SUBARU may have been a little surprised at how customers flocked to buy the Liberty GT after it was introduced here, in auto-only form, in August 2003. It was, after all, not a cheap Liberty when you consider the base model started at not much more than $30,000. But, like other top-shelf Subarus, it seemed to click. The company expected to do about 50 a month but in the end was delivering more like 140 a month. So impressed was head office that it acceded to local requests for a manual-transmission version – something that was not available anywhere else in the world. The only problem is that the manual is a five-speed, not a six-speed as seen in the quite phenomenal 3.0R-B six-cylinder Liberty. But this is only a slight aberration in a car that is purposely fast, focused and very well built.
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Subaru Liberty B4 sedan
Released: August 2001
Ended: August 2003
Family Tree: LibertySubaru's all-new Liberty sedan and wagon arrived on sale in Australia in September 2003 as a MY04 model, comprising 101kW/187Nm 2.0i, 121kW/226Nm 2.5i and 180kW/310Nm 2.0 turbo GT variants. The 180kW/297Nm 3.0R and 3.0R-B versions were released in August 2004 - the same month Subaru Oz launched the 190kW/330Nm Liberty GT manual (tested here). The GT's direct predecessor was the 190kW/320Nm 2.0 turbocharged Liberty B4 sedan (pictured), sold here between August 2001 and August 2003.
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