The Great Alaskan Tundra Humper *pic heavy*

Hello Gents and Ladies, I am Jeremiah. I live in Fairbanks, Alaska; i'm in college, aspiring to become an English teacher; and bought my foz two years ago. This is it's story:

I broke it really soon after buying it, about a month or two. I got the ol' beast stuck in the snow, and trying to tow it out did a fair deal of damage:



But that was no big deal, it drove quite alright after we shoveled it out. Then, in the spring time, a bit of hooning started the rear bumper's issue of wanting a divorce:


Summer of 2013 brought plastidip and rear wheel bearings sounding like they were trying to make butter out of gravel:



Also got a nice deep clean at the laser wash:


Of course some adventures:




The spring of 2014 brought blown headgaskets, which i replaced with the help of a local Subaru flipper and cylinder head specialist.

I also did a few mods for the local ice track like two switches in the handbrake to fully unlock the center diff when pulled, even with my 4wd lock switch on. Sadly, i have no videos of that hooning.

More adventures came this spring:



Navigator Kyle:



Continues below. I have a picture limit :(
 
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Haha, Ive done a few of them with all lowered Foresters lol

Mines on the end, they call it a monster truck haha
 
just come across this thread.
got to say your pictures are fantastic and I do like the work you have done to your foz, over here almost everybody lowers them with wide fat tyres, which is a bit pointless to me lol
keep on adding more stuff its fascinating :)
 
Great thread J22!!
Great pics of a place that i would love to go but is very far from us...(Greece-Athens)!!
 
ratboy01 said:
just come across this thread.
got to say your pictures are fantastic and I do like the work you have done to your foz, over here almost everybody lowers them with wide fat tyres, which is a bit pointless to me lol
keep on adding more stuff its fascinating :)
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tedscossie said:
Great thread J22!!
Great pics of a place that i would love to go but is very far from us...(Greece-Athens)!!
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Thanks gents, i'm always surprised to see how many places in the world are connected through this passion.

I haven't been up to a whole lot, because snowy adventures tend to always end in being stuck. But I have been spending some time at the Ice Track:

https://youtu.be/dDvLwopLmSM

And lately, i have had another friend drive, pulling me and a friend on snowskates. Great fun!



I ghetto wired my reverse lights to be always on for us:





You may have noticed the bumper is missing a chunk, well while trying to teach a friend with no license yet about how vehicles behave on ice, he got stuck in a bank. Some nice fellas helped get us out, but how towing usually goes with poor communication, he had stopped short and i bumped into him. Broke the taillight and the last zipties holding the bumper corner on. No big deal though. He didn't care, i didn't either.



And figured out my future plans!:
When my impreza is in running order (https://www.rs25.com/forums/f145/t215705-eg33-rally-car-project-no-name-yet.html) i will be using it as a daily driver while the foz gets some work:
I will drop both subframes,
cut the trunk floor out
finally fix the rear unibody frame rail
straighten the rear body and frame as nice as possible
up the subframe drop to 4" but will tie both sides together with tubing and weld plates to connect them to the frame rails
run angle iron and steel strips along frame rails to stiffen them and stitch weld almost everything
then put on some 29" cooper st maxx's
Install a winch upfront, and finally a skid plate
do something better with the rear bumper and maybe build a new roof rack

And maybe eventually get some custom struts 8 inches longer than stock, raise the top strut mounts 2" with mainy reinforcements, replace all rear links and bushings with tubing and heim joints, and build custom front LCA's with Heims.
The only issue with all that for me is the price of coilovers.
 
jf1sf5 said:
What coil overs are you looking at ?
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I was thinking hotbits non-inverted, like yours. I have a set of RSI's at Feal in California getting rebuilt for my impreza right now. Not impressed with them, especially after talking with the guys at Feal about them. How much were your coils, if you don't mind? The Inverted ones i have i bought for 900 as a set, and after the rebuild, i shouldn't be over 2k into them. I see people selling the same ones that need rebuilt for 2k, so i'm not worried that i'm spending too much. I will probably run them for the summer then sell them for what I have into them.
But for the forester, i'd like something that doesn't need servicing all the time.
 
I changed from the Proflex (inverted) to the Hotbits (non-inverted) because I had the same problem, maintenance and servicing.

The Proflex are a very good product but I think that they are really meant to be used as a rally coil over.

The Hotbits I now have are more like an OEM strut that can be tuned on compression and rebound and they really suit my needs, very happy with them so far, so is my family thanks to the comfortable ride !

I bought the DT2 kit (with all my specs like long stroke…) with adjustable top mounts and shipment for USD 2'450.- + custom taxes
 
jf1sf5 said:
I changed from the Proflex (inverted) to the Hotbits (non-inverted) because I had the same problem, maintenance and servicing.

The Proflex are a very good product but I think that they are really meant to be used as a rally coil over.

The Hotbits I now have are more like an OEM strut that can be tuned on compression and rebound and they really suit my needs, very happy with them so far, so is my family thanks to the comfortable ride !

I bought the DT2 kit (with all my specs like long stroke…) with adjustable top mounts and shipment for USD 2'450.- + custom taxes
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That's not bad really, I guess i'll see how much i can save up this summer:monkeydance:
How did you order them?
 
Updates!!
Haven't been up to much lately due to a looong stretch of temps below -20*F, but it's 30 above right now, and i got some parts to install next weekend!

But first, a pic:
IMG_2569 by jeremiah_miah, on Flickr

ok, I finally bought new balljoints, some raybestos professional grade, and also finally found a set of these for sale on 1A Auto!!:





Could have been packaged better, roll pins just rolling around inside, and some bent dust shields:







Worried about whether there is a sufficient amount of grease in the joints, they feel tight and not necessarily gritty, but not what i would expect them to feel like.
 
New CV joints are much tighter than used ones. I used to work in a driveshaft plant and we ran endurance tests on components and the diference between new and old is enormous.
 
Beautiful thread! These photos are amazing. Get some great scenery in Australia, but nothing like this.
 
Oh, you got the Heri HD axles, cool !

On your SF, you have to take the dust shields and ABS ring off anyway and replace the dust shields with the oem ones. Well, thats what I had to do on my '97 SF...
 
pezimm said:
New CV joints are much tighter than used ones. I used to work in a driveshaft plant and we ran endurance tests on components and the diference between new and old is enormous.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the info, makes me even more excited to get them on now!

essfoz said:
Beautiful thread! These photos are amazing. Get some great scenery in Australia, but nothing like this.
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Thanks man! Remember, the grass is always greener.. :ebiggrin:

jf1sf5 said:
Oh, you got the Heri HD axles, cool !

On your SF, you have to take the dust shields and ABS ring off anyway and replace the dust shields with the oem ones. Well, thats what I had to do on my '97 SF...
Click to expand...

True, i had forgotten about that; no big deal then!

On another note, i lit up my switch panel by cutting a terrible hole in the plastic dash piece:



putting a strip of LED's in there (these strips are so cheap and useful, i don't mind having 10 extra feet):



And looks good (forgot when i ordered the strip that my gauges are green):



I like being able to see the switches at night finally!
 
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