It can be a pain in the butt. But enough people have done it now that it has gotten easier. It requires modifying shift linkages, pedal assemblies, mounts and cross members. There is a couple guy's that are selling kits. There is a forum for the SVX that has a huge amount of info on the cars. (www.subaru-svx.net). I had a member there do the conversion on my car. Him and a couple other members have open a small buisness now, working on the SVX. Here's a link to there site: http://allwelldrive.net/ . If your not planning on a huge increase in horse power I'd recommend going with a 5 speed out of a newer WRX. They are plently strong enough for the stock SVX power and they have a much better gear ratio.

 

Does Amanda still visit from time to time?? lol.

 

Haven't posted on here in quite awhile..but my other ride (only one now) is this

 

My whip is a 04 bmw 645ci. I only get 19 mpg but I love that car.

 

I drive and 01 Dodge Ram 4x4. Sucks gas but I love it to death.

 

I don't have anything worth physically looking at, but its a 2004 Lancer ES that I've been doing gas mileage mods on. So far I've got it up to 43 average MPG highway, up from the stock 28, subsequently added "up to" another 14hp at the same time. It's a fun gig, but some of the ideas out there can get pricey. Takes a while to pay for itself.

 

That's a healthy jump in MPG. I'm kind of curious as to how you did it.

 

Really, it didn't even take that much: replaced the air intake system all the way up to the header with a high-flow, low resistance K&N one and ran a custom "cold air" intake tube up to it. ditched the old exhaust pipes and manifold for wider ones that didn't choke the output (it's the same engine as the OZ Rally, but for some reason they constrict the airflow to it on the ES). Left the stock cat, as I couldn't find enough hard evidence regarding the high-flow ones and MPG (HP, sure, but no MPG). Bottom line here: more air = less gas needed (generally speaking).

Also, those Pulsar pulse plugs everyone's all up in arms about. Very noticeable improvement in mpg AND (perceived) hp from those, but they're crazy expensive. I wouldn't recommend them to anyone with serious expectations, as some models of cars get almost no improvement from them, and I imagine you could even get negative improvement in certain situations. On the other side of things, that "Tornado" thing you put inside your intake line did absolutly nothing for me. Might work for somebody else, but at $50+, I'd expect at LEAST 3+mpg out of the stupid thing, and that's being awfully generous.

Beyond that, just all the junk you learned in basic car maintenence; keep your tires properly inflated, in good condition, monitor your fluids, use the right viscosity oil for the weather, etc etc etc. . .

All that little 2mpg, 3 mpg, 5mpg stuff REALLY adds up.

Now I'm looking at the more serious stuff. Still need to replace the intake header. Once that's done. it's engine \ trans tuning time. That's a massive amount of reading and tiny, incremental programming mods. It's really tedious with the automatic transmission, cuz even a small miscalculation or guess can hose the thing. WIth a manual transmission, people are even developing specific driving techniques to increase MPGs, like speeding up to 70MPH, then coasting back down to 30, then repeating. This, of course only really applies to an empty highway, but I'm seeing some Prius owners pushing 100+ MPG like that.



Economodder.com is a cool site to check out for what other people are doing, and you can also google up months worth of projects to check out.