Converted For Duty: RWD Subaru Forester
Every kid in Utah at one point wanted an all wheel drive vehicle. Back when I was in high school the choices were simple: Eclipse/Talon GSX, Lancer Evolution, WRX, or STi. Those were the options if you wanted to boogie and didn’t want to blow the bank. Now it’s different. Now rear wheel drive is the go to form of propulsion, but with the more popular rwd chassis fetching stupid prices (thanks drift tax!) sometimes you have to get creative if you want to slide. And that creativity is what brings us Jackson Brundage’s Forester.
This Forester used to be slightly different. By that I mean it was stanced out, was automatic and had a basket affixed to the roof rack. But hard parking can only satiate someone for so long. Soon Jackson was reading up on RWD conversions, and having everyone on Drift Utah tell him to talk to Derrick Lopez or Nate Omana, two other rwd Subaru pilots. Soon he had a plan.
And that plan was fairly simple: use the fact that he works at Despain Automotive, and follow the blueprints laid out by many others before him. The car rolled in powering all four wheels, and rolled out powering the right ones. Voila! RWD Subaru! While things were being removed, the front swaybar was tossed on the pile, and the coilovers he had on the car were swapped out for a set of Stance Pro Comps. The auto was thrown very, very far away in favor of a 5 speed manual box out of a 2002 WRX.
There’s a welded R160 differential in the back, and Whiteline bushings are holding it securely. The old control arm bushings have been replaced with fresh ones from Super Pro.
A Miro 563 wheel sits on each corner, and they are all 18×9.5 +34. The only difference is in the rubber front to rear: Dunlop Direzza Z1 Star Specs. Out back is whatever fits and is available. The clutch has also been upgraded to an Exedy unit, which will take the repeated clutch kick abuse in stride.
The interior is… an eclectic mix of things. The center console looks like a lumber jack that has been stabbed with a #2 Snap On screwdriver, which thankfully it isn’t but a Snap On #2 screwdriver serves as Jackson’s shift knob. Hanging about that are some Hello Kitty fuzzy dice, because kawaii. That glossy steering wheel is an NRG piece, with an NRG quick release sitting on a Sparco hub.
Stage 6 Motoring makes the seats he and his passenger strap themselves into. They’re the Chaser 1 Neo seat, which means sweet ass leopard print on the front and sparkly silver on the back! Both seats are on Planted Technology bases, and while the passenger is stuck with the factory three point, Jackson has himself a Takata four point harness.
Seeing this car from the back would reveal absolutely nothing about the conversion it has received. It looks like any Forester that’s been lowered and fitted with after market wheels; however, approaching from the front tells a different tale. Seeing the bash bar, which was fabricated by his friend Walter, instantly says “business”.
In the end, Jackson will have hopefully drift missile’d this thing out: hit everything with it at every possible angle, straightened various things with tow straps, and used it and his misadventures in drifting as a foundation to build a prettier, more competition oriented car.
Either that, or he slides this thing around and keeps adding kanji stickers and Hello Kitty stuff to it and has the most kawaii car at all the local events. Either or, so long as he watches those videos I told him to watch.
