Life with an '02 WRX wagon (sort of a review)

[Konan555]

Well, it's been over 6 months. I figured I'd share some thoughts on my first foray into 21st century motoring... with something that escaped from the 80s.

Purchased 'because it was there' when I needed a replacement vehicle at shortish notice. The intention was to spend a weekend car shopping and weighing up the options. I stopped at the Mazda dealer,on the way into the city and had a look around at an Impreza that they'd taken in part exchange from some chap who was getting old and felt that need to get a diesel... (reminds me of elephants going to a certain place to die). They'd also dropped all their PX prices to clear as their yard didn't have the space for all the 10 plate cars turning up. 1st car in mind, we set off to have a look around the dealers on the Norwich ring road. My attention span snapped before even reaching the next dealer so I did a U turn and put a deposit down.

Ended up with this. And lets get this out of the way, it ain't pretty

Fortunately, I don't care. I mean, I do find some car's offensively ugly when they've clearly attempted to be stylish... and it doesn't appear to have hurt BMW sales Subaru just don't appear to bother from the outset.



Anyway, after 250 miles a week in it for a half a year, along with weekend duties, how have I found it?

Well, firstly, it's not an estate. It's a hatchback. The Impreza estate is the Forester. I'd like a forester, but they're horrendously expensive to purchase 2nd hand. The affordable ones on the market have normally lived a life carting incontinent sheep dogs around farms with no sign of an oil change.



The impreza lacks the boot space to be called an estate. There's a bit more floor area over most hatchbacks but no depth at all due to the drive train and spare wheel. The suspension also cuts in to the width of the load area. The seats drop flatish for larger loads, but it lacks tie down points. I'm just not happy carrying an unsecured washing machine at 60mph.

However, it's still got room enough to be a little more practical than a mid size hatch. For example, it'll carry 4 225/45/17 tyres in the boot without having to drop the seats. There are also roof bars, which will be rather handy as I'm not sure I'll get a mountain bike in the boot.

A particular bonus point, in it's day to day Norfolk life, is the ground clearance. Despite being a 'performance' model, the front bumper sits over an inch higher than the Vectra it shares a carpark with. A lot of our clients have offices up glorified dirt tracks and Norfolk B roads often dictate having to squeeze on to the verge because someone in a Lawn Rover won't budge.



Touch wood, it's short wheelbase and reasonable clearance have helped me avoid introducing the exhaust to the dirt below. Coming down from a Pajero, I was a little worried a lot of my favoured parking spaces in the countryside would become inaccessible. Whilst the Impreza isn't quite up to dragging a trailer through a waterlogged woodland as the Pajero would, it's a lot more capable than the average hot-hatch when traversing a lake district camp site.

The interior also feels pleasingly robust. Japanese interiors are often the subject of criticism and, it has to be said, it's very Japanese inside. But it all works and (with the exception of the token cup holder) feels like it'll stand up to real life. Whilst the plastic is a little shiny, it's also easy to wipe clean. There are a few rattles and squeak, especially with the car's firm ride. I'd even go as far as to guess that it rattled and squeaked in 2002.

I've often run into the term 'Uninspiring plastics' in magazine reviews. I must say, I pitty the journalist that got into a car and felt inspired by some plastic



Can't say I'm a fan of pillarless doors. This is due to a rather painful headbut of the rear window in the dark!

Obviously, over this period, we've had snow. It didn't quite match the previous year (Norfolk Norfolk being under 12 inches of it a month before eveyone else got some and it made news), in which I actually had to lock the Pajero diffs to get it out of my drive, but it was enough to get people stuck.

Being 4x4 I was confident that the Impreza would behave. It didn't.

My old XR4x4 behaved admirably in the snow. The rear bias wasn't ideal but it was predictable. The central and rear LSDs where very easy to get a feel for and, with caution, progress was always a sure thing.



Unforunately, the impreza was skittish. 225 width summer tyres and tight diffs. It'd quite happily shoot off at random in the direction of whichever tyre had a bit of traction. Having rather an excitable turbo charger under the bonnet, a tiny bit of wheelspin could develop into 4 wheel drifting faster than I could let off the throttle.

Whilst I never got stuck, I never felt confident. A set of freshly powedercoated wheels from ebay and proper winter tyres... chalk and cheese.



The cold weather also showed up no end of knocks, clicks, squirts and bumps from the engine. This quickly introduced me to something very Subaru. Every time I enquired about a particular noise, I got the same answer. "Oh yes, they do that. It's OK, I thought it was the head gaskets but it's been doing it for 120,000 miles now".

They're just not modern. And that's my favourite bit. It's capable, but still feels very much like a machine. Sure, certain Mondeo owning acquaintances may point out that Aircon is as close to creature comforts as you get, but it's just a car. Plain, simple, stupid car. And a stupid car that has surprised me with it's practicality at times.