JasonGilman01

Thanks for the info on the tencioner, I bet you may be on to something there, one ideler pully spilled it's guts and sent ball bearings through out the plastic timing belt housing. I'll definatly check the tencioner, by the way, what can you tell me about it?, dose anyone know what makes it work, it looked to me like a tiny hydrolic ram, dose if run off the oil pressure of the engine, or is it simply spring loaded? The cam seals are difinatly leeking like crazy, the inside of the hosing was soaked in oil. I don't know the history of the water pump, only had the car about a year. It very well may be a replacement, since the car has almost 250,000miles. Still was running like new though. I'll inspect the pump thourghly when I remove it to see if I can determin its orgin, and I'll let you know what I find. The timeing belt was slick with oil, and crunchy, I could break the teeth off with my fingers, can't believe it held up as long as it did. I don't know about a squesling sound form the best, she didn't mention it. What she did say though, that it was running quieter than normal, as it began to overheat, but can't say for sure about that, since I wasn't there. Take it easy all, Jason

Hello all, here is the latest news on the mysterious overheating/loss of spark problem. After a long evening of detective work on the car, here is what I discovered. The water pump is indeed seazed. The timing belt is not borke, but the teeth around the crank are completly stripped off, allowing the crank to spin freely but not turning the cams. Here is what I suspect happened. The waterpump failed, but did not seaze at first, allowing the cams to keep turnig in time with the crank. As the car drove on, the failed water pump finally seazed, at which time the belt forze as well, and stopped the cams, thus, the cam position sincer quit sending to the ECU and the coils quit fireing. Oh, bye the way, I checked the spark by putting a screwdriver in the spark plug end of the spark plug wire and holding the metal shaft of the screwdriver close to the block, I did a compresion test and got all kinds of strange readings verying for 0 -110 psi, but since I later found the valves to not be moving that explains the failure of the compression check. Now the question remains. What other engine damage occured form the severe overheat? and how severe was the over heat really? Could it be the the belt borke just in time to keep the engine for self destructing? This all remains to be seen, I'll pressure up the cooling system after I change the water pump, and see if it will hold, I'm hopeful, there was no water in the cylenders, so that's a good sign, maybe I got lucky and dedn't blow a head gasket, or crack a head. I've also herd that some subaru are "Clearance Engines" meaning the valves won't reack the top of the piston, ever if fully extended when the piston comes up, so maybe I have hope there too. I'll keep you informed with the details of the adventure, and any advice, tips, or clarifications would be greatly appreciated, Later all, Jason

I agree a head gasket sounds likley considering the circomstances, but I still can't figure out why the coils aren't fireing, could this just be chance? Or might it be related to the overheating? I also forgot to put in my last post, there is no visable sign of oil in the water, or water in the oil. Any ideas on the corolation between loss of fire from the coils, and the overheating?

Hello all. What I've run into now is a 93 Impreza that won't fire. Here's the story. My wife was driving and the car began to over heat. She turned on the heater, and the temperature came down. She dorve on, then it overheated. she conitnued to run the car until it wouldn't run anymore, LOL. At which time I was summoned to fix the car. Well, after hearing the story, I figured I would find a siezed engine, but luckly the engine still spun freely and had no appearant water leeks, altough it was very low on water. I filled it with water then tryed to start it. The motor spun fine, but wouldn't start, so I checked the spark and found none. First, I checked to see if the coil pack was getting juce, and indeed the middle wire of the coil connector was hot, when the key was in the on and start position. Now here is where I get into the guess work, it kindof sounds like ECU failure, but how could that be related to the over heating? Also, I was hoping the car might be equiped with some sort of failsafe switch that would kill the spark if the engine was overheating. I searched all over for a reset switch and couldn't find a thag. Dose such a safty switch exist in Subarus? I figured that perhaps the ECU, might have such a system built in, and attemped to reset it by disconnecting the negitive batery cable, but that also failed to restore spark. I also clened all connection I could find under the hood incase water had gotten in. By the way, where would I look for the ECU, on this perticular car? I also checked all the fuses that I could find. To my knowledge there are 2 boxes 1 under the hood on the driver side finder, and the other under the dash. This is where I stand, a nice little car with no spark, and no idea why. Any ideas would be greatly apreciated, Thanks for your time, your new friend Jason.