I would like to build a speedster with more modern components like All Wheel Drive, Suburu engine/tranny/suspension. I was thinking the easiest option would be to buy a donor Suburu and just replace the body with a speedster fiberglass body from kitman. Do people even do that or is this a bad idea?
If it's a good option, is there a Suburu model/year to get that requires little modification to make it fit the speedster body?
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Simply put, a Speedster body will not fit on any Subaru chassis - they are totally different.
There used to be a builder who bought used Subarus, removed all of the pertinent drive train components and fitted them to a custom-made chassis that he built and then fitted a speedster body to that, but he was/is a scam artist who took a lot of deposit money from people and then never produced a car for them. You certainly don't want to do business with him unless you want to lose $20K - $40K of your money.
Beck in Indiana has been building Subaru powered cars with either VW or Subaru transmissions and everyone seems to like them. Vintage Motorcars in Hawaiian Gardens, CA has been looking at producing Subaru-powered cars but I don't know how close to production they are.
That's about it.
Subarus, like all modern cars, use a unitized construction, which means the body and frame are one unit. There is no separate chassis that you can take out from under a Subaru with all the mechanical components attached. Besides, a Speedster is much smaller than any Subaru (or any new car other than a Miata), so even if there was a chassis you could use, it would be way too big.
There's a guy round my neck of the woods who cut a Subaru Outback down to the sill plates and grafted a VW Squareback body shell over that. It's absolutely awesome, a Frankenstein's monster of a vehicle, and he drives it regularly to Cars & Coffee and beyond.
The first thing you notice about the car (other than the pure awesomeness of it) is that he scabbed about nine inches of additional front fender length into the car. The reason for this is that, the Type 3 VW's wheelbase and chassis arrangement in no way conforms to the Outback's.
Subaru hangs their engines out in front of the front wheels, in order to make room for those juicy, juicy all wheel drive transaxles they install just behind them. Tech note: This is exactly the opposite arrangement as in a Squareback VW.
Or a Porsche 356.
Anyway, looking his car over carefully, you'd notice more and more ingenious kludges, patches and engineering marvels, most of which he seems to have accomplished with a 110 a/c welding machine with flux core wire. It is, as I said, a work of astounding beauty.
I will root around my archives in search of a photo. Meantime, I hope this helps.
How do you make a Subaru front engine work with the motor in the rear .?
I can see using the engine and a reverse gearbox , but how do you power the front diff ?
at one time they’re were all wheel drive rally cross VW bugs that ran in Sweden , I never did figure out how they got power to the front diff.
I think you would need some kind of transfer case.
The entire engine/trans and front half-shafts are moved to the rear when doing a MID-ENGINE Subaru into 356 Speedster or coupe. So you delete the back seat area, and the engine is literally behind the two seats(same as a 550 Spyder) with the transmission behind the engine.
The 4wd needs to be changed to 2WD. The rear driveshaft and differential is eliminated, and the "transfer case" is integral to the Subaru transmission. The tailshaft of the Subaru transmission gets shortened a few inches and some welding is required internally(or buy bespoke parts from Subarugears.com).
This setup is the same concept that GM used with the Fiero. They took the entire FWD front clip from the X-body(Citation) and put it behind the seats.
The only way to get a rear engine 4WD for me would be the Vanagon Synchro setup. However, you're stuck with a 4 speed. Not a great setup for a sports car, the front drive is dashboard lockable. But the "transfer case" is part of the transmission(I think) and the front differential is pretty small. That last shouldn't be a problem as not much torque would be required in the front with the rear weight bias.
If you aren't good with Vanagon you might try a Porsche 911 running gear, maybe an aircooled Carrera 4. The problem is the track and the wheelbase of the 356 are both narrower and shorter. That will be spendy I'm sure.
Regarding the modern accoutrements - anything is possible (theoretically), but not in practice, unless you have a limitless budget. Like "Jeff Bezos limitless".
@Ace posted:is there a Suburu model/year to get that requires little modification to make it fit the speedster body?
I'm the "tear off the Band-Aid quick" guy.
Nope.
There is no modern car that a speedster body just drapes over. Its unique and beautiful shape creates all sorts of issues when you try to adapt to a different layout. Also, it's tiny in relation to a modern car. Everybody starts out in this hobby thinking there has to be a way, but there isn't.
There just is not.
Well, you can bastardize a Boxster if you care to.
We have all seen how that turned out.
I kinda like the Boxster version. It is a bit on the large side though.
@edsnova posted:I kinda like the Boxster version. It is a bit on the large side though.
The Boxster version is OK-ish. If you throw back two fingers of Scotch and squint very hard.
But then you glance at an unmolested Boxster (stone cold sober) and think, "ooooo, that one's nice".
In the end you can take a large pile of money, turn it into a tiny pile of money, and have something that, if you think of it charitably, "has a great personality".
Stan is not wrong. ..
Thinking this over a bit, sipping a bebridge, I believe that one could, theoretically, if one were extremely ambitious and technically skilled, install a Subaru WRX drivetrain into a 356 replica.
Consider the Subaru Gears 5-speed transaxle.
This is, far as I know, the "flipped ring gear" setup we need to use that box in our cars. What if?
What if those reversed boxes could be had with their AWD systems still extant?
OK now we're cookin' right? Now alls you have to do is engineer a front driven suspension and graft it onto your tube chassis, rig up the correct driveshaft, and plug in the drivetrain into the back of your speedster as normal. (And of course build a functional cooling system in the scant remaining space upfront).
Easy and also peasy! Get all that done and...
BLAMMO: instant street stardom! A turbo'd all wheel drive 356!
But wait! Seems like such a special machine should have some special styling cues, should it not? Something to signify to all who gaze upon it that this is no ordinary 356 Speedster.
And—what luck!—such a body kit already exists!
What’s the big deal?
I bet Steve Lawing has already promised three or four AWD roadsters by now……. 🤣
Or to save time and money, buy an AWD 911 and badge it 1600 Super. Cut a horseshoe shape out of 1/4 in. aluminum stock, paint it cartoon magnet red, and take it with you to Cars and Coffee.
@Gordon Nichols posted:What’s the big deal?
I bet Steve Lawing has already promised three or four AWD roadsters by now……. 🤣
I remember when SL was quacking about doing ABS on his cars. I don't think that ever came to fruition, just like a lot of "promised" things by that guy.
ABS - That's not "Additional Bull $#!+", which the buyers got by default, but "Anti-lock Braking System".
Someone on here, @Jethro? has ABS. In fact, I think several SAS cars had ABS. IIRC, that Moss green SAS roadster with the turbo WRX engine that came to Carlisle once had ABS, too (and he needed all the braking he could muster).
SL used all Subaru parts for the braking system as well as the original dash gauges and ECU + other computers so they would all be expecting the ABS sensors to be there so as to NOT throw error codes on the OBD through the CAN bus.
And remember, Jethro's car is the only one with a powered convertible top.
I wonder if @Alan Merklin might do that on his current build? That would be super trick (and add another month to the build, for sure).
After reading this article, it made me wonder if a speedster wide body could fit on an old 2000 audi tt chassis? Probably not close enough to make it practical.
@Gordon Nichols posted:Vintage Motorcars in Hawaiian Gardens, CA has been looking at producing Subaru-powered cars but I don't know how close to production they are.
They for sure are building them, I'm hoping mine is completed soon. There are at least 3 in process right now that I know of because I've been trying to get pics of mine for a while. Engine from Outfront and I've got pics of it and was able to have components fitted to my specs (within reason of course)
@Ace posted:After reading this article, it made me wonder if a speedster wide body could fit on an old 2000 audi tt chassis? Probably not close enough to make it practical.
A 2000 Audi TT had a 95.6" wheelbase. The 356A had a 82.7" wheelbase. That's almost 13" shorter. The 356 has a lot of real-estate behind the rear axle, the TT does not. It's not just that they are dimensionally incompatible, they're incompatible in how they carry their weight.
If you'd like a "modern 356-look" car, I'd absolutely recommend a TT coupe, as long as you are aware that the dynamics will be very, very different. If you want a 356 coupe, it won't be on a Audi TT chassis.
@Ace posted:After reading this article, it made me wonder if a speedster wide body could fit on an old 2000 audi tt chassis? Probably not close enough to make it practical.
We owned an early convertible and it was ok. Just ok heavy front end
