Legacy goes boom boom

So it happened, this morning i was driving to work on the m50 about 15 minutes in to a 25 minute journey, cruising on the motorway about 120km/h in overtaking lane, accelerated a little bit to merge in between traffic and take the off ramp and heard a boom, car started shuddering no power, pulled over as soon as i could and turned off the engine, lots of smoke pouring out of the bonnet scoop, i popped the bonnet expecting it to be only a burst/popped intercooler hose, saw flames on the bottom of the engine and smelled something burning, tried frantically to find something that i could douse the flames with but nothing in the car, eventually remembered i had my bucket of cleaning stuff in the boot from yesterday and the wash mitt was still wet from washing the car, used that to extinguish the flames. oil everywhere over the engine bay, so i tried to find a leak or a whole somewhere but couldnt, luckily it happened near Ciaran so i called him and he towed it back to his garage and had a look. he started it up and gave it a quick check sounded like a rod has snapped and probably made sh1t of the block.

So im not to up to date on the whole internals of the subaru engines, so worst case scenario, what could have happened and whats the best route of repair to go to get it back on the road and reliable to be able to take 400bhp? no point in rebuilding it to standard spec since its not standard power anymore.

Can anyone with some experience recommend me the best approach to this as its the first time i have had catastrophic failure like this in any car i have owned. There is another same year twin scroll for braking locally i can pillage for parts but i would only use 2nd hand parts if they are not likely to fail again if that makes sense. Want to make it stronger and more reliable and it can handle about 400bhp if i ever get near that power level, around 330 now so until i know the cause of the failure im not going to make any assumptions on what caused it. Let the rebuild times roll!

dan here's the opportunity to rebuild although probably not the way you wanted to do it,personally if it was me and i had the money to rebuild for reliability i'd go with something like a newage sti block which are seriously strong even standard and you could use a 2.1 stroker kit from lateral,if you give them a vat number it comes in at a decent price,thats what i would like to do if mine popped her clogs.Then you would have the perfect build for bigger power.Just my two cents mate

Sorry for your trouble Dan.

[quote author=GORDON GT SERIES II link=topic=32955.msg377468#msg377468 date=1327076383]
dan here's the opportunity to rebuild although probably not the way you wanted to do it,personally if it was me and i had the money to rebuild for reliability i'd go with something like a newage sti block which are seriously strong even standard and you could use a 2.1 stroker kit from lateral,if you give them a vat number it comes in at a decent price,thats what i would like to do if mine popped her clogs.Then you would have the perfect build for bigger power.Just my two cents mate
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ok so how much would an STI block cost and would that be a 2.0L block? im guessing i would need to change the gearbox if i went to 2.5 block. this be a noob question so, i get the sti block, the 2.1 stroker kit goes into the block and then you have yourself a new engine re-using some of the ancillaries on my old engine? that would be a full rebuild or any other major stuff needed?

who mapped your car?

sorry to hear Dan
on the bright side you can build it the way you want now

[quote author=Dagnut link=topic=32955.msg377474#msg377474 date=1327080052]
who mapped your car?
[/quote]

Joe Power be my mapper, i doubt its a mapping issue though

Sorry to hear that man

Sorry to hear dan.

Defo seems as if conrod exited the block.

dan if goin 2.1 your best off getting a CDB and builing a 2.1 stroker into that you will get a CDB anywer from 250 to 400 gbp

Sorry to hear Dan, I know the feeling only too well! I was in your position only a few weeks back!

Sorry to hear fella.

Sorry to hear Dan, i got a fire extinguisher in Aldi the other day for €10 and installed it in boot! You were blessed ya had something to put it out with!
Brothers Diff caught fire and he had a fire extinguisher in boot thankfully so got me thinking!
On the plus side you will have a nice fresh newly built engine soon to suit your car/mods and power level - onwards and upwards!

Sorry to hear Dan . as eli says onwards and upwards

yes fire extinguisher is on the list of must haves in the car from now on after that scare!

@scoobyIrl: what route of repair did you go down?

Lad in work got me thinking is it worth fixing, could get another legacy for a couple of grand more than that cost of a full rebuild. Not sure i could leave it standard for very long though! Sure ill wait to see what the diagnosis is

awful sorry to hear that dan,
have a 2 litre cdb built with 2.1 stroker kit and modified to suit...completely unused if your interested in going that route dan!!!
pm if you want any details..

pm sent Marko thanks

dan if you were to get a newage sti block you might be best possibly getting one second hand provided it was good as you would be rebuilding anyway and you are right the newage sti block is 2.0,the 2.0 block would have to be bored out for the stroker pistons but you would have a good torquey motor there with,so keeping the 2.0 block you would use all the ancillaries that are ok so yes you're right you would have a fresh built engine,that would be a great deal from marko if you had the cash all you do is put your heads on and drop it into your car best of both worlds fresh strokered engine without the hassle of building a block

Id bet that your conrod popped out to say hello just around the knock sensor.

Did you over rev it on track, easy to do on a down shift, and id suspect the legacy internals are bare basic similiar to UK wrx.. Its easy to over rev on a down shift and god knowswhat rpm you could bounce off, rods get weak from this or more likely you stretched a rod bolt or 2 and its just a matter of time then untill you have total failure..

No individual or tuner can advise you what to do Dan untill you decie what you want to do with the car in the long run, if you are happy at the power you were or say 400 max then the answer is easy in my mind. We can all advise ypu to spend big money on forged this or that, but fact is i dont think any of use know what the legacy is made of in terms of heads, valvetrain, cams, gerabox etc etc.. So for example you can go out and spend a fortune on a 600hp capable block and all your heads and cams can do is 400bhp, or all your box can take is 400.... and you aint going to change these things and therefore the 600bhp block is like a frigid hooker, waste of money..
No direspect to the Legacy, its a lovely car, but i have a feeling that 400hp is the comfort zone of it, it has plastic inlet manifold and i suspect tame internals, the car was not designed for same use as an Impreza after all, so id hate to see you being advised to spend needless money, when you cant make benefit of it without spending an extra 5k changing everything else to make it work.

[quote author=Altezza-Dan link=topic=32955.msg377517#msg377517 date=1327091802]

@scoobyIrl: what route of repair did you go down?

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My block was completely destroyed, and not much was salvageable, so I went like for like.
I managed to get a second hand engine from a 01 STI with low mileage, and got that fitted in Ali Burrows for a reasonable cost ...
I couldn't afford to go down the road of uprating the engine, since I had only just purchased the car 2 days prior.
The car is in completely standard form, so I'd like to put money into other areas before I touch the engine.

Best of luck in getting your own built, and be sure to shop around and do your research if your getting work done!
I've had some chancers build engines for me over the years!