1WD Foz's

1WD Foz's Foz

Howdy guys and girls,

Im new around here and thought id start a journal to document my hopefully awesome adventure modding my 98 FOZ.

It all started about 7 months ago when i came up with the idea of buying a second car for my wife and I to use for our 1 hour long drive to work, giving our Honda a rest.
Initially i was looking for a cheap Land-rover discovery also thinking we could use this to do some camping and light 4x4ing on our days off, but quickly realised that a Discovery would eat my money in fuel alone so started looking for a cheaper alternative.
Then i noticed a nice looking 98 on gumtree for $2000 no reg no rw, 189k
and seller says clutch may be due.....
I hesitated in calling him for about 3 weeks as i just wasn't sure about Subaru's or Foresters in general, then one day noticed he dropped the price to $1000
So i gave the guy a call and went and looked at it.... $900 was his lowest and the clutch felt fine.
I drove her home (with a permit).

Booked her in for a Rw the next week and listed defects found was:
~Replace wiper blades
~Rectify R/H tail light and stop light
~Replace drivers seat belt
~Secure spare wheel
~Secure battery
~Replace and bleed brake fluid
~Replace clutch & brake pedal pads
~Clean and rectify oil leaks
~Replace L/H inner cv boot
~Replace front & rear sway bar link bushes

So i did what i could and got mechanic to do the rest.
Next week i had rego

I drove it around for a couple weeks and started to notice that if i put my foot flat.... some times it would slip, so i looked up clutches on ebay and took a gamble with a relatively new melbourne based brand "Blusteele' as they had crazy low prices, $250 new ,shipped, with 12 month warranty.

https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Blusteele-Clutch-Kit-for-Subaru-Forester-S10-2-0Ltr-SOHC-EJ20J-98-02-w-WARRANTY/182301956674?ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT&_trksid=p2055119.m1438.l2649

I had it sitting there for when the Foz needed it and it wasn't long until i got the car bogged (in my front bloody yard mind you) :rotfl:
and the clutch was ruined after minimal attempts of getting out with road tires.

look at the damage to my Neighbours front lawn
luckily it only cost a slab to recover.

The truck that pulled me out :rotfl:

So i threw my car at the same mechanics that did my rw and they installed my clutch!!
Also had my flywheel machined and they found a leak in my rear main seal so replaced that while they where there....awesome!!

My wife and i started exploring how far down the dirt track this little foz could take us in places like Lerderderg State Park & LaL LaL & Bungal state forest. whilst we stuck to the chicken track mostly... I realised fast this was a capable little beast.
Next thing to go was me rear left shock...... i knew it was coming tho, and taking it offload didn't help a bit
So I ordered rear KYB's and standard Kings springs from Archm-suspension in Bayswater as they had the best prices and the boys down there are really nice.
you can find them on ebay

https://stores.ebay.com.au/archmindustries/

So i had them Installed and straight away what a difference it made, the rears must have been so saggy before cause it looked lifted when i picked her up lol

New rear kings springs and kyb shocks

Old ride height :rotfl:

New ride height

Then it was time for some new tires as i had a few issues with the old ones
I went with 4 x Yokohama Geolander G015 AT in 205/70/R15's

The last issue i had was the speedo died, subaru wanted $350
wreckers cost $10 and i got 2 :rotfl:

And im trying to figure out what this loud noise is coming from my rear passenger wheel area, it comes and goes ,sounds like a loud grinding noise majority of the time around 90-100ks.

1WD

 

[scalman]

i like those gems too. wow . i never saw or dig ones in my life thats so cool. so yh but cant you do it just with one hammer ? haha
in my trip what i had bad was fridge cooler box. its not like real fridge . and thats plug was allways melting when it was pluged, so after half trip i wasnt using that cooler anymore. still managed with food no probs. just no cold drinks inside car. so that shame. i would fix upgrade that part only. all else was just great .
those crystals gems stuff you digging there are awesome. my mom would just love them. when we go to sea with her she allways takes like 20 kg of stones from sea to bring back home to her garden. haha.
about those subs. well make your box compact and put that to side or both sides 2 boxes if you need. i mean im pretty happy with my smaller box on side. its still gives boom boom in car and i have all trunk space for me. well not after i put hi lift jack there but allmost.

 

[1WD Foz]

i like those gems too. wow . i never saw or dig ones in my life thats so cool. so yh but cant you do it just with one hammer ?

You need more tools than 1 hammer between 3 people, some situations call for delicate hands..... which can be hard to do with only a hammer lol

Just a few of the amazing smoky quartz and “crystal bombs” we found the last time we went to the Grampians.
All thanks to my trusty Foz.

1WD

 

[1WD Foz]

about those subs. well make your box compact and put that to side or both sides 2 boxes if you need. i mean im pretty happy with my smaller box on side. its still gives boom boom in car and i have all trunk space for me. well not after i put hi lift jack there but allmost.

Eventually I will definitely do something similar to your sub arrangement, but for now it will have to do as is lol
You should mount your hi lift on your roof basket your going to make !!

my mom would just love them. when we go to sea with her she allways takes like 20 kg of stones from sea to bring back home to her garden. haha.

My Wife and Mum are the same as your Mum lol
Both wanting to return with so many rocks/shells/crystals and even dirt when we are looking for gold and there’s no water nearby to pan with.

1WD

 

[1WD Foz]

So I got my new Mini tyres on Thursday, 1 day earlier than expected lol

I know they aren’t anything special at all really, but I’m just so happy i have some safe tyres to get us down and back.

Also grabbed some sca led trailer lights and tried to use the existing wiring loom but it was too far gone, so instead I grabbed 4m of 7core trailer wire and a new 7 pin trailer socket and did it myself.

Ended up all working fine and even added a mini reverse led bar just to keep with the theme lol

The “mini led bar” is the same one I used in my boot, except I only used one for reversing, but can easily add another if need be.

The only real issue I had was there was no reverse light power coming from the terminal on the cars towing socket,
so I just found the reverse lights globe, then found power, followed it back to a loom and tapped in there.
So now reverse works just fine.
Would prefer to have not bridged but it’s fine until I can be bothered doing it properly.

Also reinstalled the wheel guards.
All in all I’m super happy with it now and all it needs is a mocka license plate and I’d call it done.

1WD

 

[Ben Up North]

Great Job, how big is your thumb..?

 

[1WD Foz]

Thanks mate
Lol 1/3 the size of that wheels rim [emoji23]

 

[jf1sf5]

You have missing nuts on your mini wheels.

 

[scalman]

wow man those gems. i would be interested myself in them. but we have nothing here just mud haha.
nice new lights on trailer. those leds again. hmm mine one led stopped working those 2 for rear light. not sure whats problem. still cold outside but its wires or leds juts died. it would be shame. that one led inside works long time now. it says they are water proof and such so water shouldnt be prob for them i think .
hmm not sure i would wanna mount hi lift on my roof rack as it could attract no needed atention. even if lock it still. well i would put it when i would go on trip i guess.
p.s. im lying about gems, we had amber from sea , before you could find it more but now not so much but it was cool and my mom had some collection in small boxed of amber that she found in Baltic Sea before.

we have amber museums here and in old times there where lots amber here from sea but its gone now.

 

[1WD Foz]

Lots of mud here too scalman lol
Wow that amber is awesome man !!
Never seen it before

Maybe check your wiring is all ok , use connectors to join the light to power source rather than soldering so it’s easy to remove and inspect.
Yes my idea for you is to mount hi lift on roof when u go away
And store in boot for day trips

1WD

 

[1WD Foz]

So today I finally got around to installing my new 12v socket for the front of the car as the old one died not long ago, I also mounted my twin 12v sockets in the rear of the car for the trip so people in the back seats can charge as well.

More importantly I finally got around to putting one of my new stickers on the Foz.

And I also pre-packed the trailer lol
(And removes the subs [emoji22])

I’ll take a better shot once the cars fully packed,
And hopefully many pics on our journey.

1WD

 

[scalman]

haha no more subs for you man . but i see that your trunk really are shorter then mine as not much space when you put those blue fridges/coolers.
have nice trip and yh make pics.
btw this forum dont like large pics as its shows them in full res full screen . so they kinda big and you need to move screen to see all pic. duno how you upload them , im making them little smaller as resizing for forums. and duno im using chrome , maybe other browsers dont have that prob.

 

[Kevin]

^ there's only a couple of pics that need a little screen movement but no real issue with Windows 10 and FireFox.

 

[scalman]

well for me on chrome and win 10 all his pics , well most are out of screen and i need to move like a lot to see full pic. thats on laptop with 1080p screen. same on hdtv on 1080p. that's because it doesn't show pic as smaller first but shows full res.

 

[1WD Foz]

I have updated my last posted pics from “best size” to “medium”
Let me know if that’s better

1WD

 

[Kevin]

Just takes half the screen width now - no problem at all for me

 

[1WD Foz]

So trailer was a complete success
Had to go super slow over any bumps as the little tires and stiff suspension made the trailer “jump” over any bumps which I didn’t find to be to safe lol
But at low speeds offroad it was fine
And the foz did really well pulling all that extra gear.

We haven’t gone through our findings as of yet, but I know we did very very well.

Fully loaded on the trip up

THE most random servo I’ve ever been to lol

Our campsite setup

A medium Smoky Quartz still in half it’s original geode.

1WD

 

[Kevin]

Well done! Who are the rope people

 

[scalman]

a dogo in car . cool. never thought of that idea paint this way ower people in pics. looks like some graphic , very artistic. what program you used to paint this kind ? with mouse ? i know some apps on phone have some tools like bluring people in pic if you no wanna them seen but this is much cooler.
and i think you need larger trailer maybe. because this one allready is full haha. or you need put higher walls on it so it could carry like twice amount of stuff then its now. it still can take double high side walls i think.

 

[1WD Foz]

Hahah yes say hi everyone
That’s my rope wife and rope mum.
All made with the edit tool that came with my iPhone.
I just drew rope people on-top lol
Haha no I won’t be getting a bigger trailer but I would definitely look into getting or making the trailer sidewall extension which would make it a lot easier to stack higher,
but for now the netting I got worked really well at holding down things really tight that stuck out.

1WD

 

[scalman]

Hmm or just find higher boxes as plastic ones put more stuff in them and then put them in trailer and tight them with straps. You will have more space and dust / water / mud free storage. I like those cheap plastic seetrough boxes that you can carry in trunk on roof or in trailer.
P.s. i wish i knew all that stuff before my europe trip , would had even better time with all stuff more organized in car.