I finally found a little time to write up a quick start to the journal for my new vehicle that I received a few weeks back. After losing my beloved 2007 Legacy GT 2 years ago I ended up purchasing a Lexus Hybrid SUV for daily use as I needed something to tow my race bike to the track with. In the mean time I purchased a 2002/2004 WRX shell from a friend to begin building a time attack vehicle. This is in another journal that needs updating as well. While the Lexus was comfortable and nice to drive in, it was boring! I longed to get back into a Subaru as my daily and when the new 2015 Subaru WRX was announced with the new FA20DIT motor I was immediately intrigued. During the summer I was able to take one out for a good while from Subaru of Brampton and immediately could tell Subaru had made a major leap with the new car. I also had the opportunity to drive a few 2015 STi’s of our local customers and as much as everyone has ragged on it having the old motor, the car as a whole is significantly better then the previous models. Late in the year I made the decision to move forward with purchasing a base WRX that we could use for research on the new chassis and motor. I was then presented with the reality that the WRX supply was very thin and they were in extremely high demand. After working with Devon at Subaru of Brampton, who is a great guy and someone I would recommend asking for if you’re at SOB, we managed to find a base model shown at another dealership available. After signing the deal we found out the other dealership had sold the car a week earlier and not updated their inventory. Slightly disheartened I turned to Autotrader to see if I could locate another WRX and I stumbled across a new listing from Thunder Bay. The dealership is called Northstar Mercedes Benz which is where the name Northstar comes from. Within about a week I had finalized the deal for the car and it was scheduled to be trucked down to Toronto and delivered to the shop. The car had around 52km on it and was traded at a MB dealership in Thunder Bay. Whatever the reasons were I was able to get the car I wanted and not have to wait until March/April for new inventory to come.
We took delivery of the car on the 14th of November with 82KM on the clock. Everything in the car was perfect and we obviously took it for a quick spin to check it out. The first thing I noted was how firm the suspension was, the car I test drove before was not this firm but it also had more km on it. As I put more mileage on the car the suspension has become much more compliant while still feeling extremely tight and planted. The FA20DIT motor is very torquey and power comes on early and holds decently well for a stock car. The steering leaves a little to be desired but is actually still better then previous models. The car has very minimal body roll and the car is easily as good as a modified GR or GD with swaybars, springs and dampers. There’s still room for improvement but the baseline is much higher on the 2015 then any previous model. The seats IMO are much improved and hold much better, the interior materials, fit and finish are a huge improvement as well. The WRX upper screen display has the option to display oil temperature as well as boost, throttle position and much more. The only thing missing is an oil pressure gauge, that can be added alter though. One of the only things so far I don’t like about the car is the shifting. While the addition of the 6-speed is welcomed, the cable shifting assembly out of the box is not very good. As i’ve driven more it’s become better but initially it was very notchy and difficult to get into gear at times. I find 2nd gear is the hardest still to get into and the feel of the shifting is not confidence inspiring. Hopefully Kartboy and others will come up with some nice improvements over this set-up.
