Update 6

It's been a little while. Progress has been steady but slow. We had a cold spell and then a bunch of snow so that killed my motivation to get out into the garage. Anything less than 35 degrees and I just don't feel like holding cold tools in my hand. I finally got out there again and got some progress done and ran into a few little road blocks.

This is the prototype of the 818c. I'm going with red and this was the only picture I could find of a red one.

 I took engine and transmission out of the subframe and separated the transmission.

Transmission

Clutch is in good shape.

Flywheel has some minor cracks. That will get resurfaced.

Putting the engine on the stand.

The engine's home for the next little while.

Today I went out and did a cylinder leak down test on the engine. The piston rings seem to be sealing really well and it had about 30% leakage out the valves. That's not to bad but I'll be rebuilding the heads and putting in new valves and head gaskets anyway. The short block shouldn't need any work though but I'll find out more when I take the heads off.
I also started to put the engine on a diet and take off the unnecessary parts. The 818 won't have power steering or air conditioning so those parts were removed. It really uncluttered the engine, (which makes me want to take a minute and because this is my blog I can do what I want) I love Subaru. I love the AWD and I love the boxer engines. I love the engineering. These vehicles are the most friendly to work on. My favorite. I can't say it enough. I've owned a number of them over the years and they just seem to draw me in. When Factory Five came out with the 818 I was really really excited! It was an amazing design with a great powertrain! My wife gets tired of my always talking about it and how excited I am to get the kit and start building this project. But it's true. I eat it, I breath it, I dream it and I'm actually doing it.

Update 5

I pulled the engine out. I took the whole assembly as one piece and will take the individual parts off later. I lowered the engine down from underneath with jacks but I still needed it get it out from the engine bay. So after thinking about it for a while I finally found the answer.....  

 Just lift up the car. I had my wife pull it out while I lifted it up. I was really impressed with myself and thought that she would be wooed. She wasn't though, claiming that the car is just an empty shell. The kids thought that I was super man though.

Engine taken out.

Fuel tank and evaporative canister. 

Bare naked underneath. Just the way I like it.

Had my little helper with me. She was proud that she got as dirty as Daddy.

I got the donor done and pushed it back into the driveway. That was a pretty fun experience because it had no wheels or anyway to roll. I put it on a few jacks and got it out of my garage most of the way. Then I just hooked it up to the Escalade and pulled it across the gravel. I took all the valuable parts off of it and posted an add on Facebook for a free junk vehicle. I had about 12 people that said they wanted it and the next day it was gone. 

Ok so maybe the shell didn't weigh that much.

Update 4

I could stare at this amazing machine all day! Even better will be when I have my own assembled and complete sitting in my garage. 

I'm starting to see a light at the end of the tunnel with this donor car. I have the interior completely done. It's stripped down to just a shell.

I have all the wiring out and sitting in a big tote. 

And today I got all the rear drive train components out and laying on the ground. Still waiting to be disassembled though.

I also took of the exhaust and have it laying around.

In the factory the total time to make one of these cars is about 18 hours from start to finish. That includes paint and everything. I don't think I could beat that time taking it apart. Although, in all fairness I am being overly thorough, taking time to mark each connector and wire. Saving each set of bolts, nuts and screws and putting them in bags and labeling them. Having never assembled an 818 before I don't want to throw something out that I should have saved. 

Tonight I went an got an engine stand in preparation for the engine coming out. I should be all done up with the donor by next week. I'll then organize all the parts into totes and boxes and put them on the shelf for storage until I actually order the kit. It could be up to a year before I even order the kit. We will see. Until then, I'm keeping my eye on the prize.

Update 3

Today I got to the main part of the wiring today. I took out the rest of the interior items in the vehicle and stripped it down to almost nothing. Our cat hasn't stopped laying on the old carpet that I took out so I may save that. Otherwise everything went down to the trash. We have a community dumpster at the end of our street and the neighbors must think I'm running a chop shop because I've been throwing away obsolete car parts in the for days now.

Imagine that you boiled 40 pounds of spaghetti with each piece being 100 feet long. After the spaghetti is done cooking try to untangle it all. Keep in mind that if you get a piece wrong it could be the difference of the vehicle working or not. The engine starting or not. This still has been the best part of the project so far. I've gone through an entire roll of duct tape labeling connectors. I have no idea where all these computers and modules will be mounted on the 818 but all this wiring will go back into it. I'll post more pictures when I get it all out of the vehicle. Probably another day then I will be ready to do the heavy stuff. The engine, transmission, drive axles etc.

Update 2

I finally got out to the garage this week to get to work. A lot of the reason I haven't started yet (besides a crazy work schedule) is because I didn't really know what I wanted to do with the engine. When I bought the car I knew that it had a tick in the engine and would need some work. I wasn't sure if I wanted to do the repair while the engine was in the donor car or if I wanted to remove it and all the parts I needed and do a fresh rebuild (much more extensive) out of the vehicle. So I finally decided that I would do a complete rebuild and test it out when I put it in the 818. So with that I started to tear the donor car apart. This has been a lot of fun. I get to reverse everything they did at the factory in 2007. Every nut and bolt. Every wire. So here are the pictures.

Before

After

Before

After

This was one afternoon of work. Pictures can't describe how tedious this process actually is. I'll be working on it more this week and will keep everything updated.

On a side note Factory Five just released a new photo gallery of the 818 that they took to SEMA. It really shows what it will look like with the hard top on and the top off in convertible mode. This should give a much better idea of my vision with this project. It takes a lot of vision to imagine that the donor vehicle pictured above will ever look like the beautiful piece of art as pictured below.

And there it is. I really can't wait. Thanks for looking!

Update 1

These last few weeks have been really slow. First of all this is my busiest season of work where I do about 75 percent of my job in a quick 3 month period. This requires extensive travel so I haven't been home much at all. Secondly, Aubrey had been begging me to make her a tree house so I finally got that started. I knew that it would be getting cold soon and I wanted the kids to be able to enjoy it while they could this year already. So that took a long time. Aubrey was such an amazing helper! She stayed out there with me every day from start to finish. I think though out the whole project she only left my side for a total of two hours. I'm excited for the memories that will be made in their new playhouse.

So after finally getting that project mostly done. (It still needs a few things.) I finally got out to the garage for a little while. However, as soon as I started working I had two littles next to my side going through my stuff. Well what Dad wouldn't take advantage of a good opportunity to teach his kids how to stare directly at the sun? 

Finally after they got bored and their necks hurt they went inside. I got in about 3 hours of work. 

I finished taking off all the old on the wrecked car. That part wasn't too difficult. I did have to make a choice about the core support though. It was pretty bent up and the core support is what lines up the whole front end to make sure it all comes together when the hood is closed. So I cut out the old one and took it from the other vehicle. Now the entire front end is missing. It really shows a good shot of the engine. That is my favorite part about the Subaru vehicles. That beautiful boxer engine. Mmm

I cut out the core support from the donor vehicle and needed a welder to put it in the rebuild car. So that delayed me again. It was nice to get out though and make some progress. I also had to order a new radiator. One vehicle is a manual transmission and the other is an automatic. So one of the factory radiators has a built in transmission cooler and the other doesn't. So that's where I am until next week at least.

Thanks for reading!

Update 0

Years ago I started the blog WadeProject as a place to publish about projects and other interests I was pursuing. Sadly enough I haven't posted on it since 2011 because I haven't been doing projects.

I am happy to announce that I and starting to fulfill a lifelong dream to build a kit car. I've thought about restoring a classic and that doesn't really fit my skill set or interests. In my heart I'm a builder and a fabricator.

I choose the Factory Five 818c for a few reasons. #1 is my love affair with Subaru. I have owned many different makes and models over the years but Subaru has always been my secret lover. I love the simplicity of the boxer engines. I love the design and how easy they are to work on (to me at least) So in 2013 when Factory Five announced that they were coming out with a kit that used a Subaru donor vehicle it caught my attention. The first models introduced were a race version the 818r and a street version the 818s. The race version didn't interest me because it wasn't meant to be for the street. It was the original 818s that I fell in love with. It was a topless sports car. Amazing curves and design. A mid engine RWD sports car with a Subaru drive train. At the time I didn't have the resources to start such a project. This turned out to be a good thing because in August 2015 Factory Five released the 818c. A removable hard top coupe. I had found my soul mate. It was always meant to be. I immediately started looking for a donor vehicle. It had to be a manual transmission and fall into a somewhat limited selection of models and model years. Fate had a plan for me. I found a 2007 Subaru Impreza for sale in my price range 4 miles down the road from me. I snatched it up and started the plans to use it as a donor. About 2 days later I got an email notification from eBay about a vehicle I had been watching that was going to end soon. It had 15 minutes left. I opened the email and it was the same year, make, model, trim, and even color of the Subaru that I had just bought. Identical twins.

 This Subaru had been wrecked slightly in the front end. At first I dismissed it and deleted the email thinking that I already had my donor. Then the wheels started turning and I thought about how I didn't need the body panels from my donor and the parts could all be used to resurrect this identical twin. One vehicle could use its organ not just to build one car but to save the life of another! I quickly went back to eBay and put in a bid. I was the highest bidder at a price that I was very happy with. 4 minutes left on the bid and I couldn't watch. I turned my phone off and went to bed. The next morning when I turned my phone on I had a notification that I was the winning bidder. Once again fate had a hand in the events that took place. It took a few weeks but finally here we are. The twins are in the garage and this dream is starting to become a reality.

The build will have 3 phases to it.

Phase 1: Resurrect car A.

Phase 2: Harvest needed parts from car B.

Phase 3: Build the 818c

I'm in no hurry and this is my hobby so I'll take as long as I want doing it but if you want to follow me along while I make this dream come true just stay posted here at WadeProject.blogspot.com

Enjoy!