Subaru’s original neo rally-car for the road is getting a major overhaul for 2015—you can read our other debut story here—receiving a stiffer structure and suspension, a new turbo engine, an optional automatic, and sheetmetal that will help increase the WRX’s perception as a distinct product line from the Impreza. That’s the good news. The bad news is that the five-door hatchback, which has accounted for half of WRX sales in the past, is being killed off.
It was a Hobson’s choice for Subaru’s product planners. They wanted a WRX that was less like the Impreza, but that drove up the costs in new sheetmetal and other retooling. So they were told they could proceed to work on a sedan or a hatchback, but not both. The American market, which last year took 79 percent of WRX production, voted for the sedan and Subaru made a business decision based on the belief that the four-door offers greater sales potential amongst its hatchback-hating car buyers. We don’t know how the second
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largest market, Australia, voted, or the third largest, Canada, but it doesn’t matter. The sedan got the nod and the five-door WRX goes off to hatchback heaven.
The new WRX, based on the Impreza introduced in 2012, hits dealerships next April at a price yet to be announced, but within spitting distance of the current car’s $26,790 base price, we’re told. WRX product-line manager Todd Hill says it’s unfair to call the new car simply a refresh since so much of it is being changed. For example, the only exterior sheetmetal that carries over from the Impreza are the front doors and roof panel.
A new “nose-cone architecture” places the hood behind an all-encompassing grille and bumper cap that pinches down the face into a busy amalgam of rectangles—one that recalls much-earlier WRXs. The new headlights are available as LEDs, while LED taillights are standard equipment.
Sassy Chassis
New structural braces in the A-pillar and rear floor are intended to bolster the body’s torsional and bending stiffness as well as the car’s score in the Insurance Institute’s new “small overlap” collision test. In the front-strut suspension, thicker outer tubes on the struts, stiffer bushings, an anti-roll bar thicker by 3 mm, and spring rates raised by 39 percent are among the changes intended to impart a greater sense of control.
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here are similar changes in the rear multilink suspension, plus a spring-rate increase of 62 percent. The car’s curb weight should rise about 60 pounds versus the previous WRX, we’re told, an amount that would be greater had Subaru not increased its use of high-strength steels.
As with the rest of Subaru’s lineup, the WRX moves to electric power steering for its 2 percent bump in fuel economy, a switch we’re promised has been done without affecting steering precision or feedback. Compared to the Impreza, the WRX’s ratio quickens from 15.0:1 to 14.5:1 and bushing stiffness is increased 200 percent for a less squishy feel.
Boosted Boxer Punch
The 2.0-liter FA-series turbo flat-four is derived from the Forester 2.0XT and uses Subaru’s own direction-injection system. The underslung turbo produces 15.9 psi for a peak output of 268 horsepower at 5600 rpm and 258 lb-ft from 2000 to 5200 rpm on
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recommended premium fuel. Changes for 2015 include stiffer valve springs and friction-reducing roller rocker arms in place of flat tappets. Now that the turbo is underneath the engine, we can understand how difficult it would be to package it into the BRZ sports coupe’s low-hanging engine bay.
The WRX gets an optional automatic because, according to Hill, “60 to 80 percent of sporty cars are sold with automatics.” (Among the competition he’s counting the VW GTI, Ford Focus ST, Honda Civic Si, and Mazdaspeed 3, although only the VW here currently offers an auto.) Even so, Subaru is expecting just 20 percent of WRX buyers to go for the Sport Lineartronic, which is Subaru
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ese for its continuously variable automatic transmission. Handed down from the Forester and selected over a from-scratch twin-clutch because it would have made the WRX prohibitively expensive, the CVT has three modes, including Intelligent, Sport, and Sport # (say, “sport sharp”). In Sport, the CVT can be operated via the steering-wheel paddles as a six-ratio automatic (or it automatically switches from continual variance into a six-ratio mode if you apply more than 30 percent throttle), and in Sport # it becomes an eight-speed box that can be shifted via the paddles. Launch control should put the car at 60 mph in 5.4 seconds, Subaru says, or about the same as it projected fro the current WRX. Back in 2011, we tested a five-speed-manual WRX sedan that ran to 60 in 5.0 seconds.
The six-speed manual is also from the Forester, but has shift throws shortened by 12 percent and more
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durable carbon synchros on first and second gear. The manual’s all-wheel-drive system is also different from the automatic’s. It uses a carryover viscous limited-slip center differential to distribute power to the rear axle, while the automatic gets Subaru’s VTD system, which distributes torque using a planetary gearset and electronically controlled clutch pack to limit slip.
What Subaru once called “brake vectoring” and now calls “torque vectoring” is a brake-based yaw system that strokes the brakes of the inside front wheel to help dampen understeer and rotate the car into corners. The multi-mode VDC stability-control system still has three modes, including normal, off, and traction, a track-ish mode that disables stability and traction control but retains the torque-vectoring function to better follow a driver’s intended path.
The new WRX responds to customer complaints with larger and thicker front brake discs, which grow from 11.6 inches to 12.4 inches, and a larger master cylinder. Subaru says fade resistance has improved by 140 percent on its own test circuit. The WRX also sounds better thanks to a new exhaust that eliminates one chamber in the silencer and shortens the internal tubing.
Road Test: 2013 Subaru BRZ Limited vs. Route Napoléon
Instrumented Test: 2014 Subaru Forester 2.5i Touring
Instrumented Test: 2013 Subaru XV Crosstrek 2.0i
On the inside, a premium Harman/Kardon stereo is available, along with navigation. The D-shaped steering wheel is the most noticeable change in an interior that is trimmed quite differently from the Impreza, from the dash accents and center stack to the deeply bolstered and fabric-upholstered sport seats. The seats now have a separate headrest, which is less attractive, but the backrest is 2.4 inches taller and the headrest tilt adjusts, so the new buckets are probably more comfortable over the long haul. Power seats come on the top-spec Limited.
A 3.5-inch color multifunction
instrument-panel display is standard and offers six info screens, and a total of seven airbags can go bang in an accident, including a new driver’s knee airbag.
In sum, the new WRX strives to be even less of a factory racing special than before and more a highly cultivated and premium road car for adults. Think Audi S4 minus many thousands of dollars, and you get what Subaru is after. Once we drive it, we’ll see if the hatchback’s ultimate sacrifice was worth it.