Another lame AP Stage one review

For those on the fence about a purchase here are my quick thoughts.......

I had bad stutter. Terrible stutter and this pretty much eliminated it.

The V2 I bought identified my outback XT as a Legacy GT so I went with it and installed the 91 octane map. The whole process takes less than ten minutes and was so easy my wife could have done it.

The car is definately quicker, but not as much as I hoped for. It feels qucikest when stomping on it in first gear from a stop. It still has some turbo lag on a downshift when you floor it but better than it had been.

I don't have a full tank through it yet but I expect my milage to go WAYYYYYYY up. I travel a flat 8 mile stretch on the way to work every day. My lousy stutter reflash map from SOA was reading 22 to 25 mpg most of the time on that stretch tops. The original stock map read high 20's on that stretch, and it now reads above 30 mpg for that whole stretch of road and better in most cases around town. I hope to get back to the 27 mpg tanks I was getting before the SOA SOA reflash map.

I was only averaging 21 mpg on tanks after the reflash and my MPG meter for this tank was 22.2 or so at half a tank. Then I flashed stage 1 and have been flooring it around town to test it out and the milage on this tank has been going UP anyway. A couple gallons left in the tank but it has climbed from 22 to over 24 in about 1/3 of a tank. I am guessing my milage should improve about 20% from what I had been getting on the worthless Subaru stutter "fix".

I am a little disappointed in the added power of stage one, and even more dissapointed that I had to pay $700 to get the car to run the way it should have from the factory, but am happy the way it runs now and would do it again if I had to.

^ That I forgot

OP: well you know what to do then.....Stage II is just a matter of getting the cats out of your downpipe.....no more money.....

-Or-

You could also pick up a used HFC downpipe for around 300.

^ That I forgot

 

OP: well you know what to do then.....Stage II is just a matter of getting the cats out of your downpipe.....no more money.....

Anyone make just a downpipe with a high flow cat ? Even if it is not as good I am kind of trying to not pollute too much. Call me a green weenie. And I hate the raw exhaust "test pipe" smell.

Plus I still want to be able to unmarry with the AP and use my warranty if necessary so a high flow cat downpipe that looks like stock would be peachy. But I am guessing that does not exist.

 

I don't have a full tank through it yet but I expect my milage to go WAYYYYYYY up.

Low expectations is what drives most overachievements.

I spent about 2 weeks with Stage 1 with my previous LGT, but then Stage II came, and of course I wanted more after about 6 months.....

It's wierd how that works.

Anyone make just a downpipe with a high flow cat ? Even if it is not as good I am kind of trying to not pollute too much. Call me a green weenie. And I hate the raw exhaust "test pipe" smell.

 

Plus I still want to be able to unmarry with the AP and use my warranty if necessary so a high flow cat downpipe that looks like stock would be peachy. But I am guessing that does not exist.

I am sure there is some way you can put a high flow cat in your stock downpipe. (Probably not worth the time and energy to do that though)

Look for a used MR catted DP. They are relatively cheap and supposedly the fitment is very good.

Low expectations is what drives most overachievements.

I don't think I quite follow the joke, but the reason I expect such a milage improvement is that I was getting 26-27 per tank when I got the car and the reflash brought it down to about 21, same driving style. If I get it back to where it was originally thats a 30% increase in MPG.

In order to pull this tank up to where it is from where it was, its has to be getting about 26-27 now and I have been stomping on it.

Look for a used MR catted DP. They are relatively cheap and supposedly the fitment is very good.

Where would I look for one? Would it have been made just for legacy or for STi's and such?

And new is fine if they still make them, I don't mind spending a few bucks if it is compatible with a stage 2 flash.

^ 05+ Legacy GT specific, check out the Marketplace where members sell things....

do a search for downpipe inside the member's classified thread....

Look for a used MR catted DP. They are relatively cheap and supposedly the fitment is very good.

Since when did MR make a catted DP?

I thought they did? For some reason, I thought they made a HFC dp like Cobb.

Ok I just checked the website. They make the HFC seperate. Thats why I was thinking that. My fault.....

also, remember, you are running the OTS cobb stg 1 91 oct map = LAME. i bet if you bumped it up even to 93 oct map it'd be better and DEFINITELY better with any protuned or etuned map from PDX or the like!

I flashed my 08 STI to the CA 91 oct map and though it was more oomph, it wasn't a ton. then I flashed to 93 oct, just OTS Cobb maps and WOW! huge difference. I have Jarrad from PDX tuning the car this Sunday and I'd guess I'll be even happier... still need to clean up the 2nd gear stutter...

My gas mileage sucked at stage 1 btw, worse than stock.

yeaaaa same here.

u get more power across the whole powerband. but if you managed to get better mileage more power to you. maybe you're a lot more careful than i was:lol:

My Stage 1 mpg went up. Stomping on the gas ? Of course it is going to drop what do you expect.

To the OP: your mileage dropped because of the fun factor, not because of some calibration issues. Having the same driving style as before = more fuel burnt because of whatever calibrations went on - boost comes in earlier, is higher, stays longer, throttle mapping changed slightly etc.

SO if you want to burn less fuel you have to re-learn how to drive.

I don't think I quite follow the joke, but the reason I expect such a milage improvement is that I was getting 26-27 per tank when I got the car and the reflash brought it down to about 21, same driving style. If I get it back to where it was originally thats a 30% increase in MPG.

 

In order to pull this tank up to where it is from where it was, its has to be getting about 26-27 now and I have been stomping on it.

And NO, if you bring the fuel economy UP to where it was before the flash is actually a NET LOSS of zero mpg (or 0% fuel economy drop). Everything is relative to what the car was able to do when you took it home from the dealer (caveat: as the engine wears out, for a while - by mid teens and lasting a few tens of thousands of miles, your engine would actually run more economically - in the absence of other tuning)

I was never overly impressed with Stg. 1.....

Now when I went Stage 2... it was