hankosolder2

+1. I'm pretty sure the ignitor is essentially a resistor/heating element, so it should not be polarity sensitive at all. Because it's a resistive type load, there's no reason for a polarity protection/clamp diode.

Double post

He's in New Zealand, so things might be a bit different. Does the 2.5 have an EGR valve or not? The '93 is an earlier generation car, so it will not be plug and play. The blocks and head are the same (with one exception) so if you swap a later '95 manifold/wiring harness on it should work, assuming NZ cars are similar to US spec ones. The '93 engine will not have a tapping in the head for the EGR valve pipe...so if your old 2.5 engine has an EGR valve that's something you may have to deal with. If having a check engine light on is not a problem you should be OK. (Do you have emissions inspections in NZ?) Nathan

The thing to consider is that with a CVT, the engine can be set up to be on the verge of lugging at cruising speeds and it can "downshift" (slightly and imperceptibly) at the slightest request for acceleration. If a conventional 4-5 speed auto paired to a 4 cyl engine in a heavy car was setup to run at 1700rpm at that speed, a noticeable downshift would be required for even the gentlest acceleration or to hold speed on a gentle upgrade- with a big jump in RPM which would be annoying to the driver. Most autos are setup so they can cruise in top gear and do moderate acceleration without a downshift to avoid this annoyance.

I wonder if you could buy one new tire and have it shaved to match the outside diameter of the part worn ones. I think some high performance tire places offer this service. Just freestylin' here- I don't know for a fact that you can find such a service, but it might be worth looking into. Nathan

Per the Haynes manual, the fuel injector resistance for a '90-'94 Legacy should be 11 to 12 Ohms. Hope this helps. Nathan

Your symptoms sound more like bad clutch hydraulics than a bad clutch disc/pressure plate itself...unless the release/throwout bearing or pivot arm is disintegrating, in which case you'd probably be hearing some strange noises. A normally worn clutch will slip, grab at the top of the pedal travel and have higher than normal pedal effort. I would first make sure that you do indeed need a new clutch as opposed to just a clutch master cylinder and or slave cylinder. As for clutch upgrades, I don't know too much about them and frankly doubt you'll need one to tow a trailer assuming careful driving technique. Is this trailer towing for trip, or something you'll be doing regularly? Good luck, Nathan

Also consider the possibility of a bad coolant temp sensor (the one for the engine control computer.) I am assuming that the car does run at normal operating temp and the thermostat is not stuck open or something. As the others have said, O2 sensor is also a good guess.

I don't know the specific scales/ranges for your particular ohmmeter, but as I said, the resistance pretty much any injector ever made should be somewhere between 5 to 30 ohms, so select a range/scale which is slightly higher than the resistance you expect to be measuring- perhaps a 50 ohm range would be a good choice. Basically, you want select a range so the meter is not pegged all the way at zero or infinity so you can get a valid reading. Some inexpensive meters do not have a good scale for measuring resistances below 1K ohm (1000 ohms.) You might be better off with a modern, auto ranging digital multi meter. The Fluke brand is really nice, and you can get a model 115 or 73 for less than $150. Just set it to the ohms scale, probe your injector and you'll have an accurate readout. They also make a model specifically for auto diagnostics, but it's more expensive and probably not that much more useful...IMHO. I wouldn't worry so much about the absolute reading of your injectors- just make sure that they all measure within a couple of ohms of each other. A Haynes manual probably has a specific spec- I'll try to look it up tomorrow. Nathan

Is that a typo? The 20K ohm range on your meter is not the right one to use. An injector should be perhaps in the range of 5 to 30 ohms...so your meter should be set on a low resistance range. It does sound like the bad injector is essentially open though, so I think your conclusion is right even if your methods are wrong! ;-) If you're using the 20 K ohm scale, you're doing a simple continuity test and any good injector will read zero.

All the injectors should measure very close in resistance. (I'm assuming you are measuring the resistance of the injector coil at the injector itself.) Probably +/- 2 ohms or so between the four. If you notice any significant difference, it's almost definitely bad. I don't think they're a high failure item on Subarus, but I have changed a few Bosch injectors on older BMWs over the years. Of course, injectors can also get plugged and fail mechanically. One thing to note- some Subarus (perhaps not going as far back as the donor vehicle for your car) have software that shuts off the drive pulses to one injector if the idle RPM becomes uncontrolled. (i.e. if the computer senses the car is revving at over 2500 rpm (don't recall exact RPM #) with the throttle shut, it disables one cylinder to bring the idle down. I ran into this issue with my '98 Outback...my replacement 2.2 had a sticking idle air control valve and on starting, the car would run at high RPM for a while, throw a check engine light and begin chugging on 3 cyl until the battery cable was disconnected. So, assuming your injectors check out OK, verify that the cylinder which doesn't seem to be working is getting an injector pulse. Good luck, Nathan

The presence of voltage going to the fuel pump when the connector is not under load doesn't mean too much. (You said you disconnected the connector going to the fuel pump.) If there's a corroded or high resistance connection upstream of your voltage test point, you can measure +12v ...which would drop to next to nothing when faced with the low resistance of a fuel pump which can draw 10 Amps! Can you back-probe the connector WHILE it is connected to the fuel pump? That's a much more valid test. Also, I don't know if this particular pump is grounded through the tank or externally, but you also need to verify that the ground pin of the pump is at ground voltage- i.e. there should not be any reading on your meter if you measure between the ground on the pump and the chassis of the car. There are plenty of 10+ year old, 200K mile Subarus out there with their original fuel pumps, so the failure of two seems a bit fishy. I wonder if there's a bad connector which was "fixed" by unplugging and reseating during the first replacement of the pump. Then again, perhaps the first failure was a fluke and the replacement pump was substandard- you could be right. Fairtax's idea is a good simple way of isolating the problem too. good luck, Nathan

So- what happened with engine #3? Is it in? How does it run? Nathan

Cool. That should be MUCH faster than any stock 356 once you get it running right. Nathan

To go somewhat OT- what kind of a kit car is this? VW based, or not? At 2100lbs, it should be far from anemic.

I had the exact same problem on '98 OBW. Given that I've owned the car 2+ years and it shows no signs of prior accident damage and it never had an airbag warning until recently, I thought it was highly improbable that both the pass and drivers side airbags failed at the same time. I suspected the control module (the common factor which can set both of those codes.) I cleared codes and they kept coming back. I then wiggled some of the orange connectors under the dash on passenger side of the car. I cleared the codes again and they haven't come back in 6 months. Baffled- the connectors were all properly seated. There was another fellow posting on here who had what the dealer diagnosed as a failure of the airbag control module. Replaced the airbag control module, codes went away for one year then returned later. I think it happened annually and the guy finally traded in the OB when it was due for module #3. I have a hunch that there's either a bad crimp connector or a bad ground which is a problem on these vehicles and dealers misdiagnose it as the control module. I won't be able to try to figure it out until it fails again, I guess!

What year 2.2? Pre '97s had hydraulic lifters...post '97 2.2 had screw adjusters. Nathan

Have you proposed any other options to CCR? Such as you return engine #2, and they refund your money? You could then go with a used engine. At this point, perhaps both of you would prefer to just cut your losses. If not, I would certainly hope that they would go all out to insure engine #3 is dead-on. It can't be good for their business to have these unresolved issues aired on USMB.

I wonder if the engine might have had an incorrect cam sprocket installed on it (from a different model engine) so the timing marks appear to line up correctly but the valve timing is whacked out. A rogue camshaft which is machined wrong would be another (remote) possibility. I suppose yet another possibility would be a timing belt with incorrect markings on it.

I believe there is a normally aspirated EJ20 sold in Europe which is essentially an EJ22 with reduced bore and or stroke. That might work, especially if you used it with the US market EJ22 manifold, injectors, and engine harness. I am just speculating here, because I have never seen an EJ20 in person and do not know the specifics of the Euro wiring harness and engine control systems. Nathan

One other thought. Does it pull to the right cruising at a steady speed, or do you mostly notice it on acceleration? I'm wondering if the original poster could be feeling a bit of torque steer. I notice that his other vehicles (Jeep and Mustang) are either RWD or possibly part time 4wd with RWD active in the 2wd mode, so he's probably not used to feeling any torque steer. I do not notice torque steer in my wife's '98 OBW (5mt) but I do notice mild torque steer in the in-laws '01 Legacy GT (AT.) And I'm constantly irritated by it in my Honda, especially if I've just switched from driving the RWD BMW. I suspect the torque steer is worse in the '01 GT because the automatic tends to put more power through the front wheels, compared to the 50/50 split of the manual Subarus. Anyway, it's just a possibility, and if you're noticing it while cruising at a steady speed, it's not torque steer. Nathan

Well, if you don't have access to the trans, do you at least have access to the car the trans should be in? You could count the turns on the rear diff and at least know what you need to match.

The other thing to consider is just because your car is titled as a '97 does not necessarily mean it truly is a '97. Could be a late '96. If you have the skills, you could pull a valve cover off and inspect. The later engines have screw adjusters for valve clearance, not hydraulic lifters. There may be other easier ways to identify. Bear in mind that if the car's been sitting for two years, especially outside, the brakes could be badly rusted, it probably needs a battery and may need other things.

1 quart per 1000 miles consumption should be not enough to kill a catalytic converter. I think you either installed a substandard cat con or have bad 02 sensor(s). I realize this is sort of an apples-and-oranges comparison, but my Honda has a pretty bad oil consumption problem (600 miles per quart) and has had that problem for the past 30K miles-- still on the original cat, gets great mileage and has no check engine lights. +1 on the replacing the PCV. Nathan

High mileage Ej25s do seem to occasionally throw rods. I'd say it depends on what you are planning to use the car for. If it's for long distance travel, you might want to do a long block. If it's a commuter car and you don't want to spend a lot, it might be worth just doing HGs and taking your chances, assuming you don't drive through shady neighborhoods, live in an area with an extreme climate, etc. Don't mess with the rear main seal. They rarely fail and are difficult to install properly. If you are pulling the engine, do replace the oil separator plate unless it's the metal style. Nathan