How long has it been since you've seen a project car from Super Street? A little too long if you ask me. Well, since we made you wait so long, we're going to make it up with something absolutely bad-ass. For your reading pleasure, we managed to get our hands on APC's (American Product Company) brand spankin' new 2002 Subaru Impreza WRX to build up. I don't think the APC guys know what they got themselves into, but we'll keep it on the down low if you do. Forgive us yet? No? C'mon, what do we have to do to convince you? Just Jill? Need we remind you that the Impreza is all-wheel drive and comes with a factory 227hp turbo motor? That's around 185 hp at the wheels-pretty damned good for having just rolled off the conveyer belt but, trust us, things aren't going to remain the same on this WRX for very long. Pretty soon, the word "stock" will no longer be used in the same sentence when it comes to our Project WRX unless it's referred to in a negative manner. Now, are we friends again? Good.
APC hasn't seen its WRX since it's been handed over to us. Not to worry-we have a whole list of mods planned for the car, and you'll be involved in every part of the buildup. Key manufacturers involved in Project WRX are: APC, Blitz North America, Endless USA, Raceline Development, Sparco USA, and many more to come. Trust us-we're going to have fun with this one.
Being the speed addicts that we are, we decided to send the WRX over to our friends at Blitz North America for some help in power-upping. Yes, we have to start with the basic bolt-ons before we start getting into the good stuff. We all want to know how much power we're adding when we spend our hard-earned money.
Blitz North America offers an onboard chassis dynamometer in the form of their new Power Meter I-D. The Power Meter I-D calculates your vehicle's horsepower at the wheels in accordance to its speed, and it is ridiculously simple to install. It's amazing that something this technically advanced can be installed and so easily run with the connection of three wires (power, ground, and speed sensor signal.) Once the Power Meter was programmed for a four-wheel-drive, turbocharged vehicle, we took it for a little spin around the block. Our base run read 185 hp on the Power Meter I-D. Not too shabby with only about a 20-percent loss in horsepower from the crank to all four wheels. We can also test the 0-400m time and record our last track run with the Power Meter I-D.
Since the full turbo-back exhaust hasn't been released from Blitz North America, we opted for the Nurspec muffler and rear piping section only. Although we got the sexy stainless steel muffler and piping, the factory B-pipe will remain on the WRX until the full stainless turbo-back exhaust lands in the States.
The glare of the highly polished Nurspec muffler tank is strong enough to blind a blind man again. When it comes to starting the WRX and taking it for a spin around the block, start up is normal, idle is smooth, and a nice deep tone emits from the Nurspec's 4.5-inch tip. After our little test drive with just a Nurspec rear muffler section, an impressive 198 hp at the wheels was the readout on the Power Meter I-D. That's about a 13hp gain from the stock WRX without an off-road sounding, eardrum-blowing exhaust roar.