LandCruisers Follow me: Dedman’s 99 Subaru Forester

It has been a while since I put an update here but I did a fun little mod today which I though a few people might be interested.
First of all I decided to change my DCCD control from a variable knob allowing a variable amount of lock-up of the centre diff to a simple open or 100% locked switch. The reason for this is that its quick to operate and not once in the 6 months since I put the DCCD in have I had it anywhere except fully locked or fully unlocked with the variable knob. When off-road I want it fully locked and when on-road I want it unlocked 99% of the time. Im also guessing this will reduce wear of the clutch plates.



This made me want to have a 4WD light on the dash like the good old Subaru used to have which lit up when the centre diff was locked.

I took the dash apart to see if there was a good spot to put one. Right next to the low range light was something call hold with a little symbol next to it. It was not being used as there was no globe in it and I have no idea what it was for.

Step one was scratching the old text and symbol from this location.


Next was finding something to that looked good to indicate 4WD. I decided to get the old Subaru 4WD logo printed on a transparency in a few different colours and sizes. Cost $1.80 at office works.



Cut out and put on the dash backing. I decided on green as I thought that was the colour used on my old 83 (my memory is now making me doubt it though), unfortunately the back light made it look orange anyway. Black electrical tape worked well to prevent any light leaking through where it was not meant to.



I had to widen the light housing on the dash as the 4WD was a bit wide and there was light leakage from the Lo rang light when on.



Finished product

Both off


4WD only


Low only


4WD and Low


I might still change the backlight to a green led to get the colour to come out but it is pretty good how it is currently as well.

Showed the girlfriend and she goes "why does it say AWD"

Edit: Decided to try the green led, looks better to me

Great idea to have an on/off switch. Love the light, I was thinking red would be best but that green looks awesome and really stands out too.

How hard was it to take the dash out?

NachaLuva said:

How hard was it to take the dash out?

Click to expand...

5 screws, 3 electrical plugs and a bit of wiggling. 10 mins tops, 2 mins after you have done it once and know what you are doing

Nice mod Dedman ! I like the green !

I won't do the switch mod because when driving on snow I do use the thumbwheel about half way when climbing.

Looks good, DM :biggrin:.

Agree about the colour, best if these things are different colours IMO.

The DCCD switch mod seems like a good idea for your use too.

When it's switched off, does it behave like an open diff?

jf1sf5 said:

I won't do the switch mod because when driving on snow I do use the thumbwheel about half way when climbing.

Click to expand...

Yeah that was the 1% of the time I might not want it open when driving on road but realistically if its snowing full lock will work fine if the conditions are bad. Besides it never really snows here anyway....

Ratbag said:

When it's switched off, does it behave like an open diff?

Click to expand...

Yes fully open with 65% of torque sent to the rear wheels.


In other news I went out driving today with NachaLuva and at the top of a nice climb my clutch line failed quite spectacularly so I could not disengage the clutch. Less than ideal when off road. Managed to patch up the leak and bleed it enough to get it out of gear and get going in the right direction after that it was rev matching and starting in gear the whole hour or so trip home. Was a bit of a pain in the arse but not to bad, not bad enough to convince myself not to stop at the bakery at Warburton to grab a pie anyway :iconwink:. However Murphy being Murphy I had to stop at almost every one of the normally unused pedestrian crossings on the way. Grabbed a second hand hose from Jollys on the way home for $6 and put it in. Good as new :ebiggrin:

Bugger about your clutch hydraulics failing like that, DM.

Had that happen in heavy traffic in Adelaide with the brakes in one of my Morris 1100s. With great good fortune, and a modicum of skill, I managed to swerve up onto the Southern parklands off South Terrace!

Didn't hit anyone, didn't damage the car :biggrin:.

Losing a clutch anytime can be a PITA, and I suspect off-road when you are otherwise having fun would be one of the worse situations. We didn't think it was funny when we lost clutch disengagement in the middle of Rome traffic in a rented motorhome ....

Been a bit of a while since I have updated this thread. Haven't done all that much new but have spent a bit of time working on the car.
I replaced two front wheel bearings which were shagged and making one hell of a noise, one had also developed a fair bit of play. Unfortunately this caused my shudder on cornering at speed to come back for some reason. Basically I am getting a vibration through the wheel much like an unbalanced wheel when I take a moderate corner at speeds above 80. I have recently done all ball joints, tie rods and rod ends so I am quite stumped where the vibration is coming from.

I also spent a solid 3 days completely reoing all my accessory wiring which was a hell of a job. My wiring approach had previously been just adding accessories on where ever was most convenient which had ended up so confusing that I accidentally wired my spotlights in series with my air compressor.... This was the trigger to redo it all. Unfortunately my list of accessories meant it was bloody hard to fit all the wires in regardless of how tidy it was.

On top of standard wiring I had to re wire up:
- Air compressor
- Inverter
- UHF radio
- Winch
- Fan cutout
- Spotlights
- Solar panel and regulator
- Dual battery control
- Built in USB GPS
- Voltage readout for both batteries
- GoPro Charger
- Speedo corrector for final drive conversion
- DCCD controls and dash light
- Gearbox oil feed control
- Central locking unit
- Always on USB port in dash and rear
- Laptop charger

Maybe I have to many things in my car....

I also discovered and completed another very important mod in waterproofing my car. This was the waterproofing and relocating of the engine immobiliser key transponder unit. As standard it was located in an non waterproof box lower down than the car radio. Water doesn't have to be that deep to get to this level if one gets stuck. Given the driving I do there is a good chance that one day I may flood my car and if that unit got wet I would be stranded 100%. Definitely a worthwhile mod if you always want to get home.

Haha, that's a fair list of extras :biggrin:

As you've replaced the usual suspects like ball joints, wheel bearings, tie rods and rack ends my next suspect would be bent rim or warped disc. Both of these would be more pronounced when cornering. A shagged out LCA bush might also exaggerate it