L-Series Lift?

OneSixty

OneSixty

Forum Member
Joined
Apr 16, 2018
Messages
117
Location
Outer Perth Area, Western Australia
Car Year
2003
Car Model
SG Forester 2.5X
Transmission
5 Speed Manual
I have recently been given a Subaru L-Series and plan to modify it (of course). I don't have any photos yet, I should have it at my house in about 1 week.

Now for the reason im posting this, one of the first major modifications I would like to do is a 2-3 inch lift but I don't know where to buy one. Preferably delivery as any Subaru mod place would probably be too far to drive.

Thanks, OneSixty.
 
[MENTION=2617]NachaLuva[/MENTION] is your man, SubieLiftOz.
Can't go wrong.
Is it going on the road again? coz 2" is about as high as you can go without getting a Mod plate (up here in QLD anyway)
 
It will hopefully be road registered. SubieLiftOz has got 1st and 2nd gen Liberty lift but i'm not sure if that will fit the older L-Series.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
This is mine 3 inch body lift 35 tyres on 14 s was street driven in NSW for a few years the odd off road run was unstoppable I did have to run bolts through the floor to hold the torsion bars as it tore the factory mounts though the plus was through over engineering this mounting point the wandering at 80-100 kmh that plagues the lifted l series went away and made it stable at any speed could push it through corners without issue its now in qld have retired it to a property vehicle it was a great daily driver and would go anywhere with as good or better ground clearance than a cruiser or hilux
b12d92c8a92f7e0861a5b67be19f90c2.jpg


Sent from my ZTE Blade L5 using Tapatalk
 
Nice looking beast :)
 
Pearl blue matt black ,the engine I still this clean after 5000 km since pulling it out of my spare car done the 500+ km run from NSW to qld without an issue a mate built the car up originally to learn mechanics and I bought it from him and finished off the body it could do with a new set of front coils to lift the front back to full height though the huge steel flares do hide the height of the lift ,I wasn't into 4cyl or Japanese cars till my mate got me to help him with this one and it impressed me its not super quick but once its up there it showed the tail lights to a few later subies as well as the lift its got a 2into 2n1/4 system king springs the bash plate at the front still a couple of improvements I'd still like to do to improve the basic lift kit to make it bullet proof though its a great little 4x for feeding through the narrow tracks loves mud . lift yours do the beefed up mods and you'll be pleased with the results this old girl has 400000 + on the body I've had to strengthen a few mounting points with 16 guage plate but made a huge difference
bc948839d26fde9d6a6c07b6e2489fd2.jpg
e0c9df8cde4bf83afa81a1d2c49fd53a.jpg
ba1687d3e9fd851c48914413ebbc28dc.jpg


Sent from my ZTE Blade L5 using Tapatalk
 
great to see those old beasts still kicking
 
Sure is!

Welcome [MENTION=16083]jgaustin430[/MENTION]
 
I've been thinking of putting flares on mine for exactly the same reason, to hide the lift a bit.

Go no idea how to go about it without it looking awful though.
 
I cheated a bit the flares were actually of a previous lowered V8 VB commodore I had back in the 90s unfortunately the north coast rust got the better of the car though the flares were still fine my mate always lusted after the pair of front guards I'd saved from the project so once I took the Subie project on I cut the flares out of the commodore guards then removed the arch from the Subie fitted the flares then folded the lip out on the rear guards and attached the front arches to the lip giving an extra 2 inches of steel to massage into shape you can see the difference between stock and mine in the shot with the spare car also shows the amount of lift the wheel tyre combo achieves there's another 3inches there. In the past I've beaten the upper section of the arches then cut up the front n rear of the arch and added a triangle of 20 guage then shaped this the extra steel does save a bit of serious beating to get the desired size
d41d3608cdb1da4394031ce9fd55c21f.jpg
dc60f738dadcacb96cf78cf036532bfd.jpg


Sent from my ZTE Blade L5 using Tapatalk
 
Still kicking and paying its way ,I had it on the market a year ago but had a few tyre kickers lowballing me on the price so I just stored it for a couple of months till I got a chance to drive it up here to qld I'd rather drive it into the ground than give it away its been hauling 1000ltr pod on a trailer without an effort its narrow enough to feed hard on the narrow bush tracks on the property I'm on even snigged the odd log for fence posts it was a brilliant daily drive and always drew people to it many times I'd get back to it to find a small crowd drooling over it the only times I'd get pulled over in it were the same as with the low commodore the flares came off would be the cops settling the plastic or steel bet they had you could always tell who betted which way by the head shake or bigger grin

Sent from my ZTE Blade L5 using Tapatalk
 
Nice job on those flares. You had the advantage in that you don't have big lumps of plastic molding to consider, which the SG forester (and every one since then) has.

Might be time to start leaning on my Burnout friends.. they have excellent contacts in the fabrication game.
 
Yeah definitely but event they can be sorted with a similar way as I done mine which is find a couple of sets of old guards with the desired shaped arch and simply tack the arch onto your existing guards or I the other option is to cut up the length of your existing arch grab some suitable cardboard and make a bit template that follows your cut up then reattach our outer edge to the the new arch lots of staggered tack welds to prevent warping its always better to use new sheet metal for this one rather than a than just an old panel because of your not fighting the curve pressed into the panel and makes for a cleaner finish , I had the advantage of 30 years panel beating before I done this but take your time, slowers faster less is more , plenty of how to vids on utube or I got yeah grab a mate with the skills to help .Its how I got involved with a this Subie loved the project and took it on and finished it off

Sent from my ZTE Blade L5 using Tapatalk
 
[MENTION=15915]OneSixty[/MENTION] - dunno if it's still there, but there was a complete L series lift kit on gumtree for $300. I can't remember if it's 2 inch or 3. Look it up ;)

[MENTION=16083]jgaustin430[/MENTION] - wicked looking L mate, those flares fit right in!

Question for you - are you sure those tyres are 35 inch? Only asking as they look like 27s that are a common tyre choice. Even 31s make the L series look like a real jacked up tonka toy!

Either way, awesome rides! I just don't know how you do it with the factory 1.8 litre with the stock diff ratio!

Cheers

Bennie
 
You just keep it in each gear longer the big pipe helps I did find I rarely stuck it in 5th on the north coast but it did spend some time there on the big straights west of the range when I drove it out here ,I do have to have it in low range hauling the 1000 ltr pod full of water but it will crawl at idle with the weight. Did find it performed better with a bit of a load in the back I stepped back from V8s and a quick super motard I never noticed it being slow other than it being a 4 but as I said once you get them up there in the revs the rubber band keeps it up there n just use the gearbox to keep it there I was quite impressed with the top end and with the beefed up torsion mounts and the wheel offset it handled real well on the road little bit of rear drift but no body roll pushing it hard

Sent from my ZTE Blade L5 using Tapatalk
 
I just checked you are correct about the tyre size I was wrong there 27 , I had loaned it to a mate to drive for a while part of the deal was he replaced the tyres and I was going on what he'd told me he fitted the new set did look a tad smaller than the originals

Sent from my ZTE Blade L5 using Tapatalk
 
I had to stick the stock mags on for rego ,I found it was higher reving but wasn't as stable it also didn't hold as well felt to run on I liked the way the big wheels held a constant speed and better on fuel
52ce54ca09a9c24c29582185069a7a66.jpg


Sent from my ZTE Blade L5 using Tapatalk
 
Best of luck getting rego in qld with the three inch lift atm... They're (the police) are cracking down on this hard core. I know there are changes to the legislation in the wings but the sting is working on the current regs.

As for instability, it's probably more about the circumference vs side wall height ratio that's at play here. That and once you've gone the larger tyres it's hard to go back.

I can't comment on the ea82 and larger tyres, I've always had the ej22 with larger tyres. It's a mint combo ;)

Cheers

Bennie
 
The lift laws are mainly to cover the later 4x4s with ESC I was reading another article that said with the earlier pre ESC 4x4 with a mod plate the 75mm body with 75 tyre lift was still acceptable with a mod plate ,mine did have an engineers certificate in NSW and had been one of the last big lifts before the laws changed down there if I decide to rego mine in qld I would more than likely start with a shell that hasn't done 400000km and justbeef the mounting points as I've done with this one to prevent the fatigue points I'm quite happy to keep the old beast as a property only 4x its handy for working with my excavator and have a good range of bush tracks on the property I have a low km fairlane for a daily driver now which is more comfortable for the big distances so I can still enjoy the Subie as is for years to come its virtually unstoppable have only got it stuck once in the 6 years I've had it and that was a waist high mound that caught up the sill and the rears spun on didn't take much to get it off but other than that mud has never been an issue I found points we used to have to roll back for a run up to retake in cruisers n hiluxs you'd just push the brake n clutch in put into low 4x and it would just pick up where you spun the fronts and continue without even spinning

Sent from my ZTE Blade L5 using Tapatalk
 
Last edited by a moderator:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top