[froggreenstang]

Hi,

I'm new here and also new to subarus.

Been looking at various years of WRXs and wondering if there are any preferably years; i.e. are there any years of WRXs that had problems or that I might want to avoid? For instance, i was once told that the 02 models had transmission problems.

Thanks for any help!!!

:thumbup:

 

[EJ257]

Hi,

I'm new here and also new to subarus.

Been looking at various years of WRXs and wondering if there are any preferably years; i.e. are there any years of WRXs that had problems or that I might want to avoid? For instance, i was once told that the 02 models had transmission problems.

Thanks for any help!!!

:thumbup:

The transmission of the '02 has been known to give trouble if you beat on the car (if you treat it nice, it'll return the favor).

The '06/'07 moved up to a 2.5L engine ('02-'05 is 2.0L).

Best of luck

 

[froggreenstang]

The transmission of the '02 has been known to give trouble if you beat on the car (if you treat it nice, it'll return the favor).

The '06/'07 moved up to a 2.5L engine ('02-'05 is 2.0L).

Best of luck

Thanks!

Was the 02 the only year? If they had the same engines up to 2005, did they do something to fix it?

I'm not going to beat on it anyway; maybe just go to the snow once in a while.

 

[SeattleJeremy]

02-05's have the 2.0L engine.
06-08's have the 2.5L engine.

02's have 1mm thinner gears than 03+, but as said above they will continue to proved good service if you are nice to them.

In 04 the exterior changed, but most of the mechanicals stayed the same.
In 05 the interior changed, but most of the mechanicals stayed the same.
In 06 the exterior changed again, but this time the 2.5L was installed, and they added a second syncro to first gear.
In 07 almost everything stayed the same.

In 08 the Impreza moved to a shortened Legacy chassis.


In every year they changed small things to make them better than the last year, but over all the biggest change was the gears from 02 to 03.

 

[SD_GR]

The switch in gear width occurred mid-year in 02; my spring-build car has the revised gearset. The gearbox code is near the strut tower on the side with the battery. The codes are posted online; there are two for 02, one with the rethought gears. Other revisions mid-year for 02 include removing the paint from the coolant canister (before it removes itself into the coolant flow), and an ECU reflash for some cars. By now many early 02 cars will have had the radiators replaced, some with the later-style capped radiator (the originals did not have a cap). There's also fascinating stuff going with brake pad part numbers for the bugeyes, and the rule of thumb seems to be the correct part is whatever part I've decided is incorrect.

Buy an 09 if you can wait. Otherwise buy the newest car with absolutely no modifications and a full service history you can afford.