Subaru STI beats Honda Civic in more ways than one!

They now have an STI with a "discreet" spoiler. I recommend silver over bright colors as the constabulary takes less notice..

at less than 2700 punds it's 500 lbs lighter. The tires being equal I think the roadholding will be a tad better on the civic because there is less weight to glue to the pavement. If the stuff is seriously twisty the engine is completely out of the equation. You should've seen how Lotus Elise was blasting thru the local seriously twisty stuff. I'm talking 25-40 mph corners. RX-7 that tried to chase the thing was waaaaaaay slower. I don't know if RX-7 had Advans or something worse, but it was very obvious it was no match to the much lighter car. I'm a firm believer in the weight reduction measures now.

Do they (the STI) only cost $33K down there in the States? I could swear they were up in the $70K range up here in Canada, last time I looked. The WRX's might've been in the $33K range. These days there's not much of a difference between the Canadian and American buck.

Yousuf Khan

Only $33k US? That's a lot of money! But since Evo MR can be had for around 34-35k Subaru would be stupid to ask any more for STI. That's too much for me, but at $28k Evo RS is attractive: let's see:

$23k WRX plus $1700-$2200 for the front Brembo tourismo front plus $1000 for a set of 4 Advan Neova to replace Crapenza 92 plus $2000-3000 to replace the crappy tranny in WRX with the STi 6sp unit (if a transmission shop lucky to find a used/rebuilt one).

Evo makes much more sense to me from the $$$ perspective. Oh, I'd also have to replace the grandma suspension with the proper unit. More dough to dump into the car. Plus you'd void the warranty. I think there is no contest.

Do Canadian authorities prohibit importing US cars into the country?

As a former Lotus owner, I think the magic is in the low center of gravity. The Europa I had was almost exactly a meter tall (I could bend at the waist and lie on the roof). The fiberglass body couldn't have weighed 200 lbs total - most of that was less than 2 feet from the ground - and the occupants were seated nearly supine. I figure the center of gravity, occupied, was about 20 inches from the road.

Anthony Colin Bruce Chapman was a fanatic about handling - he designed the independent rear suspension with some pretty shocking camber. It looked weird, but that car cornered like a demon.

Mike

I was told by my buddy with the STI that it only cost him C$50k, so it's much closer to the U$33k about 3 years ago. However, these days with the strength of the Canadian buck, the U$33K cost should be closer to C$36k now. However, I don't think the cost has come down much even as the exchange rates have readjusted. These days the Canadian dollar is 90% of the US dollar.

As for importing cars from the US to Canada, there's a few regulatory differences. Canadian cars still have the 5mph bumper that US cars got rid of about 10 years ago; US cars have the 2.5mph bumpers now. This extra regulatory requirement has prevented certain cars from being brought in, such as the Pontiac GTO, and the Mitsubishi EVO. And also there has been (starting from 15 years ago) a requirement for Canadian cars to have daylight running lights (the headlights are on as soon as you turn the car on). There might be others, but I can't think of them right now.

Yousuf Khan

"YKhan" wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@g10g2000cwb.googlegroups.com:

Not to mention Kilometers vs. Miles.