Subtitle: You'll never believe this!

First of all, let me thank everyone who has offered advice, encouragement, and sympathy with the problems I had with my SVX. You've been fantastic and I really appreciate it.

If you've followed the thread to this point you will know that I returned my black SVX for a refund last Thursday. Friday is car day in the local paper so, shortly before supper "Shall I take a look through. I guess I should, I might find a Talon". My son is looking for a 2nd generation Eagle Talon TSi AWD. It looks as though he will get one from Ontario from an Internet acquaintance, but "I should take a look anyway". The colour ads aren't in date order, otherwise I would have only looked for 95s and up, but it was necessary to plough through all of them and there I found:
1992 Subaru SVX, mint, 90000 km (56000 miles for US members)

To make it still more incredible this was listed by a dealership within walking distance of where I live.

I don't know what the odds are of this happening. Maybe in Toronto, for example, it would not be surprising, but there are probably no more than about 14 or 15 SVXs in Winnipeg (Earthworm: you probably know better than I do - how many are there?)

I went down and checked the car out today. It has not been cleaned up at all yet since it was only traded in last week. This was an advantage since I was seeing the car in its worst possible condition - but also the best one for finding any problems. The car runs, rides, and handles much better than the black one which I returned. It's also quieter, without a couple of rattles that were present on the black one. The engine seems very strong and free of vibration, and the transmission was very smooth (I suddenly realized after driving it that I hadn't even noticed it shifting). There is a very small leak from where a hose attaches to the PS pump, and some oil leakage at the gasket (I think) between the oil filler spout and whatever is underneath it (very precise!!). The various bits and pieces all seem to work OK although the stereo door is misaligned, and the interior (remember, it hasn't been cleaned and detailed yet) looks very good. The leather is still soft although a little worn on the driver's seat. Unfortunately, the bodywork is not great and there are several rusted areas. Rather than letting the dealer fix it up I will, assuming thaat I buy it, take it to a specialist outfit for a better quality finish; expensive (although I'd expect to get a better price from the dealer if they don't have to do the work), but probably worth it. The colour, by the way, is teal (Earthworm: Do you know this car? It's a one-owner car and the previous owner is Ming Cheung).

The salesperson is going to check with Ming and see if I can talk to him to try and get the service record, details of any accidents, etc. If everything works out OK I may soon be an SVX owner again!! With hindsight, I think that the engine failure in the black car may have been a stroke of luck: without it I may never have returned the car. Certainly this new possibility seems better in almost every respect (except colour - I still like black!).

OK, now to a couple of things that I think are important to other owners.

SVX Performance
I don't know about the ECU changes that CopsodyX reported on earlier in this thread, but he is definitely correct regarding the original redline being 7000 rpm. I checked my copy of the Road and Track test. They report that the redline is 7000 rpm and there is a clear photograph of the instrument panel with the redline on the tach starting at 7000 rpm. This may not seem like very much but there is a great gap between first and second gear ratios and a 6500 rpm redline will drop you well below the torque peak on the first/second shift. Some time ago I synthesized a torque vs rpm curve from dyno data on the KC site and I'll generate a simulation to determine what effect a change in redline would have on acceleration times. One wouldn't think it would be that great, but you never know. It's possible that this is a major reason why the road test reports (remember that these guys get their test cars 3 or 4 months before the cars go on sale) all show much better performance than the production cars. There was a post a while ago where someone (I can't remember who) reported being told by a Suby tech that a SOA executive tested the cars before they were sent out to dealers and demanded that they be detuned to give a more luxurious image. The easiest way to do this is to lower the redline (if they were to retune the ECU then they would have to repeat all the emission testing I would assume). CopsodyX suggested that this was to reduce the stress on the tranny, but I don't think that this is reasonable: torque, not HP is what kills tannies and the torque at 7000 is less than at 6500 rpm. Maybe, just maybe .....

17" Wheels
My black car came with 17" wheels (Enkei CDR9 IIRC). I have been told that these were 40 mm offset. The Canadian Subaru Tech Support line told the dealer that the nominal offset is 55 mm, and the allowable range is 45 to 55 mm. I had Michelin Pilot XGT tires on by the way. One thing that I noticed (so did my son) was that there was very little self-centering action and the steering was very light around the center, whereas all the other SVXs that I've driven had quite heavily weighted steering around the center position. I think that this was due to the incorrect offset. If you check:
http://www.sportcompactcarweb.com/te...cc_wheelguide/ you find that the proper offset is "... very,very important..." and that self-centering can be affected. I've seen similar information elsewhere. I WOULD THEREFORE RECOMMEND THAT THE MINIMUM OFFSET BE 45MM IF YOU GO TO 17" WHEELS. I found some 5zigen Copse wheels, 17X7.5 5-114.3 48SLP wheels which would be better (these are 48 mm offset). Go to www.discounttiredirect.com and search on there. They are $199 each. I also found that there was a slight rub on the fender liner, but that may have been due to the Avon tires which the previous owner had installed.

OK, no more (this is long enough already!). Wish me luck with the teal SVX.