Now that I've owned my car for a week now, I've noticed few random things and wanted to confirm these were normal function/behavior of the car:

1) the windshield washer/nozzles point downwards? It seems that the fluid shoots down, stays on the blade and then the blades wipe them across? Are the nozzles not supposed to spray the windshield directly?

2) Is it just me or when I mash the throttle, full power really doesn't kick in till 4000 rpms and the car is somewhat laggy? I can drive comfortably before that but you don't really feel the torque upto 4000rpms... but from 4k-6k the engine pulls fast. Just doesn't seem very linear.

That is all for now!

 

1> The nozzles are on the wipers, they should spray strong. If they aren't, the hoses are pinched by the plastic cowling or the battery cover.

2> Hard to tell without knowing your frame of referance.

 

Reset the ECU, Unplug the Negative terminal push the brake 3 times plug back in, You should feel the full power.

when I just picked up my car same thing happened to me, I was wondering were the power was lol.

 

The wiper "jets" are not going to spray fluid on the windshield in the manner you typically see on other cars. It's just a few simple streams a little bit in front of the blades, and the blades spread it out over the glass. At first I thought it was a little strange, like it was blocked, but that's how it's supposed to be, and honestly, it works better than just about anything I've seen on a car. It's certainly an efficient use of the fluid. My old Mazda CX-7 used to spray fluid up and over the top of the car. I saw cars behind me get hit with it. And it would also spray fluid onto the entire windshield, but obviously the blades can't cover the entire glass, so there was always overspray.

As for the power issue, one of the strengths of this engine is it's very nice power curve from about 3500 RPMs to a little over 6000. It may feel a little laggy below that, but it gets to that range quickly. Installing a plenum spacer helps the low end a little bit, but really improves the mid and upper ends nicely. I love hitting 4000 RPMs.

BTW, it's a good thing the wiper system is so efficient, because the fluid reservoir is relatively small. I make sure to check it pretty regularly, especially in the winter.

 

One of the mods I would recommend along with the plenum spacer mentioned above would be swapping out your rear differential with a 3.5 or a 3.7. The shorter gears run through the power band quicker and you will get better low end acceleration.

The power from 3000-6000RPM's is really impressive as well.

 

You may want to make sure all the jets on the wipers are clean. A simple needle, pin or pick can clear them out, as well as be used to push them around to adjust their aim. There's about 5-6 on each wiper.

 

You didn't mention what you drove. Is it a 5AT RWD? 6MT RWD or AWD model?

 

good call, it's an awd model. i don't expect the same responsiveness as a manual. my main complaint was that the power just didn't seem very linear. i'll try resetting the ecu.

i figured that was the design of the wiper washer. efficiency is great but one thing i noticed this weekend when temps really dipped is that residual fluid remains on the blade and freezes thus blocking the nozzle. not a big deal but annoying.

 

the cam profile does seem to tend towards 3K or so before really getting torquey...

but as stated in other posts, shorter gears help acceleration (3.5 or 3.7 for AT, 3.9 or 4.0 for MT).

Also, Osiris has a couple tricks to help the low end - ETC update helped my off idle acceleration a bunch (everything below 3K - AT).

I guess the point is, there are fixes to help with the few less than stellar stock quirks - but on this car its expensive to do the things I've mentioned (or most other mods for that matter).

 

^Yep.

OP, just don't forget there's a lot more to changing FD ratio in an AWD

 

^^^ I overlooked that he was awd... FD might be a problem - has any awd done it?

 

^IDK about G35s
I know subie guys will change FD. But honestly I know more about the way a Subaru AWD system works than I do the G35. I would be lost there.