IC in front bumper? possible? good? bad?

-K- · Post by **-K-** » Mon Apr 18, 2005 8:12 pm

Nice job free5ty1e, that was one idea I was looking into for the pipe routing and now that I've seen seen it it's my favorite.

IronMonkeyL255 · Post by **IronMonkeyL255** » Mon Apr 18, 2005 9:58 pm

With it set up that way, can you still put on the grill?

How big is the i/c?

That is a pretty nifty way of doing it. I was thinking it would be pretty neat to fab up a custom i/c that would replace the grill. I remember seeing an oil cooler dome that way once.

free5ty1e · Post by **free5ty1e** » Tue Apr 19, 2005 2:24 pm

Headlight aiming just requires a bit more effort... it's pretty ghetto-rigged at the moment but hey that's the theme

Grill won't fit just yet, but with some modification it will. The front bumper steel is still there, only the bottom part. The I/C actually sits on the bottom of the bumper and is mounted at the corners. The IC itself is from an Izuzu something-or-other, don't know, found it on Ebay. It's overall size and shape appear to be roughly two Saab TMIC's side-by-side, so it's not especially big. The turbo side is always warm after boosting, and the outlet/tb side is always cold. Could use some 'speed holes' in the front to allow more air to pass directly over the fins, and there's room in the back for two 7" puller fans should I choose to add them.

a 7' section of 2.5" exhaust piping with 5 bends in it cost $30. The rest of the cost was the radiator hoses I found at Napa and Central Auto parts, and the silicone bends and reducers from Amazon Hose (probably another $150 or so total). The oil filler neck dent was custom. Good ol' hammer and blunt chisel.

91White-T · Post by **91White-T** » Tue Apr 19, 2005 5:11 pm

Isn't most of the IC behind the bumper cover?

free5ty1e · Post by **free5ty1e** » Tue Apr 19, 2005 10:53 pm

At the moment, yes, we didn't modify the bumper cover too much yet - just enough to have it fit in there and stay together right. I do plan to open that up a bit eventually.

vrg3 · Post by **vrg3** » Tue Apr 19, 2005 11:18 pm

How can aiming require more effort? It's either aimable or not, right?

free5ty1e · Post by **free5ty1e** » Wed Apr 20, 2005 1:39 am

well, the headlights are currently out of their adjustment range due to the mounting. They've been shimmed to look in the general direction of the roadway ahead.

So, aiming requires shimming or un-shimming until I get a chance to re-mount them properly (probably the same time I try and get the grill on there, and open up the front a bit).

vrg3 · Post by **vrg3** » Wed Apr 20, 2005 1:42 am

Okay, so the answer to my question was "no."

dzx · Post by **dzx** » Wed Apr 20, 2005 2:32 am

Are you getting started on lighting again vikash. LOL. I didnt understand it the first time but now its kinda entertaining.

vrg3 · Post by **vrg3** » Wed Apr 20, 2005 6:04 am

Getting started again? I always thought being able to see and be seen was important...

THAWA · Post by **THAWA** » Wed Apr 20, 2005 6:29 am

Well it could easily require more effort if the adjusters were in a place where it was harder to adjust,

dzx · Post by **dzx** » Wed Apr 20, 2005 8:08 am

lol. Subaru must not have thought lighting was important on the pre-facelift legacy's

mikec · Post by **mikec** » Wed Apr 20, 2005 1:08 pm

Vikash, it is.... At least I think so.

free5ty1e · Post by **free5ty1e** » Wed Apr 20, 2005 2:00 pm

lol... ok so no they can't be adjusted through normal means just yet. I try not to do much driving at night in the Subaru because of this, although they're in a useful position right now and it's not entirely unsafe.

Ghetto-rigging has it's downsides; such as the necessity of re-doing the job later. There's never enough time to do it right, always enough time to do it twice

That's what I get for spending most of the time working on the piping... (but at least I don't have to do THAT twice....!)

vrg3 · Post by **vrg3** » Wed Apr 20, 2005 2:07 pm

dzx - The NHTSA and DOT didn't give them too much of a choice. 92 was the first year that HB2 headlights were permitted, and Subaru started using them immediately.

Chris - Well it doesn't seem like it'd be too bad... you just need to shim the mounts so that they're parallel to the plane they were originally in, right?

free5ty1e · Post by **free5ty1e** » Wed Apr 20, 2005 2:38 pm

Basically, yes. Unfortunately, they're not really mounted properly yet - so we have to pretty much redo them anyway. It was getting dark that day and we realized that I might need headlights to get home. lol

vrg3 · Post by **vrg3** » Wed Apr 20, 2005 3:03 pm

If you were wealthy this would be a great chance to just switch to some more compact and better-performing headlights, like the Hella Bi-Xenon 90mm modules or something. Then you could keep the corner lights in their correct placement too.

dzx · Post by **dzx** » Wed Apr 20, 2005 3:41 pm

Hmm, i always wondered why i couldnt see anything at night in my '90 legacy. That really sucked on the canyon roads with cars coming at you.

free5ty1e · Post by **free5ty1e** » Wed Apr 20, 2005 4:10 pm

Ahh, if I were wealthy...

hmm... I'd probably already have a monster ported / coated 16G with full blown engine management and a 6-speed tranny. And perhaps I'd have fixed the headlights. I guess I see where my priorities are lol

Seriously though... I'm looking around for the hell of it to see what they might cost, and I haven't found any place that sells them yet. Perhaps I should look through headlight selections at my local auto parts store for something comparable.

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IC in front bumper? possible? good? bad?