Roxsie: Athos' MY13 Forester

In the morning I picked up the new Forester (2.5i) from the dealer, trading in the old MY06 X.
By the end of the day I'd installed the fire extinguisher, AC inverter, rubber floor mats (only made one non-critical mistake in cutting the rear ones to size), arranged the tools/recovery/etc gear in the back (most of it now fits down with the wheel under the floor!), installed small cargo net in the back (helps keep the shopping in place), added mounts for phone, eTrex, and UHF radio, bought and installed new roof bars (2nd-hand Thules), picked up and tested the bike carrier I'd been having converted from the old 40mm hitch to 50mm, etc. Of course that's on top of all the little things like configuring the stereo.

Dropped by the dealer in the afternoon and showed them what I'd done to it already (they'd expressed interest in the extinguisher mount). They laughed at the emergency bog roll in the back, but come on: some equipment is essential!

I still have to sort out the storage for the compressor, but apart from that she's ready for some work this weekend.

 

[PigSti]

What does bee-poo look like?

 

[Athos]

What does bee-poo look like?

It varies. Sometimes round yellow spots, sometimes darker. Sometimes (when they hit at an angle) they're not round.

 

[Athos]

They're tiny spots, but they appear all over...

 

[Biesel]

235.60r17 should fit in your boot.

 

[MiddleAgeSubie]

Congratulations on the Forester! And I admire the careful prep work you have done.

Some random thoughts: beautiful pictures...I have to check if a full size spare would somehow fit in my Outback...the new Forester is surely impressive...the approach and departure angles+X-mode and even a factory skid plate on the Turbo (but only up front, it seems) have surely put the Forester on the table...but we are set for a while with what we have

Happy and safe travels!

 

[Athos]

Just now (after 3750 km) rotated the tyres (including the spare) and got them aligned. The front ones at least had already started wearing unevenly, and they all looked dramatically different to the pristine spare. I want the spare to be similar to the others for if(when) I need to put it on, and as I'm considering moving to a different profile tyre when this set runs out I figure I may as well use the spare to increase the lifespan of the set by 25%.
At this point I plan to do it again in 5000 km or so.

Noted that the shop attached the lugs with an air wrench, but then torqued them by hand to the right point.

While the wheels were off I noticed this bit of corrosion:

I'll bring it up at the first service (which will be a while off) but in the meantime I'm wondering if that's normal. This is after I rubbed the dirt off.