Forester suspension on an Impreza OBS

OBS Chris

OBS Chris

New member
hey i have a 2002 Impreza OBS i was wondering if anyone on here knew if i could replace my springs and struts with forester struts in order to raise the ride height of my car. I plan on putting general grabber all-terrain tires on my car when it is raised and i know that 1 inch spacers will work but i want to know if the forester springs will raise it too much or if it will mess up the drivetrain or gearing or anything. its been done before but i don't know what other mods they needed in order to make it work.
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I have been out driving in deep atv and jeep tracks and not once have I bottomed out yet(knocks on woods). The spacers + tires will give like 2-3ish more inches of clearence, which is a lot! Spacers are safe, nothing effed up in my drivetrain. You do have less mpg and mph, but that's because of the tires.

Oh and wizdom from Nigel...

heyguys remember....that if you upsize tires too much to do lift job, you can screw up gearing/drivability royally

if diameter of new Lifterd Rubba is 10%+ over stock, Bad Bad Things can happen to drivability, esp on an OB Sport that already has the gas sipper 3.90 final drive.

like, your car will reach only be able to reach top speed in 3rd gear.....
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no not a mystery, that's how the mysteries of gearing work. with oversize grabber tyres, 5th gear becomes essentially useless. did I mention that the stock gearbox with oversize tyres will suck large donkey danks?
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mantra (repaeat after mee) "lift the susp with springs or spacers, not just the tyres"

corollary: "if some is good, more izz not necessarily bettAr"

capisce?

and take alook at this sheet

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sick huh? Its fxt struts and Jackson Spacers, but he had to lengthen the control arms, more work. But damn

Annnndd one more edit..

Theres a point where the lift is just useless i.e.
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Granted your car will not be this high, but will that guy with the fxt and jackson spacers really use is car offroad? I cant se him doing any Rallyx, that thing looks tippy as hell. Im done here...
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haha okay thanks garret i think i'm going to just stick with only spacers.

thanks for the info.

and Brandon i wish i could have it as easy as you.
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I know people do it all the time in Legacy's. They either use Forester struts or Outback struts. It's very popular and they say there is no other modification necessary. But an Impreza is a little lower than a Legacy, so I dunno

 
i would think it is safe then using blocks or spacers cause there is no extra stress on parts that subaru didn't come with.the older imprezas need moding to get them in the car but the 02+ impreza share all the bolt patterns so no moding needed to get them in just maybe a spring compresser for easy install

 
Okay so itll look sick nasty! But answer this question first, what are you going to be using it for? My car still handles like a champ on the road, but also rips in the dirt. . Some people have been putting them on sti springs, so they have alittle more ground clearence, but they keep the handling capability of the sti springs. So just think about what you want before you pay anything. I can atest to that.
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^ haha i know can attest to that.
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since i'm not going to be offroad all the time i think i should just get the spacers so it wouldnt start handling like brandons car. i like mine. i think spacers are the answer.
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so how does this car differ from yours gclark

http://www.mainelysubarus.com/forums/showthread.php?t=8212

so if someone seen both yours and his side by side they could tell me which one had the spacers and which one had the forester struts with out looking under the car i'm sorry but i really don't think you know what your talking about so you should stop misleading him on which set-up is better cause you have only tried one way and have no clue about the other

 
^owned

i think the struts would be bettah probably because garrett is just getting by with his tires fitting. Me and Chris went to Evergreen today and they said the struts would be fine and not disrupt the drivetrain.

 
Yeah its looks pretty similar. I found this on nasioc though:

So I lifted my 99 OBS with stock 04 Forester suspension (struts, mounts, springs), and I got crazy wobbles due to the binding. It also caused my to leak via shredding a seal. I went back to stock, and now it runs flawlessly.

http://forums.nasioc.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1228188&page=33

So do what you want, its your car not mine.

 
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