I installed the Dust Deflector on our MY04 Forester XT today. It’s probably a 20-30 minute job if you’ve done it before. In my neophyte hands, it took me about 2 hours (of course I took things slowly and carefully).

The tools you’ll need are listed in the instructions. (http://content.subarunet.com/snet/business/fixedops/guides/2003MY_Forester_Rear_Window_Dust_Deflector.pdf) Nothing real extraordinary except for the riv-nut tool (which I'll talk about more later). You will be drilling some holes into your car's body, so you got to psych yourself up to do it.

I had some 3M Rust Avenger that I used to treat the bare metal edge after I drilled the holes. I also had some GE Silicone II Metal Caulking that I additionally used to seal up the holes and around the bracket bolts. They tend to go crazy with the salt here during the winter so I tried to do a good rust prevention job.

I recommend using a Riv-Nut tool (also called a 'threaded insert' tool) to place the Riv-nuts. I bought one from Pros-Pick (http://www.pros-pick.com/threaded_inserts.html) for US$39. The included Riv-nuts were not easy to collapse even with the ‘tool’. It would have been pretty hard to do (reliably) with a home-made device. I think that $40 was well spent.

The instructions were pretty easy to follow. I measured everything out twice before I started the holes. There is a little ‘give’ in the deflector itself to compensate for a bracket that is slightly misplaced – I would guess about 2 or 3 mm of play in any direction.

When you start the holes, the instructions recommends that you use a center punch to create a divot to mark the spot for drilling, and also to provide a start so the drill doesn’t skip. I used a nail for this. After banging the first one a bit hard, I’d recommend using somewhat of a soft touch here. Not only did I make a nice divot, but the surrounding metal dented in. I didn’t realize the metal was so soft. No harm though, the dented area was drilled out in the next step anyway.

After I drilled, I de-burred the holes and treated with Rust Avenger. This product supposedly treats bare metal and ends up like a primer coat after it chemically converts rust. I’ve used it on paint chips in the past with good results (rusted or not). After a waiting period, I also treated the edges of the Riv-nuts with the GE Silicone II caulking for added protection.

Once the Riv-nuts were mounted, it was an easy couple of steps of bolting things together. I used a drop of blue (medium strength) thread-locker on the bracket-to-rivnut bolts so they would not loosen up.

Here's the template marked out. You do this with included template paper as well as the actual brackets. I measured things out a couple times to make sure my holes would be placed in the right spot.

Once the template is marked out you start the hole with a center punch (or hammer & nail for those with smaller tool boxes). The holes are drilled up in increments from 1/8" to 1/4" to the final size of 25/64". I didn't have a 25/64" in my bit box, so I bought one at Home Depot the day before.

Next I de-burred the edges of the holes and treated the bare metal drilled edge with 3M Rust Avenger.

Next I inserted the riv-nuts into their new holes and cinched them down with the tool.

I never heard of a riv-nut before and did some searching before this install. I ended up going with the tool and not going with a more home-made approach like this (http://www.fjr1300.info/howto/rivnut-tool.html). If you do a google search on riv-nuts you'll find a number of home made tools that people have devised.

The riv-nuts that Subaru included were of a reasonably hard metal. It might have been difficult to cinch down safely with a home made device.

A little silicone caulking is good for what ails you!

Bracket installed. More silicone caulking around the bolt edge. The excess caulking cleaned up easily with alcohol. I also used blue (medium strength) thread locker for the rivnut-to-bracket bolts (I'm never taking this down anyway).

In addition to the bolts, there is also a strong adhesive backing on the bracket to solidly mount it to the body. Once these puppies are on, it'll be a bit of a challenge to remove them.

Now everything gets bolted up.

Here's a check of level. Good thing it was right on -- I'm not sure I could have done anything about it if it wasn't.

Clearance check.

Final installed pics.

Rear oblique view.

Here's what came in the box and the riv-nut (or 'threaded insert') tool that I got from Pro's Pick.


As a total aside -- Pro's Pick had the tool for a reasonable price, so I got it there (they seem to be a hot-rod truck modding source from Canada). A week or so after I made the order my credit card number was stolen. Turns out that it was my transaction with this site that was the source. I actually got a call from the owner a few days later who apologized for the theft. He said a number of his customers recently had their credit card numbers stolen from his site. He seemed nice, genuine, and apologetic. Although he said he's improving the security on his site, you may want to phone in the order.