Hi, all;

It's an honor to be a member of the club! Even though, sadly, I have yet to find a 360 to call my own. I lost out on the bid for the sweet, black 360 sedan on eBay a few months ago and it's haunted me ever since. I've been looking for a 4WD Justy for quite a while, too, to add to our Subaru herd. We have a 1997 Outback that we bought new and it now has 335,000 miles on it and runs absolutely like new (no lie!). And, my wife traded her uber-troublesome 2011 Mini Cooper in on a 2015 Crosstrek in January of 2015 and she'll never stray from Subaru again. We also have a Prius that I use as my business road trip car (I'm an architectural photographer and travel 40,000-50,000 miles a year) and an Audi TT ALMS coupe (silver with red leather; there's something about a red interior, like a 360..)..

So, if you'll allow me to hang out and learn from the masters for a bit, I promise that I'll really join, as in, I'll own a 360 in a short while! Thanks, I've already learned so much over the last few days here reading a lot of the posts, what a great bunch of folks!

Scotty G in St. Paul

Excellent! thanks for joining us. Yes, you are right, red interiors are just fine. Welcome!

Thank you, sir! I've loved your videos for a long, long time now. It's a pleasure to be even remotely associated with folks with your experience and knowledge.

Scotty Welcome aboard from Norman Okla, way down south on I35!! Hang on the right 360 will find you!!

Thanks much! I just rolled through your lovely city, twice, on my way to and from assignments in Texas a few weeks ago. I used to stop at the Bavinger House there (Bruce Goff - architect) but it was destroyed in a wind storm a couple of years ago, unfortunately. (I'm an architecture geek, too)
I hope you're right on finding the right 360, or it finding me.. Thanks!

Scotty G wrote:Thank you, sir! I've loved your videos for a long, long time now. It's a pleasure to be even remotely associated with folks with your experience and knowledge.

Quite a honor I'd say. Thank you. I'm glad to instill some 360 juice in your chemical make up. They are too fun not to share. Being part of this 360 group makes you an official 360 insider. I don't know what your time line is.... but I will have a Sedan for sale someday when I finish it. Unfortunately, It won't be very soon.

You may have already seen it :

Welcome aboard Scotty. I've had a sedan for more than 2 years and am finally getting to it (tooooo many projects in front of it). You will find all the help you need in this group.

Thanks for the encouragement! I'm starting to feel like I could do this..
One thing I'm a little worried about, I'm 6'-5" tall, hopefully that won't be a huge problem (no pun intended). This won't be a daily driver for me, just something to take to local car shows, etc.

Welcome Scotty. I'm a newbie myself, and find the folks on here so very helpful and fun! Good luck finding your 360.

Ted
360 van
2014 Forester XT

Scotty, Welcome to the club! Before buying a 360, it would be a good idea for you to try one on. Any chance you could arrange a rendezvous with a sedan or a van? They would be a little snug, I'm sure, but they should be do-able. Don't even think about getting a truck.

Thanks, carlofsumner, 1800sss and rogerbhp, for the welcome and for the advice. I can't fit into a Jaguar XK-120 but that doesn't mean that I still don't want one, if nothing else than to put it on a velvet turntable in our living room..

Now I'm really getting worried about not fitting into a 360 sedan! It didn't even cross my mind before seeing a video of master 2StrokeTurbo cramming his legs in one just an hour or two ago; that got me thinking. This could be life-altering since I've literally had dreams about getting one, or several, over the last couple of years! I don't know anyone in the Mpls / St. Paul area with one but I'll see what I can find out before throwing too much money around. I was hoping for the Holy Trinity (sedan, van, pickup) eventually, too! Shoot.

Scotty I know a guy in Eden Prairie that had one in the back of his Minneapolis Motorplex Space. That was a few years. His space is directly across from the club house.

Wow, thank you for that golden nugget, oldone! I am meeting a fellow car nut tomorrow and we're going to drive around Mpls and just look at cars all day to get our fix in. We went to a Cars & Coffee at the Motorplex (a huge complex of unbelievable garage condos; no living quarters, just "garages", some nicer than our house) and this gentleman had a mint 360 that he found in a ditch and had nut-and-bolt restored. I didn't ask to sit in it, but I almost bought one of his two Comuta-Cars for $5,000 on the spot. https://flic.kr/p/Bf6FBV

I wonder.. hmm.. I still have his card here, maybe I should give him a call, he was one of the nicest gentleman that I've ever met.

Welcome to the Club from downunder, Scotty - for a brief moment, seeing your avatar piccy, I let myself believe that I might have a fellow Young SS owner, but alas! ... not to be (I thought you might have located the fabled American Young SS that was purported to have been imported many moons ago!).

Anyhoo, regarding your height - I think that this was brought up in a topic a few years back.

Just look for a sedan with a sunroof!

Welcome Scotty .

Welcome to the club. It seems that collectively we spend much more time tinkering with them then driving them so I think you'll still get the feeling of being a 360 owner without fitting in the car.

But if you want to fit I would definitely advise getting a sedan because you could easily modify the front seat. You would just move the mounting bolts back enough for your knees to fit under(or to the side of) the steering wheel. It's more important for you to drive than to fit people in your backseat comfortably. And you could still get kids back there which would be the only humans that could fit back there anyway.

Have fun with your new hobby!

Stephen

Scotty,
On a van, it's very easy make a steel strap to lean the seatback away from the steering wheel. (It works fine.) On the sedan, you can figure out what to do. (That works fine, too.) The truck is more complicated as it will require some surgery; just figure out how tall you want to be after the operation is finished. You still have 2 out 3 odds you can drive a Subie without surgery (better odds than you can get in Vegas!)

Ha, thanks, folks! I sure hope that I fit in a sedan, I'm off to see if I can find one in Mpls to sit in.
Embarrassingly, I drive my Audi TT less than 50 miles a year; ouch. I'm on the road about 200 days a year on photo assignments so I'm not home much. I guess I could take the TT one of these trips. When we got our 1997 Outback (in 1997) I contacted the factory to see if there was a way to move the driver's seat back a few inches, but they said it would void the warranty and wouldn't be safe. Hopefully I wouldn't be voiding the warranty of the future Subaru 360 that I get..
Thanks again for the friendly welcome!

Oops, I forgot to ask, Books1, you mention the mythical American Young SS version? I understand that a left hand drive version of the Young SS was never manufactured from the factory? That's disappointing, being a left hand drive person. Not that there are any Young SS versions available anyway even in right hand drive configuration.

Scotty G wrote:Ha, thanks, folks! I sure hope that I fit in a sedan, I'm off to see if I can find one in Mpls to sit in.
Embarrassingly, I drive my Audi TT less than 50 miles a year; ouch. I'm on the road about 200 days a year on photo assignments so I'm not home much. I guess I could take the TT one of these trips. When we got our 1997 Outback (in 1997) I contacted the factory to see if there was a way to move the driver's seat back a few inches, but they said it would void the warranty and wouldn't be safe. Hopefully I wouldn't be voiding the warranty of the future Subaru 360 that I get..
Thanks again for the friendly welcome!

You will fit in a Sedan just fine, ...once you get in. You will not fit in a Subaru 360 truck unfortunately. You will just bang your knees. Trucks have cab confinement issue with the back cab wall. I'm 6' 1" and have trouble. You can creatively modify the both the Sedan and Van front seats back a few inches to make them even more spacious.

Welcome to the club. If you want a 360 with a great club history I have one for sale. It's in WV though.
My Hippie is for sale. Sadly I need to let one go. It's 90+ % Complete runs but needs brake work. Click the search button and type hippie in you'll find nearly all the information available on this 360. Email me at ssi_kjones@wvdsl.net if your interested.

Scotty G wrote:Oops, I forgot to ask, Books1, you mention the mythical American Young SS version? I understand that a left hand drive version of the Young SS was never manufactured from the factory? That's disappointing, being a left hand drive person. Not that there are any Young SS versions available anyway even in right hand drive configuration.

Correct Scotty...... BUT: the opportunity is there for an American owner to create a replica Young SS - you would need a Young S (LH drive, naturally) which were definitely imported by SOA (Subaru of America, Malcolm Bricklin' s outfit), then be prepared to spend a bit of dough on the Japanese auction sites, plus also have a lot of patience, for eventually, you would almost certainly be able to obtain the unobtainable, i.e.; the Young SS motor (I've seen two for sale over the past couple of years). Everything else apart from the speedometer, domed clear acrylic headlamp covers and an "SS" logo on the bonnet) is virtually the same cosmetically.

I already have a spare orange air filter cannister if someone is thinking of going that way....

Cheers,

Ian
P.S.: There are indeed complete examples of the Young SS available for sale surprisingly regularly on the Japanese auction sites! Conditions vary a lot, too.

Thanks, books1 (or, Ian?). I was hoping for a Young model, if possible. From what I understand, the Young S version didn't have any "S" badges anywhere, just a "Young" badge on the rear and on the steering wheel? If there isn't such a thing as a Young SS with left-hand-drive, a Young S is the one for me. I'm an original-or-restored-to-original-specs guy, in general, so turning a Young S into a fake Young SS wouldn't feel right to me, I would know that it isn't real every time I took it out to a show and would have to explain it. But, I'll get over my right-hand-drive fear eventually and look for a Young SS one of these days, I'm sure.

Thanks for the info, sir, much appreciated. There is a yellow Young S on eBay that I may try for, but it may be beyond my scope of talent; restoration-wise, and beyond my space limitations. A more complete (i.e., more expensive) one may be the way to go for now, at least until we get our new garage built and I have more room (2 two-car garages and four cars, two motorcycles, and a boat, snowblowers, lawn mowers, etc. = no extra inside space). I have a feeling that Subaru 360s are like Lay's potato chips, I won't be able to stop at just one once I get going.

I also have to get a Subaru Justy 4WD, but those seem to be even more elusive, oddly, since they're a couple of decades newer than the 360 line is.

I'm also an originality fan, although I respect the work undertaken to customise many of the non-originals around. I did make the point of saying that a modified Young S to a Young SS (LHD) would be a "replica". That covers it all for me. At least it would give you chaps an idea over there of the difference in power, etc.. (a point I have yet to experience!).

Unsure why they never put "Young S" badges on the Young S. Maybe it was in the throes of losing out to the Honda N360 in the most popular Kei car stakes (Subaru 360 had held that position for ten years in Japan) that they threw everything at the final variant in a valiant effort to try to regain lost ground.. dunno.

Welcome, Welcome welcome..

Yes you'll fit just fine in a sedan.. I had a fellow at a show jump into my sedan and he was over 6'6".

I'm not sure how his feet felt but he was able to wiggle the wheel and actuate the controls with little effort.

You'll get used to it..

My advice..
Find the most complete, and cleanest specimen you can find.
It took me over 7 years to get mine together.. well.....I didnt really go stock so maybe that timeframe could have been cut down a bit..

But anyway, you will learn the fine art of being patient, and you will get very used to the emotion of disappointment.

In the end, you'll have what you wanted.. just stick it out and hang in there... these vehicles aren't sorted overnight. But with the help of the group you'll get what you need....

..Eventually.


Don't give up.

Racing my 360 with helmet makes me 6'4"

Ha, are you advocating that I wear a helmet?.. (kidding).. Very cool. (now, about finding one of your perfect gas tanks again; or any gas tank)..

Thanks for the great pep talk, Books1 and Sigmaz. I'm still mentally stuck on a Young model, as unreasonable and inexperienced / juvenile as it may sound. I've waited a couple of decades to start seriously looking for cars that I've always wanted and I would like to hold out for one if I can. Maybe start with a van (even, an ElectaVan) or something until then.

hi there! welcome to our little world!

Hi, Subie Gal! Darn nice of you and everyone; I'm glad to be here. I hope to be a real member soon (as in, a 360 owner).

Lucky for you Scott "Young" trimmed sedans are quite common.

I'd bet you have a better chance of finding a pretty clean Young than a clean DX..

That's based on my exposure to the breed.. I've probably had more Youngs than DX's sleep over at my shop.

That's not really depicted in the following photo.. but it's all I have right now..

Sigmaz,
That almost sounds like a similar situation of there being more Hemi Cudas now then were actually built at the factory?
I'd be all over a Young S. I'll keep looking, thanks for keeping my hopes up. The yellow one on eBay was too far gone for me to realistically restore on my own and I couldn't find a local (Mpls / St. Paul) shop that knew anything about them to help with parts of it.

Happy Holidays to you and the 360 Team!
Scotty G

Jon:

What color is the subie furthest from the front in this picture?

Sigmaz wrote:Lucky for you Scott "Young" trimmed sedans are quite common.

I'd bet you have a better chance of finding a pretty clean Young than a clean DX..

That's based on my exposure to the breed.. I've probably had more Youngs than DX's sleep over at my shop.

That's not really depicted in the following photo.. but it's all I have right now..

It's red

books1 wrote:It's red

Cab or Merlot ??????

Hah.. yeah it was a beautiful deep red. I don't know the color code but it is a very pretty car.

Ha, cab or merlot.. classic!
Beautiful cars, every one; even the non-color (white) ones!

Of all of those cars I have more photos of the white one than all of the others combined.

That's what white is... isn't it? A combination of all the others!

Ha, I knew that someone would catch that, Books1! I'll probably have my architect license revoked now.. I was just being casual with my color / colour lingo there.

Welcome Scotty,
I might have your unicorn right here in Mpls?
PM me...search my old posts and pics...my interests have changed and would like to find my Young S a good home with a club member.
Mark Justesen

Wow. Match made in heaven

oldone wrote:Scotty Welcome aboard from Norman Okla, way down south on I35!! Hang on the right 360 will find you!!

HMMMMMM..............

MJ wrote:Welcome Scotty,
I might have your unicorn right here in Mpls?
PM me...search my old posts and pics...my interests have changed and would like to find my Young S a good home with a club member.
Mark Justesen

It was a pleasure to meet you today, Mark! Thanks for the tour, what a great car. I've got some thinkin' to do, especially to research the moving-the-seat-back-with-some-sort-of-new-custom-brackets thing, unless I'd just want to put the car in our living room, which I wouldn't mind, either..
I've never wanted to be short (shorter than 6'-5", I mean) before, but dang it, that is so disappointing that I don't fit!

-SG

Scotty, try washing in HOT water - it works with my clothes! (i.e.; they SHRINK! )

HA! That works on my pants for sure - I wish it worked on my legs, they're a few inches too long.

Moving the seat should be fairly easy for anyone with the proper tools. I'd look into that if your really wanting to fit in a sedan

Scotty,
It was a good visit...sorry if I talked your ears off.

You? Talk a lot? Haha

Hi Scotty,

Let me offer my belated welcome to the club! Regarding moving the seat back - I considered that at one point (and I am not nearly as tall as you!) I believe that it's a matter of drilling a few holes in the floor and moving back the seat rails. I think there's about 5 inches of space to move back into. I have not looked at this recently so someone correct me if I am wrong...

Anyway if you need a manual, see the link at the bottom of this post.

Steve