Subaru Impreza 2009 News

Subaru has launched a major 121,754-vehicle recall to fix a potential fault which can cause the brake lights to fail (though the brakes themselves will still work), with every Forester, WRX, Impreza and XV sold over a particular timeframe impacted.

A number of potentially hazardous faults have been identified in vehicles sold in Australia, prompting a wide range of recalls.

It edged out basic black, with white a long way back in third.  Silver has been surging ahead in recent years, also topping the popularity contest in Australia in recent years despite the one-off attractions of everything from Kermit green to gold and even purple as hero colours on Australia's benchmark performance car, the SS Commodore.The colour chart emerged this week from DuPont, an American paint maker that has been compiling a similar popularity poll in the USA for the past 57 years.  "This is the first year we have run the world colour information. North America had silver at number one from 2000 to 2006, but while was number one from 2007 to 2009," says Nancy Lockhart, colour marketing manager for DuPont's original equipment paint division.Lockhart says the results vary by regions, with black on top in Europe and silver dominating in Asia and South America.  "There are still distinct regional differences in preference, but global trends are unmistakable. Colour preference can change from year to year because of a variety of factors including types of vehicles introduced, reduced vehicle size, consumer tastes and even the economy."These and other cultural, societal and demographic influences can shift regional trends over time.”  But she says silver, the top choice with prestige brands including Benz and BMW, is the dominant force at the moment with little likely change in coming years.  "Silver is likely to stay on top and will share the race with black," she says."Bright and chromatic metallic colours of high interest in North America. Purple is beginning to emerge in small volumes."  DuPont charts the colour changes partly to boost its business and partly as a way of helping carmakers identify emerging colour trends.“The auto industry is an increasingly global business, so regional and global colour data are vitally important to designers," Lockhart says.Despite regional differences, the top three colour choices rank well ahead of gray in fourth and — surprisingly — red in sixth. “The top colours become ‘aspirational’ with a universal appeal," says Leatrice Eiseman, the executive director of the Pantone Color Institute.  “There are many reasons to buy a new car, yet we know colour is often the ‘driver’ for purchasing a vehicle.  “Consumers have gotten very savvy about how and where to look for colour trends and they do look for guidance on what’s new in colour.”Silver is top in Australia in a reflection of the global results but DuPont says there are significant differences between regions.  In Europe, black is pulling ahead from silver — 27 to 19.9 per cent — but in Japan the perennial favourite, white, lost four percentage points from 2008 and silver dropped back to be equal in second with black.In China, silver is clearly the favourite with a 36 per cent score and black dropped back by four points despite remaining in second.  The big upset in the latest results is Russia, where green — only eighth with 1 per cent of the global result — was second to silver and took 18.2 per cent in the DuPont rankings.GLOBAL CAR COLOURSTop 10 choices — 20091. Silver — 25 per cent2. Black — 23 per cent3. White — 16 per cent4. Gray — 13 per cent5. Blue — 9 per cent6. Red — 8 per cent7. Brown/beige — 4 per cent8. Green — 1 per cent9. Yellow/gold — 1 per cent10. Others

The Trax STi: car, tank or snowmobile?  US Subaru rally driver and general all-round mentalist Ken Block is back, this time with what is possibly the ultimate snow vehicle - a very much winter-ready WRX STi.It's called the Trax STi and it started life as one of Block's open-class WRX STi rally machines, but with the power of the 2.5-litre turbocharged boxer motor tweaked to 400bhp courtesy of a tweaked Motec ECU. The suspension also got treated to Group N-spec dampers. Oh, and the wheels and tyres were replaced cat tracks..."The Trax STi is a very fun project for me," says Block. "It combines two of my favourite things in life: driving a rally car in the snow and snowboarding in the powder in the backcountry. Having a house in Utah, I get to enjoy lots of sliding around on the snow, but this project takes that to a whole new level as I can now hit up the backcountry in the fastest snow cat ever."The result, as you'll be able to see by clicking on the video below, is pretty special. We particularly like the snowy drift around 30 seconds in where Block is playing with understeer and oversteer almost simultaneously...

The Japanese company's new diesel boxer engine will not make it down under for another two months, well after the arrival of the all-new Liberty this week, and it will only be fitted to the high-rider Outback. "We're going to launch the diesel in Australia in the Outback model," says the father of the new Liberty-Outback range, Takeshi Tachimori.The Japanese vice-president of Subaru was driving in the first Outback diesel to reach Australia during Repco Rally Australia last weekend and says the car is a major breakthrough for the company. But he says a massive development program in recent years on everything from the latest Impreza to the new Tribeca means there will be a staggered roll-out of the diesel engine, even though it is already fitted to the Impreza, Forester, Liberty and Outback in Europe."In just two years we updated the whole vehicle line=-p. It's such big work for us," Tachimori says. "We launched the Forester last year and this is big work for us. We cannot do everything at the same time."He says the biggest changes for the new Liberty and Outback are the cabin space and body design, which were both focussed on American needs. The previous Subaru models were seen as too small in the USA and that meant a major change. "We discussed that we must look for the global market. We shifted the target to a global direction," he says. "Japanese people said the new Forester is too big, but it's not a big car in the United States or Australia. People looking at the new Liberty and Outback say they are so big, but the change is not so big.The height is a significant increase, and also the proportion. "For this fifth generation we changed our centre of gravity, moving to a global position."Tachimori also says Subaru went against the normal development flow by designing its Liberty wagon first. "Most car companies make the sedan, and then add the cargo space. We began with the wagon as we are sharing the car body with sedan, station wagon and outback. "We wanted a strong presence, especially with the Outback model. The packaging is a mixture of a sedan and SUV."Apart from the diesel engine, the big technical change for the new Liberty and Outback is Subaru's first constantly-variable automatic transmission. It has a six-speed manual mode and was done in-house because of the complication of mating it to the company's unique boxer engines and all-wheel drive package."Our powertrain is very unique and our problem is making a good transmission. We cannot have a transmission from a supplier," Tachimori says. "Transmission is always a problem for us. We had to a have a better transmission for better fuel economy, so several years ago we decided to make a new transmission and it will be CVT."The 2.0-litre Boxer diesel engine in the Impreza is claimed to achieve fuel economy of 5.9L/100km with CO2 emissions of 155g/km which is 20g less than a Corolla.It's no slouch, either, with 112kW of power and 350Nm of torque between 1800 and 240 revs, propelling it to 100km/h in nine seconds and a top speed over 200km/h.The horizontally opposed four-cylinder engine sits flat and deep in the engine well with a variable geometry turbocharger and catalytic converter mounted underneath for a low centre of gravity. Coupled with Symmetrical all-wheel drive, this improves handling and traction.Subaru claims the flat-four layout with horizontally-opposed pistons cancels out second harmonic vibration which means there is no need for heavy balancer shafts.Apart from reduced diesel noise, it also ensures a lively throttle response. The 1998cc Boxer diesel has an 11mm longer stroke and 6mm smaller bore than the 1994cc petrol engine. Cylinder bore spacing is reduced so the engine block is 61.3mm shorter at 353.5mm. It uses a common-rail fuel-injection system with fuel pressurised at 180MPa.The variable nozzle turbocharger ensures the correct boost at all engine speeds and placing it beneath the engine contributes to the Imprezas low centre of gravity, where it also connects directly to the catalytic converters, boosting environmental performance. 

The four-time national champion set the fastest time during a production-class shakedown ahead of Repco Rally Australia, which begins on the NSW north coast on Thursday night.Speeding along a dusty forest road south of Murwillimbah at up to 180km/h, Bates was quickly into stride with the Toyota Corolla his team designed and developed at their race base in Canberra to take to back-to-back Australian championships with Bates and Simon Evans as drivers.Bates clocked a time 1 minute 49.1 seconds in his Toyota Corolla, comfortably ahead of Norwegian driver Evyind Brynildsson in a Mitsubishi Lancer on 1:50.17, with Aussie youngster Eli Evans third on 1:50.8 in his Subaru Impreza. Japan's Toshi Arai, who leads the Subaru effort in the world championship, was also in the leading group with Australian co-driver Glenn MacNeal."That looks pretty promising. Testing doesn't mean a lot, and there are plenty of quick foreign guys who are still learning the Australian conditions, but it looks good," Bates said. "I'm very happy to have a few runs through the stage and to have the car running well. It felt very slippery at first but once I got more into the groove it seemed to be working well."Bates is one of two wildcard local entries, along with three-time Australian champion Cody Crocker. The Subaru star has graduated since to the Asia-Pacific championship and is just five points from claiming his fourth straight crown this season.Crocker clocked 1:51.5 over the test stage, according to unofficial times from the crews' co-drivers, but said there is more to come as he learns a car supplied by Tasmanian team boss Les Walkden in a late deal for Rally Australia."I've still got some things to do," Crocker said. "I'm just glad it's happening. It looked like we were going to miss out when our regular car from Indonesia didn't make it, but now we're here. How good is that?"Bates and Crocker are both hoping to upset the regulars of the world production car championship and believe they have speed, as well as local experience, in their favour. "I want to win Group N (production class). That has to be the target," Crocker said. "There are quite a few good foreign drivers so the pace will be incredibly quick. But no-one is fast on every stage so we'll aim to be quick and consistent." "I've got to beat Cody. If I can do that we should have a shot at the production class win," said Bates. "I also think it's fantastic to have Rally Australia back, and to have it on the east coast for the first time. It was a fantastic event in Perth, but the reality is that the east coast is where all the people live and this should give a huge boost to Australian rallying."REPCO RALLY AUSTRALIAProduction car testing (unofficial times) 1. Neal Bates, Toyota Corolla, 1:49.1 2. Evyind Brynildsson, Mitsubishi Lancer, 1:50.17 3. Eli Evans, Subaru Impreza, 1:50.8 4. Toshi Arai, Subaru Impreza, 1:51.3 5. Cody Crocker, Subaru Impreza, 1:51.5 

CHAD Reed can almost taste the victory champagne as he closes on an AMA outdoor motocross series victory in the USA. He rode his 450cc Suzuki to another 1-1 result at Unadilla in California last weekend, his fourth win of the season, and now has an almost unbeatable lead with just three races to run.CODY Crocker will come to Repco Rally Australia fresh from a dominant win in the Rally of Malaysia with Ben Atkinson alongside in his Subaru WRX. The Aussie crew continued their clean sweep of the Asia-Pacific championship series and were helped when their two closest rivals, Katsu Taguchi and Karamjit Singh, both crashed into retirement and left Crocker's team mate Emma Gilmour to follow him home last weekend.DANIEL Ricciardo is closing fast on the prestigious British Formula 3 championship after his fifth win of the season, this time at Silverstone, last weekend. He backed the victory with third place in the other heat at the home of the British Grand Prix to extend his series lead in his Carlin Motorsport-run Dallara-VW.WORLD touring car champion Andy Priaulx will be passing on tips to youngster David Reynolds when they share the Bundaberg Rum-backed Commodore at Phillip Island and Bathurst. Their pairing is part of the Walkinshaw Motorsport attack on the V8 Supercar classics which sees pairings of Garth Tander-Will Davison and Paul Dumbrell-Craig Baird at the Holden Racing Team, with Steve Owen-Shane Price in the Autobarn entry.Marcos Ambrose rebounded from his dominant form on the road course at Watkins Glen with a disappointing 35th place in the latest round of the Nascar Sprint Cup at the high-speed Michigan International Speedway. Ambrose could only qualify 26th and battled a poor handling car all day, although he is still 17th in series points.RISING star Daniel Erickson added a second, fifth and sixth to his results in the British Formula Ford championship at Silverstone last weekend. He actually qualified on pole position for the first of three races and scored enough points to be second for the weekend and is sixth in the series.CHRIS Wootton remains second in the Formula BMW Asia championship despite a disastrous weekend at Sentul. He was quick in practice and qualifying but had two mechanical failures before a seventh and a sixth place from the four races held in Indonesia. 

JAMES Davison drove brilliantly to convert pole position into an Indy Lights victory at the Mid-Ohio course last weekend. It was the second career victory for the third-generation racer and came at the same track where he scored his first Lights victory in 2008.RYAN Briscoe's snakes-and-ladders chase for the Indy Racing League crown took a slight slide at Mid-Ohio when he could only manage third place behind Kiwi Scott Dixon, who claimed the IRL record with his 20th series victory. Briscoe was also beaten by Britain's Justin Wilson, as Dixon moves into the championship lead with a 20-point margin over him.GARTH Tander will lead the Holden Racing Team until at least the end of 2011 after re-signing with the factory Holden team for another two seasons. He has been part of the Walkinshaw Racing stable for five years, winning his V8 Supercar championship with the HSV Dealer Team before being transferred to Team Red alongside Mark Skaife and now Will Davison.JACOB Smith, riding a Honda CRF 450, was the overall winner of the 2009 Australasian Safari with Stephen Riley and John Doble taking the auto division in a Mitsubishi Pajero. Smith led from the third stage and eventually took the overall victory from his brother Todd after seven days of competition that ended in KalgoorlieSHAWN Jamieson became the first 2009 title winner in the Shannons Nationals series when he took the saloon car crown in round seven at Morgan Park in Queensland. Matt Kingsley is on track for the PorscheGT3 Cup Challenge after his fourth straight round win as Lee Castle swept the Australian Manufacturers Championship races with his Subaru WRX STi. The Shannons Nationals moves to Oran Park next month for the last major meeting at the Sydney track.DAVID Brabham took another second place for Acura in the American Le Mans Series race at Mid-Ohio last weekend. He lost his shot at first place when his co-driver Scott Sharp damaged the bodywork while lapping a backmarker. 

CHAD Reed hit another major milestone in his American motocross career when he scored his first outdoor race win on a 450-class bike last weekend in Pennsylvania. After a pair of third-place results, the indoor supercross star qualified fourth and completed a 1-1 sweep that also moving him to the top of the championship pointscore with his Makita-Rock Star Suzuki.A monster off-track shakeup has changed the operation of V8 Supercar racing. CEO Cameron Levich is out, chairman Tony Cochrane will run the day-to-day operations as caretaker CEO until the end of the year, Mark Skaife has joined the board as an independent and technical chief Campbell Little is working through a three-month notice period after tendering his resignation.A lacklustre 31st place was all Marcos Ambrose could take home from the high-speed Sprint Cup battle at Michigan International Raceway last weekend. Ambrose had a tail-happy car all weekend and only qualified 33rd after a string of recent top-10 efforts in his Toyota Camry, although he still holds 20th place after 15 races on this year's Nascar circuit.AUSTRALIAN co-drivers Dale Moscatt and Glenn MacNeal were close to the front at the Acropolis Rally in Greece, as world title leader Sebastian Loeb made a rare mistake and handed victory to Ford's Mikko Hirvonen after destroying his Citroen C4 in a massive crash. MacNeal took 10th place and third in Group N production cars with Japan's Toshi Arai in a Subaru Impreza as Moscatt guided Russian teenager Evgeny Novikov to four fastest stage times and a points place in a privately entered Citroen C4.DICK Johnson is now officially an icon. The retired touring car racer was one of 150 icons named by the Queensland government last week, joining a list which included everything from barbecues to sunshine after votes from 30,000 Queenslanders.JAMIE Whincup and Steven Johnson teamed up for a surprising off-track success on the Gold Coast last week. The two V8 Supercar stars, who are deadly rivals on the track, combined in a B-grade indoor cricket team _ the Tank Slappers _ to take their championships with a convincing win.A major innovation has come to the Australian Rally Championship with a top-10 shootout ahead of the next round in Adelaide on July 31-August 2. The Pedders No Bull Shootout will match the top-10 seeded drivers over a single special stage for additional title points a $1000 prize ahead of the two-day main event. 

The Gymkhana Two video was produced to market Ken Block’s first-ever Rally TeamWorks Collection for DC Shoes. Filmed at the Port of Los Angeles, Block hits the all-new course in a custo- tuned, high performance, and brand-new Subaru Impreza WRX STI, with a guest appearance from DC Team rider Rob Dyrdek.