hankosolder2

Sometimes the idle air control valve will stick if the car has been sitting. You can remove the hose to it, spray some carb cleaner in there and work the valve back and forth with either your fingers or a screwdriver. (it's a rotary valve) Failing that, you'll need a new one, or you have an unmetered air leak somewhere. Nathan

Loosen the lugs slightly, move the car forward slowly and jam on the brakes. Repeat as needed, taking all appropriate safety precautions.

So, the $64K question.... did he use OEM gaskets, or was that what you were alluding to when you said "the next time he does this job...."

I agree with GD- some people find it fulfilling to have mastery over as many parts of their lives as possible whether it's home repair, car repair, etc. I've never taken a car to a mechanic for anything other than A/C service and alignments (both services require specialist tools which are cost prohibitive.) I've done engine swaps, clutches, transmissions, suspension work, head work, a complete body shell swap on an MG... HOWEVER, as I get older, have family obligations, moved to an urban area w/o a garage, etc. I sometimes find myself CONSIDERING letting a mechanic do some of the work. What holds me back is wanting to know exactly what was done and knowing that it was done correctly. Unless you know a cool mechanic who will let you watch over his shoulder and who is receptive to your suggestions and you can spare the time to watch him work (which kind of negates the time savings aspect) you're never going to really have confidence in the work. Anecdotally, I once found a brake caliper bracket mounting bolt on my Dad's Mazda which had been stripped out by a mechanic. He then added a washer in an attempt to catch a different section of thread. It was one of the most dangerous repairs I've ever seen on an automobile. I do think that GD is minimizing the difference in the skill set required to make the leap from oil changes to doing head gaskets. There certainly are a lot of threads on here about people screwing up trans oil pumps by not seating the torque converter properly, people who can't get the timing right on a DOHC timing belt swap, etc. Ultimately, people need to make their own decisions about how 'hands on' they want to be with their car and how confident they are that they can see a job through without causing more damage than a mechanic might! Nathan

Have you disconnected the battery since the unexpected high idle code? I'm not sure that clearing codes with a scanner will reset this. Check the #3 injector for a pulse with a "noid" light. I'm skeptical about "sticking valve" theory with 180psi compression on #3.

Hows the compression on #3? Also, the Subaru engine control software kills the injector pulse to one cylinder if it detects uncontrolled high idle RPM. If you disconnect the battery and the car briefly runs on all 4 and is idling high, you'll know that's what's going on. Nathan

Remember that peak HP and torque numbers are less important for real-world vehicle performance than the area under the torque curve. (i.e. VVT and other tweaks to the engine may make the torque peak broader, not just make the peak higher.) It might be more instructive to compare quarter mile times of the new car vs. the old (adjusting for the inevitable increase in weight of the new car ) I think the thing with timing chains is that the failure mode is more often noise & slop than breakage with no audible warning. They also wear strictly by use and mileage and are unaffected by age... i.e. a low mileage older car with a chain should be fine, whereas a timing belt equipped car still needs to have it changed on time due to the rubber deteriorating. Finally, there's usually just a single front crankshaft seal (which, depending on the design can be changed w/o pulling any of the timing gear apart) as opposed to multiple cam seals, the failure of which can hose the belt. As with anything, it depends on the quality of the materials and the soundness of the design. Time will tell. Nathan

That's sounds like wear on the crankshaft thrust washers (i.e. fore and aft play.) The clutch assy is applying force attempting to push the flywheel towards the front of the engine. From the mechanic's description, the play is not fore and aft, so I think this is a different issue (or a scam.)

I wonder if the difference has to do with the extra weight of the battery being on the driver's side? (in the US) Sure seems like a small detail for them to have two different p/n's for. Nathan

GD- not to thread jack, but in a nutshell, what do you think of the frankenmotor?

Well, if you think the problem might be due to the knock sensor pulling timing, you could do one of a couple of things. One is to just install a fake out resistor in lieu of the knock sensor for testing purposes. You can just measure the resistance of the knock sensor to ground and substitute a similar value resistor. (of course, you'll have no knock sensing, but just to see if the idle stabilizes...) If this solves it, you might be able to build a voltage divider circuit using two resistors to dial down the sensitivity of the knock sensor. (One in parallel with it and one in series.) Given that the sensor is near the bellhousing and you've got your block bolted to a VW transaxle (?) perhaps some other mechanical noise is being mis-read as knock. Just guessing. Nathan

Good idea! The deal fell through on this car anyway, but if I ever attempt to use that engine in another car, I'll try to pressurize it & see what happens.

Thanks to all of you who chimed in. I'll measure the circumference and rotate if they're within 1/4" Nathan

I've been extremely slack about rotating the tires on the '98 OBW (5MT.) The fronts are much more worn than the rears, but all the tires still have quite a bit of tread left. There's no torque bind or any other symptoms. I will measure the circumference of the tires and change them if they are more than 1/4" off, but assuming they fall within that spec, do I rotate the more worn tires to the rear, or will the car be dangerously tail happy in wet/ snowy conditions? The current tire industry recommendation is to always have your less worn tires in the rear, regardless of the drive configuration (i.e. FWD, AWD, RWD.) Any experience or thoughts on this? Nathan

Well, I'd guess that you could try monitoring fuel pressure (with an add on gauge) as you make a right turn in case there's something strange going on inside the tank (hole in pickup sucking air as the fuel sloshes, etc.) The other possibility is that the body flexes slightly on a turn and an electrical connection somewhere is being disrupted. I think the first possibility is more likely.

Oh, I was by no means thorough! The leak was definitely from the pass side, not the center water pump region. I pretty much took the PO's word that the leak was from the HG. (He did the T-belt job himself, so he wasn't a total idiot.) Maybe I can find some way of pressurizing the entire long block assy off the car to see if I can find the leak prior to stripping the engine down.

Good point. I'm pretty sure the bearings are OK, as it wasn't overheating even when driven @ highway speeds. Unless the PO was really slack about topping up the coolant.... The thing that worries me is that I never actually verified that the leak was coming from the HGs... so I suppose it could be a core plug, crack in the block or something crazy. Maybe I'll see if I can just find another EJ22 and play it safe. Nathan

Oh, I was planning on doing the HGs...it was more a matter of "does an external coolant leak from the engine mean a badly warped or cracked head, etc." Nathan

Bought a '98 OBW 5MT about 4 years ago from a dude who claimed it sprung an external HG leak following a T-belt job. I noticed a strong smell of coolant and dripping on the passenger's side of the car (didn't really scrutinize.) I drove the car home (60 miles@ highway speed) topping off the coolant once. It never overheated, and the leak seemed to stop once the engine got up to temp. Since the engine was (I thought) a DOHC EJ25 with 180K miles on it and piston slap, I pulled it and installed an EJ22. After I pulled the engine, I noticed that there was a rebuilder's tag on the block! I would have analyzed the problem further if I had known the engine probably had less than 100K on it... Long story somewhat less long, I now have a pressing need for a cheap automatic car and have found a 97 OBW with a lunched T-belt. I'm thinking about doing the HG on the EJ 25 from the '98 and putting it in the '97, but I'm concerned about the external HG leak. That's not the normal failure mode for an EJ25, so I'm worried that there might be something seriously wrong with my donor engine. Has anyone experienced an external HG leak on a phase one? What was the cause? Nathan PS: Sorry for the 'extended narrative.'

Yes, they can fail and leak.

A larger rear bar will lessen understeer/ increase oversteer. A larger front bar will increase understeer/ reduce oversteer. An easy way to conceptualize it is that the end with the stiffer bar will be doing more of the cornering "work" and thus those tires will slide first. Lots of people get this backwards and think that since a bar improves handling, you put a stiffer bar on the end of the car you want to help. I think (but don't know for sure) that the stiffness is some sort of square law deal (i.e. if you increase the OD of the bar by 50% the roll stiffness will increase by 75% or something.) Nathan

It's possible (and IMHO, best) to keep the existing rear charcoal canister. I did this swap and just did a little loop between the two tubes on the front of the 2.2 manifold/ vac pipe assy which would have been connected to the 2.2's charcoal canister. I think I may also have added a "T" somewhere and plugged a hose. It works with no CELs. If you're not in a huge hurry, I might be able to work up a diagram or shoot a photo. It's definitely doable. Nathan

Well, on the positive side, it's an EJ25 with 200K miles on it. I bet if you search within a two mile radius, you'll find your car with a rod through the block.

The transmission has trans fluid cooler lines which run to the radiator in this vehicle, yes? Perhaps when the tech was replacing the radiator he created a trans fluid leak or forgot to top off the trans fluid. I don't know about the engine overheating issue though, unless the new radiator has a coolant >atf leak, perish the thought. I find it pretty amusing that all 2.5s supposedly fail the chemical HG leak test. I wonder what the reason for that is? Perhaps all the HGs leak ever so slightly?

I'm pretty sure it's interference, unless it's a stick with the 2.2. '96 was an oddball year for the ej25, as it has the hydraulic lifters. Nathan