1998 Subaru Impreza Turbo 5 door from UK and Ireland - Comments

Further to this debate about which is quicker between a Subaru Impreza Turbo and a Honda Integra Type R, I can tell you very definitely as I am fortunate to have both in standard form. The Subaru has a slight edge in the dry, but in the wet then its by a mile the Scooby.

I have owned my Subaru, which is a 1998 UK Spec, for 3 years and its reliability is 100%. Yes fuel consumption is sore, but expect this with any turbo car (the new Focus ST expects 20mpg). I service mine once a year and its from a Subaru dealer, and it costs under £100. I cannot believe so many people have slagged the Scooby off, but you really must of bought dogs or dodgy grey imports.

Remember, always lets your turbo warm up before going on boost, and also very important, after hard use, let it sit for at least a minute, so the turbo blades are not starved of oil.

To sum up, the Subaru Impreza Turbo is fantastic and a UK spec car was tested by Top Gear in Nov 1997 and hit 0 - 60 in 5.2 seconds. Supercar performance by anyones standards.

Chris (Northern Ireland)

I'm from Australia and I work with cars I've driven a variety of cars over the time and I have seen these two cars go and also driven them now lets break them down into two. Quarter Mile performance: Subaru WRX will do low 15's standard with no boost no mods and the Honda Integra Type R will do a low 15 with no turbo, if you drive these cars right meaning with a good reaction time which would have to be 0.4 and also having perfect shifting so really it's up to the driver, but if you have two professional drivers they both can do low 15's if you put on a bigger intercooler and also a air filter pod the WRX will do a low 14's would be it's best with out the boost put up. The WRX STi will pull off a high 13 standard. The WRX will have a better take off, but the Integra will have better top end speed, since the WRX loses it with it'a all-wheel drive, but when it comes to a circuit race the WRX will leave it behind, but not by much. In australia we currently own the fastest WRX in the world which can pull of 8 seconds down the 1/4 mile, but see if you do the same to the Integra the Integra would be quicker because of what it does stock standard. See Honda as been praised for producing and this is the Japanese spec version the Integra has 185kw while the australian spec has 165kw and that's with out the turbo, the Evo 7 which is the fastest japanese 4 cylinder in the world standard only has 280hp which is round about 200kw at the wheels and that's with a turbo so imagine what a Honda Integra could do if it had a turbo. I don't hate any import I love them all, but see it depends what you want out of the car and also where you goin with it and also how much your willing to spend. For a 1/4 mile car the Integra for circuit WRX if you want a circuit/drag car the evo, but again because it's all-wheel drive it will lose top end speed also the integra with a turbo will be a big rival. In fuel consumption the Integra is the way to go. Insurance if your keen for the expences go for the turboed cars, but overall just for a normal daily driver the Integra... Yes I said I work with cars, I know my own car club plus I'm also sponsored by many brands like HKS, Apexi and many other companies I dunno what is like in the UK, but that's how it is here in Australia. So depends how big your wallet is..?? anymore questions just leave any other comments or visit my clubs website www.teamgroundzero.net and leave your questions in the forum or email me at jvwijtenburg@hotmail.com...

To the above comment well done that man, I've just been browsing the new comments section and happened across this 1.I've not yet read back through the old comments yet, but the debate about these cars interests me a lot as I own a japanese import honda integra type R, and strangly enough I've just turbo'd it, now running around the 300bhp figure (not been dyno'd yet as still running it in) but the speed is incredible. i have a few friends who have owned, driven or been in a huge amount of performance cars including evo's subaru's and skylines and they all think mine feels quicker than all of them. OK I will admit that all those cars are virtually standard, but still quite an achievment to get 300bhp,8900rpm and still only weigh 1060kg and the best handling front wheel drive road car ever made (the LSD helps that a lot)

Almost all Subaru little H-engines will sooner or later produce some slight piston-slapping, and this is due to no damper material to suppress the sound from hearing.

It should be no problem for Subaru, (my scooby friends own various subarus and they slap a bit, but are still running very cool to this day).

For the bearing, yes, Subaru used to have very weak bearings, but I have heard they did improve the suspension system, including (lateral link, stabilizing bar, hub, bearing), all were made stronger, but I will still see how much stronger they are made. For old Subarus, these parts are extremely weak, so be cautious not to hit the curb, or bend something.

Also notice that Subaru used to have weak trannys, but after 03 newly designed auto & manual trannys seem to solve this problem. So be gentle for your throttle, especially when moving from stationary, AWD tranny cannot withstand much abuse due to no energy will be transferred into tire-burning easily, thus almost all kinetic energy will be absorbed into the tranny itself. so if you drive it hard, a cracked gear or shattered tooth will be the result. This not only apples to Subaru, but to almost all AWD/4WD.

Regarding 16th may, you said you had the fastest WRX in the world with 8 sec 1/4 mile, I'm not disputing that, but you also said if you did the same to a ITR it would be quicker. Now being an expert you should know it would take about 8 seconds before it stops wheelspinning. Or you ease off the power to stop the spin, but then you won't get your 8 seconds. And I might be wrong, but I doubt you could get the same power out of a 1.8 VTEC, they are designed to create power at the top of the rev range N/A, if you alter it you would just turn it into a 1.8 turbo.

Yes that's true, but look on youtube and you will find lots of Integras and civics using the b18c engine with a turbo running in excess of 600bhp. There is one running 712bhp, and one even running above 800bhp.

Now when you're talking those sort of figures, obviously the rest of the car has been modified too. I don't think I've seen an 8 second Integra, but I've definitely seen a couple runs into the 9's and that's still being FWD.

The Honda engine is great for turbo charging and takes it well as long as you reduce the compression a bit from a very high 11:1 down to a more reasonable 9:0 or 9:5.

I am so sad, I sooo want to buy a Scooby, but I think ill let my head rule my hart on this one. I have owned many cars of various performance and from different manufacturers over the years, some have been better than others, but a trawl through the different SUBARU carsurvey pages seems to show an alarming number problems, some of which seem to be definite design flaws. Coupled with other posters bad experience of Subaru service centers its back to the drawing board for me and perhaps ill settle for something a little duller, but better quality.

Maybe next time Subaru...

Sydney, Australia.

How about a Legacy GTB Twin Turbo; are these any good? Anyone in Northern Ireland know if you can insure Japanese Imports over here?

There is really very little difference performance wise between the uk 2000,wrx scoobys, etc and an integra in terms of performance the sti s and other models with around 300bhp will obviously be quicker, but as mentioned the running costs are miles apart not to mention how common a impreza is compared to an integra.

Oh and a standard itr can run a 14.2 on the 1/4 mile.