Subaru chips in with power

Evening Chronicle (Newcastle, England), April 7, 2006

If your Ferrari-style Subaru Impreza is a little too slow, fear not ( help is at hand.

The UK importer has introduced a new `chip and pin' performance pack that chips the engine management system so that you will be pinned to the back of your seat when accelerating.

The Prodrive-developed Performance Packs are available for the latest Impreza 2.5 WRX and STI models plus the Forester 2.5 XT manual.

The Impreza WRX gets an additional 74lb/ft of pulling power from the performance pack.

The WRX and Forester 2.5 XT manual produce 270bhp and 260bhp, which are increases of 40bhp and 30bhp respectively.

A performance pack for the automatic Forester 2.5 XT will be available soon.

The kits are available from Subaru dealers at pounds 1,700 including fitting. They do not affect the warranty and meet UK regulations for noise and emissions.

Figures for the Impreza 2.5 WRX STI with the performance pack show power increasing to 316bhp at 6,000rpm instead of 5,600rpm and torque now at 332lb/ft at 3,700 rpm instead of 289lb/ft at 4,000rpm.

This is sufficient for the 0-60mph time to drop from five to 4.8 seconds.