yeec

Sold my HgAg T last week, in it's place is a new searing yellow Rapid T with 18" wheels, premium sound and tinted windows Wow, it receives heaps of attention, the yellow is so bright ! I haven't seen many in Rapid on the roads, which is good, I don't want the colour to be as common as blueprint :lol: First impresssions on my mkii vs the mki I had before ... the steering is definitely lighter in the mkii which is great at low supermarket carpark speeds but feels more vague at higher speeds imho. The accelerator feels different too, it seems to be more smooth and requires less pressure than on the mki. All up, I'm extremely happy and impressed. My previous 2004 T gave me zero problems whatsoever, lets hope my new one also stays problem free !

Cost was very similiar to mine except I got 1 year/25000km petrol included but no tires.

Can't beat a packaged finance lease, brand new XR6T auto sedan $40K inclusive of on-roads, insurance, servicing, 12 months/25000km petrol.

Go the Rapid, I got mine two days ago, it definitely gets lots of attention !! (I had an HgAg before and could never find my car in carparks, don't have that problem now haha !)

I was in the same boat as you, my 12 month lease on my 2004 T was about to end and 'cause I like variety, I was also considering the GT or 3.0RB. The build quality, smoothness and safety features of the Subaru's really impressed me although the power is far short of the T. I choose another T in the end as the massive fleet discount on the Ford (vs the stuff all discount on the Subaru's) meant it would of cost me $5000 gross extra per year to get into the Subies.

Fleet pricing varies depending on the fleet company. The fleet company my company uses is entititled to approx $11000 discount.

Oh yes you will 'cause I did. My total after tax cost for my new 2004 XR6T auto sedan was just a fraction over $40500 on a 12-month fully maintained finance lease. Considering that this included on-roads, insurance, servicing and 25000km of petrol, it made the outright cost of the car to be approx just over $36000. (And when I sold it, there's no GST to pay either).

You don't necessarily have to go thru a dealer, some leasing companies (ie Macquarie) allow you to lease a car bought privately, thereby saving you some money if you aren't able to purchase a new one.

I've owned both, I sold my modified MY99 WRX for the XR6T because I wanted an effortless cruiser with loads of torque and easy driveability. The Rex was loads of fun, brilliant around corners, in the wet, in the dirt etc etc but demanded more concentration and involvement than suited my lifestyle so I bought the T. In fact I just sold my last T a few days ago, picking up a new mkii on Fri. I wish I could have two cars though, my T for a daily driver, and something like a STi or Evo for weekend fun.

Whats the size of your car allowance ??? I leased my brand new XR6T auto sedan with premium sound for $20000 gross per annum based on 15,000km annually. Or purchasing outright with a fleet discount (dont't know if you can get that), it would only cost approx $38000 inclusive of on-roads (or even less via a finance lease like I did last year).

Here's a Subaru Brumby that's had a STI transplant - 200kw ATW, Brembos, AWD. It has the performance, brakes and the suspension ! Fully compliant with an engineering and emissions report. http://img78.photobucket.com/albums/v347/lewlew/

Totally agree, my previous car, a rex (a modified MY99) was hard to get off the line cleanly, a perfect launch was pretty hard to achieve, but in the auto T, just put your left foot on the brake, dial up some revs, and let her rip !! A perfect launch nearly every time ! However, in corners, in the wet, on dirt, on gravel, my Rex (even unmodified) would of left the T way behind in my experience of owning both cars.

My 12 month novated finance lease thru Custom Fleet costs me : $25171 gross thru my package ($13341 nett) $27287 residual GST inclusive total cost = 13341 + 27287 = $40628 inclusive of on-roads, rego, servicing, insurance and 12 months/25000km petrol. For me, it was the easiest and cheapest way to own a brand new auto T sedan. The total cost ($40628) inclusive of everything is cheaper than what practically anyone could negotiate on a brand new T sedan privately. Go a finance lease if you can, no upfront costs as the lease payments come out of your pay and the residual is only payable at the end of the lease.

I lease my T but it's a novated finance lease thru my employer. I just pay the lease costs thru my remuneration package and payout the residual at the end of the 12 months and that's it. I think that only those that lease privately would need to take depreciation into account ???

Sedan or ute ? Fleet discount, staff discount ???? If you are a private buyer with no access to employee or fleet discounts, maybe you'd like to say where you got it from so that other's can also get a good deal and give your dealer some referred business ?

3M make such a product, see http://www.mmm.com/US/auto_marine_aero/aut...ngfast_no16.pdf. I've heard you can get it here in Australia but don't know of any distributors ...

Andrew, what size sway bars did you get and how much are they ??? I use to have a Rex too with the Whiteline sways bars, strut brace, ALK and APS CS kit which totally transformed the car. I know that Whiteline have a XR6T project car (review is at http://www.whiteline.com.au/docs/articles/AS_XR6T.pdf) but I didn't think the sway bars were released yet ????

Bra's are for t*ts, not for cars !!! I think they're friggin ugly things ... I mean, you've got your pride and joy, all washed, polished and sparkly ... then you want to cover the front of it with an ugly bra ???? I always try to make sure that there's plenty of distance between myself and the car ahead of me to minimise stones and gravel etc being thrown up. Slight chips etc are inevitable but if they annoy you, once every year just get one of those mobile paint and dent repairers to fix it up at a fraction of the cost of a paint shop / panel beaters.

Mine initally did that too occassionally ... usually when I'm on the freeway travelling at 100kmh having had the cruise control on for a while then when I wanted to go for a brief squirt it would 'cough', lose power, reverberate etc. By changing down briefly to 3rd seemed to fix the problem. It only occurred within the first 1500km of having had the car ... I put it down to the fact that the car hadn't yet 'settled' in and some internal mechanicals were still a little tight .... have now done over 9000km and problem hasn't re-occurred.

WTF ?? I must have been extremely lucky ... I ordered my '04 T with premium sound on a Tue and picked it up 3 days later on the Sat !! Are people ordering them with things like the new luxury pack, premium brakes, adjustable pedals etc etc in combinations that mean that they aren't in stock so have to wait for them to be especially built ??

Jan '04 XR6T auto with prestige paint, premium sound, mats and spats. Did a 12-month finance lease thru my package. $12862 payable over 12 months, then a residual of $26136 ($38998 total), fully inclusive of on-roads, 25000km of petrol, insurance and maintanence.

Zeke - Fantastic and very detailed reply !! Many thanx ... I will have a go at that during the weekend, the minor reverberation and slight rattle on rough roads annoy me !!!! My old Rex (the '99 model) had rattles all over the place due to the rock-hard suspension and the castor kit so never worried about it but the T is soooo quiet and refined so want to get rid of every little noise !

Zeke - could you give me a hand, how do I get it off ??? Thanx !!!

Yeah, I've got a slight rattle from the passenger side door. Sounds like maybe the speaker is a bit loose as the bass sort of reverberates. I just want to get in there with a scrwedriver .... don't want to take time off work to drop it off at the dealers etc etc when I might be able to do it myself ... is it easy to take off yourself or is it quite fiddly ????

It's funny how a colour looks ok on one car but not on another. Envi on the XR6T, XR8 looks shocking but seems to look ok on the base XT.