MilesFox

how about the ignition ignitor inside the disty? i had a car that did this, it would crank and crank, and then fire up as soon as you let off the key.

just so you know, the subaru transmission does not have a separate transfer case, but instead a gear reductiion before the front diff. the rear wheels are driven from a shaft directly from the front diff. depending on how much you will build, a nissan transfer case can be installed if you are doing custom suspension/frame and axle setups. there are a few examples if you search if you want a dual range out of the box, look for the earlier models 85-88. later models got stuck with single range 5spds. spfi (86, 87, 88-94)would be most ideal for reliability, unless you are good with carbs (85-87.5) turbos can be fun, so long as you have enough sense to keep up with maintenance, oil, cooling, etc. otherwise, 85-95 gl/dl/loyale are all mechanically identical less the difference between carb/spfi/mpfi turbo. but 5spds can swap out into automatics and so on and so forth

if you are having the clutch done, have your mechanic replace the seal on the breather plate behind the flywheel. 99% chance the rear main seal is fine, but usually when you have a leak at the rear of the engine, its 99% the breather plate. your mechanic might have an easier time if he just pulls the motor out of the car. perfect opportunity to do front seals and tbelt/water pump. off the shelf, the clutch set should go for 175, and the engine seals about 7-10 bucks apiece(a little more for the rear seal or valve covers). timing belt 30-60 bucks, and water pump 40-60 bucks

you will hear arguements about swirl and fuel mixture condensing inside the intake. maybe you can rough up the surface inside the intake? the draft is going to alternate between each cylinder bank since aech bank fires almost simultaneously. you may want to make some sort of riser that gets wider towards the bottom with a vane in the middle

if you have that idea, i would say cut out the middle of the cover below the crank pulley, so the cover can be lifted off around the pulley instead of having to remove the pulley. the oil pump sprocket will be exposed, but that is so tight a clearance nothing will get in there, and you still have the tensioner pulleys covered up. if anything is leaking inside, it will drip out of the bottom of the crank anyway. you know, this is a good idea i haven't thought of before. its a good workaround to make a timing belt job easier next time without being caught naked:lol:

you might not get much wheel play on a subaru with bad bearings. when i had a bearing go out on my ea82, i replaced the wrong side at first, there was virtually no slop with the double bearing setup, even though the inner bearing was disentegrated(by this time the wheel bearing was louder then the radio). just an idea. you should go on your wheel bearing suspicions...vague steering is the first clue before any noise or slop

you could take the time to paint the suspension components, with enamel(brush on rustoleum) if you want to prevent rust. up here in the rust belt, i have seen trailing arms split in half from rust, the welded seam would rot out on them. just a suggestion if you want to take your time with stuff. sand and dirt will accumulate in the torsion beam as well. try to dig out any sand or mud that has accumulated behind the mudflaps, wheel arch, and rocker silld, and especially behind the shock mount tower, since those are prone to rust out. also clean up the edges of the gas tank since sand and dirt will accumulate there as well, and that is where the gas tank will leak if it fails from rust. also, on the passenger side, remove the cover plate for the fill tube and clean/paint that as well. my suggestions are for salty winter regions, but it doesn't hurt to prevent rust any way you can since its apart.

maybe a bad ball joint? usually they rattle over bumps. also, if the wheel bearing is going out, the rotor will walk around in the caliper bracket. both of these will cause handling issues. the latter could possibly throw off the abs because the tone ring and sensor are not truly aligned, and would give a different signal. if you have a super crappy tire, try rotating it out with one of the better ones and see if that changes anything.

your compression looks good. if you continue to have trouble, spray some carb cleaner around the intake gaskets. it wouldn't hurt to do them anyway, as was in my case.

sounds just right for the application. the car should handle 1500 lbs with no sweat. i have towed 2500 and 3000 lbs behind a fwd gl sedan across 300 miles. but that kind of load is only safe with an experienced driver. do you have a hitch alrteady? the commercially available ones (valley, curt from u-haul) are rated for 2500 lbs and 250 tongue, 1-1/4" drwawbar and 1-7/8" or 2" ball.

if not the cable, maybe the pressure pate is worn out. with a worn pressure plate the clutch will drag, the gears will be sticky, and you would have to tighten the cable too much imagina one of those toys that looks like a ha;f ball that you push the middle inside out, and a fre seconds later it pops out and jums in the air. this is similar to how the clutch pressure plate disengages, when the middle is pressed in, the outer pops away from the clutch, and vice versa

i just took the covers off my new-to-me 94 legacy. previous mechanic installed new timing belt and water pump, but not the seals. the belt was COATED in oil being covered up, where open covers would have leaked the oil to the ground instead of slinging it all over the belt. i can see your point when it comes to moisture or road salts for the sake of the tensioner pulleys, though. the only thing that gets me is people are afraid of the belts wearing prematurely with open covers, but, its obvious you can VISUALLY INSPECT the belts any time you are under the hood, and replace them in FIFTEEN MINUTES off the side of the road if they do let go.

i can host the file for download on a web server if you want it hosted somewhere to link to

you can get a vinyl dye spray paint that is specifically for vinyl interior parts. i would think the krylon might flake off. the krylon should be ok for center consol parts and other hard plastic. i have seen a while interior painted with black vinyl dye over blue. it looked uniform, but some of the plastic bits looked a little glossy. i would say dye on the vinyl and krylon on the hard plastic. make sure to clean the parts very will with soap and water, remove them from the car if you can.

if you leave the seals alone, do yourself a favor and leave off the timing belt covers. you will thank yourself next time you do seals or a water pump. take the time now to remove all the pulleys and remove the inner timing belt covers behind them. the cam seals are super easy, the cam retainer comes off the car, and you can change the seal on your work bench. btw the pics in the article are from an 87 rx turbo you do not have to replace the springs on the tensioners. they are just there to hold the tensioners in place until you lock them down. you can simply hold the tensioners tight by hand when you tighten them up. make sure you have all the slack out of the drive side of the belts before tightening them(top of belt on pass side, bottom of belt on driver side)

if you can get the turbo gl-10 for cheap, it would be a good candidate t fix and flip. some high school wrx fanboy would probably buy it because its a turbo subaru, fanboys always end up with grandma's gl-10 and join the forum asking what kind of turbo they can put on it. the low miles would help i sell. otherwise its worth the AT for parts, and the engine for parts, and the body to build on(find a carb model donor with dual range and swap in)

use a long bar and place it from the front of the car over the control arm under the axle and butt it against the radius rod bushing. push down on the bar and push the knuckle towards the car and the ball joint stud should fall in. this is my one-man technique.

probably the throwout bearing. did they replace that along with the clutch?

you can jack up the engine for better clearance, but there is a proper way. instead of going by the oil pan, jack it up by the trans by the front diff. remove the pitch bar first. this is what you do if you were pulling the motor also

axle nut should be torqued to 145 ft lb. the flat washer goes on one way. make sure it is not backward. sounds like you have a axle nut/washer/torque issue. use red grease, not yellow grease

save yourself the cost of a new oil pump. you will be fine just doing the oil pump seals. your problem is most likely leaky cam tower o-rings. if you invest in a new pump, you will likely have the tick still if the cam tower o-rings are not replaced. ditch the timing belt outer covers and the covers behind the cam pulleys. do the cam seals while at it. with naked covers, you can replace the water pump without removing the belts or anything else.

i am assuming you are using the ea81 mechanical disty. just connect it to the coil directly. the yellow wire is for negative, the black wire is positive. if you are using an ea82 flywheel, the ignition timing marks will be different for the ea81 engine. you are going to have to use the pencil in the cylinder trick to find TDC for #1. follow the thread about tomrhere's 88 gl-10 with the ea81, as there is discussion about the flywheel timing marks

if you notice the ea81 control arm is straight, and the ea82 curves forward. you will have to relocate the ea82 control arm if you are using that. you will have to make a tab behind the control arm mount, and move it back, where the back portion of its mount is now the front. you can salvage the rear mount portion from an ea83 crossmember and weld it to the ea81 crossmember to accomplish this. its hard to explain without pics, but i am probably the only one who did it this way. if you could search way back into history, i got the idea from 'rguyver' posts on the old usmb

the 'dog bone' piece between the firewall and the top of the trans. remove it(you will need to anyway) and remove the bracket that goes around the little access cover(on top of the motor) there is supposed to be a cover on the bottom. are you trying to undo the bolts from underneath?

nice trick with the yoke plugging the seal. A spray paint lid and a rubber glove works for that purpose, also I pulled a whole lum pn an 83 wagon, fwd 5spd, NEVER AGAIN! i see you removed the trans mount, that looks a lot easier. poersonally, though, dont the motor and trans separate is easier for me. I could consider pulling the 2 together on newer ones, but has anyone INSTALLED motor/trans together? btw use caution with cinder blocks, i have heard stories of them failing. you would be better off with wooden blocks or logs, even.