Meguiars ScratchX rules, hands down. Just got back from washing my car. When I had removed the SUBARU from my trunk there was light etching left in the paint that I could not for the life of me remove. I had used rubbing compound and polish so many times that the paint had become faded and very swirled around that area. 5 minutes with ScratchX on a foam applicator removed all the swirling and cloudiness in the paint and had taken out a fair amount of the etching from the old emblem. I plan on taking a lot more time tomorrow morning and to see if I can fully eliminate the rest of the etching or make it extremely hard to see.
I also decided to give it a go on my headlights. I had picked up a headlight restoration kit earlier today because being 7 years old the headlights have started to haze up a bit. Two minutes with some light elbow grease on each lamp and they practically look brand new. Hoping to drive around a bit later tonight to enjoy the increased light output.
http://tinyurl.com/scratchX
Sorry, but you will have to copy and paste that link as I am too retarded to get blogger to generate the link properly at this time to find out what it is, and if you love your car and have noticed small paint damage such as swirling or light scratches, do yourself and your car a favor and pick up a bottle. I swear the paint looks brand new after a few minutes with that.
Pics of the trunk will be up tomorrow after I have some time to work on it a bit more.
Friday, June 10, 2011
The car
Well, since its going to be a main focus of my posts here I figure I might as well get this out of the way. My current vehicle is a 2004 Subaru Impreza WRX. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the car, it is powered by a 2.0L horizontally-opposed 4 cylinder engine, turbocharged with a Mitsubishi TD04H-13T turbocharger. It has a 5-speed manual gearbox and delivers power to all four wheels through its symmetrical all-wheel drive system. The engine is rated at 227bhp and 217lb.ft. of torque from the factory. Most car magazines rated the car's 0-60 time in the 5.5-5.9 second range when it was originally reviewed 7 years ago and it can run the quarter mile in the low to mid 14 second range.
My car is a color that Subaru only offered for the 2004 model year called Java Black Pearl. Its a black paint with copper metallic, which in the proper light can make the car look slightly brown and even green at times. It has also had a 3" cat-back exhaust system installed, as well as an AEM cold air intake. The clutch was recently upgraded to a Competition Clutch stage 2 kit, which incorporates a stronger pressure plate and a carbon-kevlar clutch disk, at the same time the factory flywheel was replaced in favor of a lighter ACT Streetlite flywheel which was 8lbs lighter than the factory 22lb flywheel.
Current plans for the car include replacing the factory up-pipe with a less restrictive catless aftermarket pipe, upgrading to the larger top mount intercooler from the STi, installing an aftermarket downpipe which uses high-flow catalytic converters, and having the car professionally tuned with a goal of achieving over 300 bhp, which should net me over 250 hp to the wheels.
Cosmetic modifications that have been made so far include replacing the factory 2004 tail lights with the lights from a 2006 Impreza, removing the factory SUBARU badge from the trunk lid, as well as removing the factory spoiler. Plans include a complete respray in the factory color, the addition of the larger STi hood scoop, a rally-style roof vent, and the factory 2007 limited spoiler.
Hope you enjoy the pictures, much more coming soon.
My car is a color that Subaru only offered for the 2004 model year called Java Black Pearl. Its a black paint with copper metallic, which in the proper light can make the car look slightly brown and even green at times. It has also had a 3" cat-back exhaust system installed, as well as an AEM cold air intake. The clutch was recently upgraded to a Competition Clutch stage 2 kit, which incorporates a stronger pressure plate and a carbon-kevlar clutch disk, at the same time the factory flywheel was replaced in favor of a lighter ACT Streetlite flywheel which was 8lbs lighter than the factory 22lb flywheel.
Current plans for the car include replacing the factory up-pipe with a less restrictive catless aftermarket pipe, upgrading to the larger top mount intercooler from the STi, installing an aftermarket downpipe which uses high-flow catalytic converters, and having the car professionally tuned with a goal of achieving over 300 bhp, which should net me over 250 hp to the wheels.
Cosmetic modifications that have been made so far include replacing the factory 2004 tail lights with the lights from a 2006 Impreza, removing the factory SUBARU badge from the trunk lid, as well as removing the factory spoiler. Plans include a complete respray in the factory color, the addition of the larger STi hood scoop, a rally-style roof vent, and the factory 2007 limited spoiler.
Hope you enjoy the pictures, much more coming soon.
The name.
Yes, I know the name of the blog is drifter garage, but in reality, its a bit of a lie. I have zero real life interest in drifting, I think its the equivalent of a car talent show. How much of a lame-ass showboater can you be while going slower than you would if actually racing, and essentially beating your car and tires to a pulp.
My online pseudonym, drifter2be, originally started out on my days on XBOX live. My main activity was drifting on Forza 3 and I didn't feel like coming up with a gamertag that was based on my current car, because I changed cars so often back then. I wanted to find something that was generic enough to be used almost everywhere I interacted online, thus, due to my love of Initial: D and my fondness for tearing up the downhill courses of Fujimi Kaido in Forza 3, drifter2be was born.
Outside the confines of cyberspace, my name is Joseph, I'm a 24 year old guy who lives in a small town called Hemet, smack dab in the middle of Riverside County in sunny southern California. My main passion in life is, you guessed it, cars. My chosen profession is automotive service and repair, my biggest hobby is my car, and most of my free time is spent researching modifications and helping others with their cars. Unfortunately, I have currently found myself unemployed, but no matter, I am a strong capable individual and will easily bounce back from this. My other passions include gaming, Star Trek, and my beautiful girlfriend, though for the most part those will not be points of discussion here.
Sadly, tonight I find myself locked in yet another battle with my arch-nemesis, INSOMNIA, which is why I've managed to not only start this blog but make two consecutive posts already. Time to take a break, peace out!
My online pseudonym, drifter2be, originally started out on my days on XBOX live. My main activity was drifting on Forza 3 and I didn't feel like coming up with a gamertag that was based on my current car, because I changed cars so often back then. I wanted to find something that was generic enough to be used almost everywhere I interacted online, thus, due to my love of Initial: D and my fondness for tearing up the downhill courses of Fujimi Kaido in Forza 3, drifter2be was born.
Outside the confines of cyberspace, my name is Joseph, I'm a 24 year old guy who lives in a small town called Hemet, smack dab in the middle of Riverside County in sunny southern California. My main passion in life is, you guessed it, cars. My chosen profession is automotive service and repair, my biggest hobby is my car, and most of my free time is spent researching modifications and helping others with their cars. Unfortunately, I have currently found myself unemployed, but no matter, I am a strong capable individual and will easily bounce back from this. My other passions include gaming, Star Trek, and my beautiful girlfriend, though for the most part those will not be points of discussion here.
Sadly, tonight I find myself locked in yet another battle with my arch-nemesis, INSOMNIA, which is why I've managed to not only start this blog but make two consecutive posts already. Time to take a break, peace out!
Welcome to my blog/WTF am I doing?
Well, here it is. This is something I have been meaning to do for a long time, and just never got around to it. Why? Laziness. Why did I start this? Good question. Best answer I can give is no particular reason. Figured this would be a good place to express myself and my thoughts, post updates of what I'm doing with my car without having to stick with a single forum or social network in order to do so. Also, there are so many random things that come to me throughout the day that I feel the need to share, regardless of whether they are relevant or not. What better place than my own blog, right? Who knows, maybe I will end up with zero people reading this and I can just go crazy with it. Which reminds me, there will probably be a gratuitous amount of material that will probably deem this NSFW, so keep that in mind.
Thanks for looking, come back soon...or not, I really don't care!
Thanks for looking, come back soon...or not, I really don't care!
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