Michael-

Welcome to the board! The six in the SVX could easily be the finest I'll ever experience. My girlfriend's father has a newer BMW 540i sportwagon and the v8 in that thing is unreal.

As far as service manuals go, your best bet is to find a set of Factory Service Manuals specific to your model year.. I think you can expect to pay somewhere around $300 for the whole set, but in my experience, they're very clearly written and wonderfully illustrated. The Chilton's manual or SVX/Legacy/Impreza/GL/Justy was responsible for me breaking an ABS sensor (didn't actually need to be removed, but the instructions insisted that it did)

I don't actually know WHERE you can find a full set of FSM's, but I'm sure someone here can chime in and help you out. Enjoy the car, but do it responsibly!!

(you'd be surprised at the range of people who need to be reminded of that)

-adam