, you should buy another Honda as a foreign student with a limited budget, no tools and little technical knowledge it's really not one of your better ideas to own a Subaru. I understand that they are probably much cheaper to buy here but there is a good reason for that. Also the cars you are looking at will have needed to have things like cambelt done recently with proof, they will also be close to wanting a new clutch, things like suspension tend to be worn and maybe knocking, those three things together will cost in the region of £2000 to fix.

We all understand the dream of owning a Subaru but the reality can quickly become a nightmare. I suggest if you really have your heart set on owning one that you stay on the forum and learn about these cars before you go ahead and buy one without much knowledge.:thumb:

What he said. Make sure you can afford to run it, especially if things go wrong. These cars are expensive to run, especially if you have little mechanical experience such as yourself.
Find the cars that you are interested in, post the links on here and we will point out any alarm bells and advise you on what questions to ask.
Personally, a standard Impreza, 90% of the time will end up being more reliable than a modified one.

As for the compression test, spark plugs take around an hour to change and I for one would not let some guy I didn't know to start messing around with my engine. What if he broke a coil pack? Would he replace it if he didn't end up buying it? As mentioned, take someone with you who knows that they are talking about. Or hire the AA or RAC to conduct and inspection. Usually around £150 or so.

:thumb:

Basically I was 600 miles from home and had a 500 deposit on the car that I was told I had to pay to secure it.
Same as the op I didn't know much about subarus or I would have noticed the bent valves,clicking rear diff,seized calipers plus the countless other things that were wrong with it.not had any luck at all with and I'm almost ready to crush it tbh.
It was advertised as being hpi checked,good tyres,22b bumper,just been fully serviced inc all oils changed,remapped for uk fuel etc and was a bit vague on everything else,tyres were bald,bumper was fibreglass,no alarm,spare key,hpi cert,stel bonnet,fibreglass scoop and vents,still running jdm map and his last words were 'better change the oil'
From someone who stocks around 10-15 of these he should know his onions and be honest.
Cost me 4k to date and currently got the engine out for replacement but that's went sour too.
Maybe I had bad luck or I'm being too critical of a 14 year old car but I paid top dollar from a 'specialist' and got tucked up.
Called him once and got fobbed off so just took it on the chin and learnt a valuable lesson,never put a deposit on anything when distance buying.
I'd have no problem letting a potential buyer do a compression test on my car,confirms car was good at point of sale and gives seller and buyer peace of mind.

Always buy on condition, it should be fairly obvious if a vehicle has been well cared for:

- is it clean inside and out or covered in leaves and mildew?
- has it got matching good quality tyres all round?
- any coolant in the oil or oil in the coolant?
- any smoke on (cold) start up and not just water vapour from a car that's been stood about for a week?
- take it for a drive does it feel tight, no undue whining from gearbox or diffs?
- floor it in 5th at around 40mph any smoke from the turbo (useful to have a friend following to help with this)?
- check bodywork for signs of crash repair and/or rot, try and get under boot carpet and inspect wheel well and arches inside and out.
- has it got a wad of receipts for service parts and sundries at least an inch to 2 inches thick?
- ask the owner what fuel he runs it on, if the answer is other than Vpower or Momentum, personally i'd walk.
- have you got a couple of grand stashed away that you can always call upon if the worst should happen?

If the answers to all the above are satisfactory then start negotiating on price don't get too carried away 'cos its the right colour and you really want it, try and approach it objectively...not easy!

Took me 6 months to find a decent one and that was 4 years ago, but when I found it I knew it was the right one for me.

Happy hunting!!! :thumb:

Thanks for your opinion, I really do appreciate your advice and understand that owning a Subaru is more expensive. The main reason why I want a WRX /not STi/ is because I know it's a lot cheaper than maintaining an STi. I know Subaru specialists from my country /Bulgaria, please don't hate me because of that haha/ and they all supported the idea of a WRX because it is a very reliable car and also what they advised me was to LPG it, not a thing that I considered to put on any car I would own but started thinking about it and then I spoke to a couple of guys who run their STi's on LPG /One of them is running at 400 bhp/ and they say there is absolutely no loss in power or approx. 2% and high-performance turbo engines make use of the lpg a lot better than normal cars. So I researched this and I am willing to do it after receiving so many positive replies especially from Impreza owners.

What is the other reason for wanting this car is because my rally career is important to me and I want to develop it, so owning a car like this will constantly keep me in condition and also I and my father are looking at buying an Impreza for a rally project for our national championship /If we don't find the needed money, we will use the one that I buy, but that's the plan B :)/.

Thank you to all who replied to my thread and I think we are making a great discussion and I am grateful that you guys are willing to help :)

As Gear Head suggested, I am posting the link of this one, which I think is quite good, 2 owners, mileage is alright for the age and most importantly it has had recent cambelt change, new tyres and FSH - http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/2004-Subar...3D281280177599

I am not in a rush to buy as I am going back home in August, so if I buy something now, it has to be SORNed for a few months, but there is also a tendency of price rise for these cars?

Hi again guys, I am not quite sure if the aim of this post is right or not but I just wanted to protect you having seen this car for sale again but at a much higher price than it was actually sold - http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Subaru-Imp...item338bdb429b

This is the car which I had a viewing on some 2 weeks ago, the guy agreed to sell it for £3,600 /advertised price £3,795/. On the actual ad it was said that the car was a Cat D with rear end damage but repaired, brakes, tyres all good. After some conversations I decided to go and buy it as it looked good on the photos but on my way to Leeds decided to do an HPI check and ouch... should have done it earlier, the HPI report said it was cat D in 2009 and then a cat C in 2012 being recorded as a total loss and substantially repaired.

When I went to see it, it drove good, however I did not have the chance to drive as I didn't buy temporary insurance prior to purchase. The current owner was its 8th owner and the mileage is somehow strange at 39,000 for 8 owners and an 8 year old car. Also, the guy told me that when he bought the car it started running a bit crappy and also it was overheating, so he changed the headgaskets. This is something which is totally unacceptable for a car on 39,000 miles and I know that if you start touching Japanese engines, that's it..

The boot is not professionally repaired, when I lifted the carpet, I could see that it collected water where the spare wheel is and it smelt like mold. The paste they used to repair the boot is highly visible and was not painted. Also when you close the boot, the space between the boot door and the rear light is bigger than normal and you can place your finger inside, there is also a cable coming from the spoiler going to the boot through that space, something that I have not seen on any other Impreza :lol1:

On the front, the bonnet seemed a bit lighter blue compared to the body and the front winglets looked displaced, which brought an alert to my mind that the car has been crashed on the front as well, which automatically means new dashboard and that's why low mileage..

I had a look at the last MOT and the advisories are all four brake discs, pads and tyres need changing soon.

I wasted a whole day and about £70 to get to Leeds and back but learned a lesson to sort all things beforehand and ask for hpi reports, number of owners and service history as there was no such with the car hence mileage can't be proven.

I hope this post will save someone from spending their hard earned £5000 for that car, I am sorry to the seller for sharing that. I've read that 2006 cars with two damages are worth no more than £1,800 but as this being a Subaru Impreza, I think it's worth no more than £2,500.

At least you only wasted £70 and not £3.5k. :thumb:

Reason why it only had 39k miles probably because it spent most of its time in the bodyshop being repaired and being off the road!! You will always notice that Cat d cars are pretty low mileage as they get damaged and sometimes be sitting around 1-2 years before someone decides to repair them!!!

Yeah that's a fair point scoobyboy :)

What do you think about this car guys http://www.gumtree.com/p/cars-vans-m...wrx/1051777620 It's a good price and I asked him to give me more detailed information so will see. I also did a check here https://totalcarcheck.co.uk/FreeChec...ul&make=subaru but don't know why when it is exported it has a red tag on?

Edit: He just told me the car has 4 owners, timing belt was changed at 50k miles and he remapped it 2 months ago to approx. 260 bhp, full subaru service history but no HPI certificate, although he said he guarantees there are not any problems.. but I just don't know how to get there to see it :lol1: it's good for someone from Ireland.

it is in Northern Ireland

So add some cash to get it back

Yes, I calculated all transport incl. ferry and it is about £3,200-250 no more than that :)

Listen out for any knocks when going over bumps/potholes/speed-humps.

The blobeye suffered from a well documented issue with it's shocks. Something about the design of them leading to them sticking.

You can sort it out for a few hundred miles by greasing them up but to get rid of the knocking entirely you'll need to replace them with something like KYBs Excel Gs (which are effectively OEM). It happened on mine at the rear at about 35k miles.

Some useful threads on here about it if you do a search.

Good luck with the search for your new car.

Thanks for the advice mate :) I am going to Belfast tomorrow for the car I posted above, it looks just the right deal for me and the guy is nice, it comes with full service history from Subaru, which is the most important thing for me and he also sent me a video of cold start and I am just awaiting another video from today, but wish me luck tomorrow :)

So finally I am a proud owner of an Scooby blobeye, which I bought yesterday from North Ireland, it was a lovely trip by plane, ferry and then 320 miles of fun with the Scooby from Cairnryan to Worcester, and the car behaved very very good. The car itself is in a very good condition, tested it before purchase on Belfast docks, there a lot of speed bumps and the suspension is very good, no knocks nothing. The engine pulls very good without any smokes from anywhere and with these 260 bhp or 270 it is so so good, never driven such a lovely car. I am satisfied with the mpg as well , I drove it normally, on the motorway 70 miles maximum so it is about 26-27 mpg considering I pushed it a bit a couple of times :)

Cambelt was changed at 50 or 60,000 miles and it is currently on just under 93,000 so I am guessing some 7,000 more and it will need replacing. The standard discs are also not good for the power, so I saw Brembo 326 mm grooved and drilled for £99, which is very good price. And yeah, I want to put either a WRC rear spoiler or the STi one. Below are some pictures :)

https://fbcdn-sphotos-c-a.akamaihd.n...50900156_n.jpg

https://scontent-b-lhr.xx.fbcdn.net/...18375158_n.jpg

https://fbcdn-sphotos-d-a.akamaihd.n...41562549_n.jpg

https://fbcdn-sphotos-g-a.akamaihd.n...58785264_n.jpg

That looks very nice Marvi, well done i'm pleased for you, all your friends in Bulgaria will be jealous. :lol1:

I would not put LPG kit because of the cost of a good system + wet kit in the UK is around £1500/2000 and I don't do enough miles to justify that expense, also Subaru valves don't seem to like it from what some people here say. I know this is probably popular in your country because LPG is very popular out here in Croatia too, because of that the kits are cheaper and it's easy to find people to fit them for quite cheap prices.

Drive it for a while and enjoy it before you start thinking about spending more money on it, don't use 95 ron petrol, Shell V power or Tesco momementum only and you will be fine. :thumb:

Edit to add; get yourself a set of gauges and a centre pod for them that goes where the clock is, then you will be able to get around 30mpg by watching the boost gauge and by not letting it boost too much you will get decent mpg around town.

Avoid drilled discs as they tend to crack around the holes.