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Old 04-25-2001, 01:12 PM   #1
Rez
Scooby Newbie
 
Member#: 1958
Join Date: Jul 2000
Location: Taxachusetts, USA
Vehicle:
1999 Impreza 2.5 RS
Rally Blue Pearl

Post

Heya-

1) The 'thunk' is your center diff. You need to be a little more smooth when you shift. It happened to me for the first couple of weeks until I learned when to shift 'properly' for this car. I noticed it again when I had a friend of mine drive it. It all had to do with when you lift off the gas \ push in clutch timing. Leave your foot on the gas for a fraction of a second longer. Just a fraction, and the thunk should go away.

2) Ummm a 'thunk' there as well? I know that there are click noises when any major electrical system is turned on and off. The rear defrost makes a click when it is turned on and off for example. I think a click is normal but a 'thunk' isn't.

3) The open door light does come on at odd times. If you disengage the alarm, it goes on, if you turn off the engine it goes on. It IS just a little odd but I think the designers were thinking you're gonna need to get in and out of the car so why not light the door open lights...

bryanw had the alarm going off properly nailed.

The red button is NOT a Valet button. It is an indicator that the alarm is set. The electronics that are hanging is the programming button AND the valet button. The red light will blink differrently in Valet mode. The hanging wires should be tucked underneath. Look around on your floor for a small threaded piece of plastic. This wound up coming loose on a number of cars and fallen to the floor. A drop or two of Locktite will fix it. Find the hole that the button should go into and rethread it.

4) Same thing happened to me. They took the fender apart to install my LoJack system and they didn't put it back together properly. I had the dealership put in a new plastic lock rivet in but after loosing 3 of them at that dealership I had Exeter Subaru fix it for good. Don't know what they did, but it's been snug ever since. Just find a heavy duty rivet to put in there.

-Rez
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Old 04-25-2001, 01:22 PM   #2
bryanw
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Member#: 807
Join Date: Jan 2000
Location: Greenville, SC
Vehicle:
2002 WRX Wagon
Black

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>>>The red button is NOT a Valet button. It is an indicator that the alarm is set

Yea, Subaru calls this the "valet button". Because you can push it to go into "valet mode" where it blinks but the alarm doesn't engage. It also serves as the alarm indicator.

Have you seen Subaru's new alarm system? We have one on our new Forester and it's much worse than the old one on my Impreza. The new ones beeps the horn instead so it's like 5 times louder. You can't ever double-press the alarm on/off buttons, like you know how sometimes you'll hit the "lock" button a second time to make sure you actually turned it on. And sometimes you press the "unlock" button again to make sure you unlocked it. Well the new one doesn't even respond to the second presses. So you have no idea if the alarm is actually on/doors locked unless you go and look to see if the stupid light is flashing.

And also, with the old alarm, you can press the "lock" button with the doors open, it'll beep once and lock the doors, then when you close the door, it beeps again and turns the alarm on. The new one doesn't let you do this. It will only engage/lock if all the doors are closed.

Why is it that when Subaru "upgrades" something sometimes, they're actually "downgrading"? Do they pay attention to customer comments? Do the execs who make these decisions actually use these damn things? I can't imagine why they upgraded to a worse alarm. Must be a cost thing or something.
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Old 04-25-2001, 09:56 PM   #3
-JB-
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Member#: 6060
Join Date: Apr 2001
Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Vehicle:
MY01 Impreza 2.5RS
Black

Post

Thanks for the replies guys.. You put my mind to ease for the most part, but there still seems to be a couple things that are bugging me.

I've felt the clunk of the diff, and have learned the cause of that pretty quickly and have adjusted my shifts to try to avoid that, but the click is something that happens w/o the clunk (something tells me these arent exactly scientific terms). It sort of resembles the sound of running through the gears of a parked car, but louder. It's a very metalic gear sound twice "Ch..Click" is the best way I can describe it. What I'm assuming you guys are talking about with the diff is the lower tone dropping sound if things arent smooth.. Probally something that has to be heard first person to figure out.

I'm also starting to experiance this slight hiccup of acceleration around 4K especially in 3rd gear. Nothing major, sort of seems like the engine has a couple of rough edges that need to be worked through. Nothing trips up north every weekend wont fix Nothing like Canadian wilderness.. and gravel roads.. <if I could be bothered to figure out those little devil icons, one would go here>
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Old 04-25-2001, 09:57 PM   #4
-JB-
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Join Date: Apr 2001
Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Vehicle:
MY01 Impreza 2.5RS
Black

Question

BTW Rez what is a LoJack system?
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Old 04-26-2001, 12:36 AM   #5
-JB-
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Join Date: Apr 2001
Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Vehicle:
MY01 Impreza 2.5RS
Black

Question Experiances so far... normal?

Well I finally got my car. It's been 22 years in waiting. What I thought was going to be a wrx, turned out to be a brand spankin black MY01 2.5RS coupe. Funny how my mind works. Love the WRX, but I was in love with the RS first, so I'm happy as a pig in.... mud. I figure it has to be one of the last to be sold in North America..

I am starting to notice the little bugs and glitches. This may say first post, but I've been lurking around this board for the past 4 or 5 months by another handle and have tried to get all the information I could, so please dont chastise me for being a newbie. If any of these dont seem normal, I'd love your opinions, but I'm assuming most of it is just the car finding it's groove..

1) The most distressing thing to me is in between 1st and 2nd gear. Every so often I hear a click when shifting. I'm not ripping through the gears yet, as I'm still breaking in, but I still give it gas here and there. Hey I'm human. I haven't heard this noise in any other gears, and I've read that 2nd on our cars is a weak link, so I'm wondering if this a problem that needs replacement immediately...

2) When I turn my lights on I can hear a click/thunk that sounds like it's coming from just behind the glovebox.. dunno..

3) I had a bit of a hard time with alarm instalation with the dealership, and I thought it was remedied, but there still seems to be some quirks. I don't know if procedure differs from US and CAN, but mine just doesn't seem right. I'll quite often get the door open sign on the dash at odd times. It seems to go off when either the dome light dims, the car is started or the alarm is armed. But it is on when all doors are definatley closed. I don't really care if this is normal, but if it's a sign that there's faulty wiring, then it definately erks me. It also seems that if I arm the alarm when the emerg blinkers are on, instead of two small clicks and arming, it chirps twice then trips the siren.. I'm wondering if this all just a bad ground or something.. ideas?
Also my programming button is just hanging from a cluster of wires at the bottom left of my steering column (looks like it would be pretty easy to deisable the alarm with everything just hanging out there in the open). And to add fuel to this fire, where the manual says the button with the red warning light, doubles as the valet button, mine is just a dummy. No button what so ever. Argh..

4) I was going over the car yesterday and found that my front left bumper has come loose where it meets the tire well. It had that little plastic rivet just hanging on the bumer, not connecting at all. I tried to pop it back in, but I can't get it to stay as solid as the other side. Not a big problem, but again if it was knocked hard at some point and came loose, they should have told me about it.

Overall I'm loving it. I'm glad to finally get the car of my dreams and only have to worry about coming up with all these monthly payments If you've read this all the way to this point, thanks for the help, and if there's any other things to look out for before my first checkup, I'd love the advice.

700km down, 1300 to go. Time to sneak out of work early.. it's a beautiful day, and just gots to drive. Shhh....
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Old 04-26-2001, 12:45 AM   #6
bryanw
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Join Date: Jan 2000
Location: Greenville, SC
Vehicle:
2002 WRX Wagon
Black

Post

>>>1) The most distressing thing to me is in between 1st and 2nd gear. Every so often I hear a click when shifting.

Is it more of a "thunk" coming from underneath? If so, it's the center differential trying to shift torque to the rear real fast. It's normaly when you shift from 1st to 2nd quickly. Mine does it now when I shift 2-3 because of the mods. You'll get used to it.

>>>2) When I turn my lights on I can hear a click/thunk that sounds like it's coming from just behind the glovebox.. dunno..

Never heard of this.

>>>I'll quite often get the door open sign on the dash at odd times

The door open indicator has multiple purposes, so it can be confusing at first. It always comes on right when you turn the alarm off and stays on until you start the car I think. The dome light does the same thing. And both the dome light and the indicator come on as soon as you shut off the engine, even with the doors closed. I don't know why, but that's normal.

>>>It also seems that if I arm the alarm when the emerg blinkers are on, instead of two small clicks and arming, it chirps twice then trips the siren

Normal. Anything that draws power from the battery other than the alarm itself will set it off.

>>>And to add fuel to this fire, where the manual says the button with the red warning light, doubles as the valet button, mine is just a dummy

Uh oh. That's bad. The programming button is supposed to be attached under the dash. And the valet button thing obviously is supposed to work and blinks when the alarm is on. It sounds like they didn't finish the installation.

>>>it's a beautiful day, and just gots to drive. Shhh.

For the first full month I had my car, I snuck out of work 3-5 times/day just to go driving.
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Old 04-27-2001, 07:56 AM   #7
bryanw
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Member#: 807
Join Date: Jan 2000
Location: Greenville, SC
Vehicle:
2002 WRX Wagon
Black

Post

>>>shifts to try to avoid that, but the click is something that happens w/o the clunk

The click may be the shifter bushings. On very new cars, you'll hear a small mechanical click when shifting gears. Try it with the car turned off and see if it still does it. It wears and the click goes away very quickly, like 50 miles.

>>>I'm also starting to experiance this slight hiccup of acceleration around 4K especially in 3rd gear

Yep, that's the hesitation that everyone talks about. I had that problem until about 2000 miles when I changed to 92 octane. It reduced it in half. Then at 4000 miles, I put on the Stromung muffler and the hesitation went away and hasn't come back sense.

The strange thing about the hesitation was it only occurred on hot days (over 70) when the car was cool. Go figure.
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Old 04-27-2001, 09:04 AM   #8
-JB-
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Member#: 6060
Join Date: Apr 2001
Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Vehicle:
MY01 Impreza 2.5RS
Black

Post

When you say the click goes away after 50 miles, do you mean on every drive? I haven't really noticed if it persists after a long drive, but most of my trips are way under 50k, unless it's the weekend, then I go until 'I' run out of gas
The hesitation isn't really getting to me yet. Although I'm still keeping it under 4K, so that may change when I'm really ripping around and start noticing it more. Intake and exhaust are definately on my to-do list, but I figure I should wait a waile until spending more $$$. I'd rather hae the car for 6 months and then slowly bolt on new rubber, then intake, then exhaust, etc.. I'd like to feel what I'm missing first. I'm happy now, so why fix what aint broke? Although from what everyone says on this board once you get the mod bug, it doesn't stop... ever.
For now I'm hoping to pass the break in preiod this weekend. Actually make that I'm going to make sure I pass the brake in period this weekend. I need to hit redline... it's just sitting there.. taunting me... Then it's in for it's first tune-up and oil change.. mmmm... it begins.
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Old 04-27-2001, 10:20 AM   #9
Rez
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Member#: 1958
Join Date: Jul 2000
Location: Taxachusetts, USA
Vehicle:
1999 Impreza 2.5 RS
Rally Blue Pearl

Post

www.lojack.com

Worth the effort. If the car get stolen and not recovered, they refund you the price of the LoJack system. Sort of a no lose situation as far as the system is concerned.

-Rez
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Old 04-27-2001, 10:54 AM   #10
Skeandhu
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Chapter/Region: VIC
Location: Vancouver, BC, Canada
Exclamation

JB,

Regarding point #2):
Quote:
When I turn my lights on I can hear a click/thunk that sounds like it's coming from just behind the glovebox.. dunno..
That is just a relay that you hear clicking... Most likely to switch between the DRL (Daytime Running Light) power and normal headlight power. In any case, it is nothing to worry about.

Enjoy your new ride!

Kevin
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