1999 Subaru WRX GC8 Restoration

Joel's favourite Subaru headlight shape is blobeye, so early on we were leaning that way and initially dismissed some listings. We began to open up to the idea of a non-blobeye Subie as there were few marketplace listings that actually felt right.

Doomscrolling facebook marketplace eventually brought up a listing for a blue 1999 GC8 that we'd end up buying. It wasn't the only one in the running at the time though. We were also looking at a club spec No. 52 yellow GC8 with 200,000+ km on the clock, and a rather banged-up 2002 blobeye WRX in silver. The last two listings however just felt like they would need a bit too much work for two engineering students with some discount tools.

The big day had arrived, it was a crystal clear Saturday morning and we set off at 8:00am for a 50 minute drive inland. We made lists of what to inspect and plans for all sorts of outcomes, whether the car was rusted through or was in good condition. It felt surreal to drive past the real thing as we looked for a park. With a torch in hand, we made sure to check chassis seams, suspension and the interior for signs of rough treatment.

Although we found the car to have a blown head gasket, peeling clear coat and general surface rust, it was structurally sound and the engine sounded healthy. Before I knew it, Joel had already dropped the hammer and shook hands at $5,500 which, looking back on it, was a fair price.

We then realised we had not thought of how to bring the car home and we began to feel our stomachs turn as a delayed result of the purchase. An hour-ish later, a tow truck pulled up to take the car back the 50 minute drive. The car turned over for what would be the last time in a while to manually park it in position, ready for repairs.

Same day as the purchase, a mock up restoration plan was written covering four areas: engine bay, brakes, interior and exterior. The intent going in was OEM+. That is, restore rather than upgrade, with the "plus" being tasteful visual mods to personalise the car. Current mods on the books are BBS RG383 gold rims, an STI spoiler and gold fittings for the engine bar.

A full parts catalogue followed the next day with around 30 items across exterior, interior, mechanical and maintenance, mostly from Australian retailers. Notable inclusions are a Haltech ECU and harness alongside the replacement fluids, gaskets and trim pieces. This was a robust list that, for money's sake, would be treated as a guide rather than an absolute list.

A couple of days after that, a technical write-up for the head gasket job and, by extension, the EJ205 turbo engine was formulated. This will turn out to be a difficult multi-stage job. Dual MLS head gaskets with ARP 2000 studs for the flat-four boxer engine, new machined finish on the cylinder heads, and the wider engine-out work that comes with it (seals, timing belt check, clutch, cooling system, engine mounts). Budgeted at roughly AUD $5,000–$8,600 depending on what is replaced or restored.

This was stage 1 of the full restoration. We thought it right to tackle the interior first because once that was clean, we'd actually be able to sit in the car.

First and foremost, the driver's, passenger's and rear seating were all pulled out. Some bolts were rusted and in poor condition while other bolts appeared mismatched. One bolt in particular was so corroded that it sheared off the mounting peg on the ratchet we were using. Lesson learned, use a spanner to initially loosen such bolts in the future. Once the seating was out, we were able to tackle taking off the dash to reveal years worth of dust and many an empty screw hole. The centre dash tray was removed as this would later be replaced.

Beginning the clean with some modest vacuuming of the cabin flooring, we brushed and sucked up all sorts of debris. Grabbing a wire brush, surface rust on metal pieces was scrubbed off before coating them in a nice thick layer of rust converter to restore them and seal the surface. Rust converter was a game-changer for this project because it gave us peace-of-mind knowing future rust development would be slowed and the black semi-gloss coating simply looked mint.

A Ryobi spot cleaner was then employed to suck out all manner of grim and spills from the seats and flooring. This was probably the most shocking part, watching clear water turn brown, black or even green. I think a second pass was very much justified. The seats received a good dose of rust converter while they were out too.

Seats, dash and some of the trim pieces went back in the day after the clean-out — everything that had come out for the rust treatment and shampoo now reassembled ahead of moving on to the exterior.

Stage 2, and first up was a power wash — sprayed the whole car down to lift the already-peeling clear coat, then finished with a foam gun for a proper shine. The windscreen and rear windscreen also had their stickers removed as part of the same clean-up pass.

From there: headlights, fog lights, front grille and the front bumper all came off — a couple of the bolts needed a triple-extended ratcheting screwdriver to reach, which turned out to be the right tool for an awkward job. Alongside the lights and fairing, a mystery unit held in with just two bolts and connected to nothing — nicknamed the "Bluetooth radiator" mid-post — also came out. Turned out to just be the intercooler.