Okay, now I know what most of you are thinking here: “But muh WRX” as you hit your vape and blow fat clouds. Sorry to offend the Subaru Bro’s here but the majority of you own a piece of junk anyways.
My actual point here is that over the years so many of these cars have been ruined by people who don’t have enough money to actually take care of the car and or who don’t care enough to actually treat the car right. Subaru has a great reputation, their all wheel drive system is one of the best. It is why I would LOVE to own one. So “GD” is the name of the chassis that spans from 2002-2007. Within this time span there is the Bugeye (02-03), the Blobeye (04-05), and the Hawkeye (06-07). My best friend owns an 07 WRX STI, he named her Jade and she is a beautiful car that he spends too much money on.
The nomenclature: (most of you already know)
So the Impreza is the actual model, WRX stands for World Rally eXperimental. (That threw me for a loop too, don’t be alarmed.) STI stands for Subaru Tecnica International, and that is the name of their Motorsports division. The STI versions’s of the WRX are more expensive so they are much less victim to mistreatment.
Every WRX that I have looked at in my price range has had some sort of issue, something wrong with the engine, tons of rust, the “Glass” transmission issue, and sometimes they’ve had them all at once. The sellers often lie, they hike up the price to way more than what its worth. I myself went to look at a Sedona red Bugeye that was listed for $4500. I could literally fist the rocker panel, the sub frames were basically gone and the passenger rear quarter panel was JUST bondo. Now at this point I was slightly scared of the big man selling it so I humored him by going for a test drive and this is where rock bottom got even deeper.
Reverse- Perfectly fine
First- The clutch felt like it was still trying to grab through the entire gear even though it was brand new? Weird.
Second- Same weird thing with the clutch
Third- Clutch issue less prevalent but still there
Fourth- UH WHERE IS FOURTH.
I looked at the big man as I tried to shift into fourth a few more times just to be told that I didn’t know how to drive the car and that he was going to show me how.
Fifth- Oh this one works but the RPM’s are super low because WHO CARES ABOUT FOURTH? C o o l. (Here’s a secret, I care about fourth gear.)
I pulled off to let him drive it back while my best friend sat in the backseat wondering how the big man would ever sell this car.
When being shown “How to drive the car like a real man” I was witness to the big man roasting the clutch to no end, not being able to shift into fourth himself, shifting into third and redlining it almost all the way back to his house. And to top it all off, once we were back to his place he told us that the very obvious clutch smell was the brakes heating up. He had no idea how much my best friend and I know about cars when put together. That poor husk of a WRX wasn’t even worth $1000
And that highlights how most WRX’s are driven and why you should be very wary of them.
-Vince
Clutch Out Media 