stephenw22

I just pulled the dash and then disconnected the plug going to the light. Took me about 30 min.

What is your driving style, electrically-speaking? My wife's car goes through tons of alternators. The reason for this is that she: 1. Drives with the lights on all the time (10-15A) 2. Always has the fan on speed #3 or #4 (5-10A) 3. Has the stereo up loud to overcome the road noise on the gravel roads (5-10A) 4. In winter, has the rear defroster on, most of the time (10-15A) This is an extra 30-50A of load, in addition to the engine's own requirements. Also, there is the battery charging load. With only a 65A alternator, they tend to cook quite thoroughly. Also, remember that the 65A is not at idle, but at a decent speed. So, if you're mostly cruising around town, the alternator won't be putting out the maximum current.

I usually carry 40-50 lbs of mud in my wheel wells. Makes for better traction... Actually, next spring I'll probably take the mud flaps off my cars, they seem to trap mud and dirt against the body panels.

From what I remember, when the car is in '2', the car is locked into 2nd gear only. (kinda like the 3-sp on my old ford). When it's real icy outside, I'll start the car in '2' when driving around. It keeps the wheels from spinning as much on ice.

Just so I'm understanding perfectly, this is for a '93 loyale, right? Have you found the green (test) and white (read) connectors? How (exactly, and I mean, exactly) are you trying to read codes? I just want to make sure I completely and perfectly understand the situation. Thanks!

Most of my gauges stop responding at -40. Actually, they don't stop, but they respond extremely slowly. The tach acts fine, though.

That magic shift lever mostly got me stuck in huge snowdrifts, because it made me feel so invincible... Then I'd have to go out through the back gate because the snow was up and over all four windows, and it was holding the doors shut... Then I'd get my 1/2 ton stuck trying to pull the subaru out... Curse you, Subaru, for making a 4x4 wagon that works so well!

On my first car (the '85 wagon) the rear wheel bearing was worn out, but in a weird way. It ran fine in a straight line, but when cornering (to the right) the bearing would make a grinding sound. I never ended up changing the bearing out - other electrical problems ended up finally killing the car (stupid mice!) I put at least 60k miles on the car with the rear wheel bearing that way - just goes to show you how flat and straight all of the roads around here are... :-\

I'm of the good filter / cheap oil school of thought. All of the oils sold need to meet the current API standards (SJ or S-whatever), and that's good enough for me. Since the oil is okay to start with, the filter is what keeps it good. A better filter will filter more and bypass less, and also has a better anti-drainback valve. My cars tend to leak/burn enough oil that I add a little every 500-600 miles. An extra $4-5 worth of oil over 3000 miles isn't much of an operating cost.

1.5 miles! awesome!

I just went through this with my Hornet. It's triggered every 60,000(ish) miles. You can either find the connector under the dash and switch it, or pull the dash (which I was doing for a dash conversion anyways) and disconnect the bulb.

My steel-toed boots are 'self-cleaning', but it seems like this feature only turns on after I enter my house. My wife hates my 'self-cleaning' boots...

On my '85 and '86 wagons, the rear shock was the adjustable part, as long as it wasn't rusted together too badly. I think it was ea-81 style vehicles that had the torsion-bar adjustment. The rears had a shock that could be adjusted to either a low or high position. On both my cars, the shocks were rusted solid in the low position.

For front adjustable struts, monroe makes a model that has the adjusting bolts. I can't remember the part offhand, but if you want I can grab the number off the box when I get home tonight.

When you're bolting the cams to the heads, it doesn't matter what position it's in. There's one position that makes it a little easier, but you can do it no matter what position the cam is in. As for installing timing belts, when the 3 marks on the flywheel line up with the arrow in the window, one cam 'dot' points up and the other one points down. Without the 3 flywheel marks, I have no idea what you'd do.

On the passenger side (North American models) of the transmission, near the engine, there is a big circular cover. Inside is the governor. It helps control shifting. It is a spring-loaded valve on a spinning shaft, driven by a gear in the transmission. There are three failure modes for the governor. 1. The gear on the governor shaft becomes worn-out and slips. On non-turbo models, the gear is nylon and can become worn. Turbo models have steel gears. 2. The gear in the transmission becomes worn-out and slips. This gear seems to last longer than the governor shaft gear, but it can still wear out. If it wears out, it's probably easier to get a replacement transmission from a junkyard. Again, non-turbo models have a nylon gear, turbos have a steel gear. 3. The valve gets jammed on some varnish, dirt or debris and it starts to stick. This is what happened to my turbo wagon. It resulted in the car being 'stuck' in gear. It would never kick down to first gear unless I manually put the car into '1'. If I started in '1' and shifted to 'D', it would stay in first for a bit and then violently jam into 2nd or 3rd. There's a write-up on the USRM about cleaning up the governor.

I don't know how replacing the EGR valve would do anything. The computer probably just looks at the current draw of the solenoid. The computer and EGR system isn't advanced enough to tell if the valve is screwed up. Maybe if the valve is stuck open, it can see an A/F ratio problem, and gives a 34, but I really don't know. I'm one of the ones who used a 68 Ohm, 4W resistor to 'simulate' a solenoid. It cleared the code off my ECU, and the car seems to run just fine without it. I also plugged off the EGR system.

I had a double-din stereo in my power wagon for about 4 years. I bought the deck at a police auction for $120. The only problem was the usual one (the deck was too deep for the mounting hole.) I was even able to use one of the oem mounting brackets to hole the stereo in the slot. The other one didn't fir, and I don't remember why. I improvised a cover out of black plastic chunks that I glued together. The deck was a pioneer unit that had a slot for a cd and a flip-down face for a cassette tape.

what kind of cost would we be looking at?

You'd have to make sure that you had the offset right on the new rims, wouldn't you? This is one area I know very little about, as far as cars go. $69 each doesn't seem so bad, as long as they're made right. I'd rather pay a few more $$ for something that doesn't come apart on the highway.

Fantastic! Thanks!

I tried to take the plug out of the Hornet (see my sig). I tried a breaker bar with a 6' snipe, and I also hammered for about 30 seconds with a 3/4" impact wrench we have in our shop. Nothing was getting the plug loose. Rather than have the threads come out with the plug, I just gave up. I bought an inline block heater and put it inline with my heater core hoses. It's an 800W heater, which should be good enough. If it's not enough, though, we have a 1500W heater for a tractor laying around as well. That would be overkill, though. Inline block heater is my vote.

Thanks for all the info guys. I'll try flushing the core out this next weekend here. I have one of my wrecks all ripped apart, so I already have a standby heater core, just in case. I'll make sure to go over the heater core swap article, just in case...

The fan is pushing out plenty of air, it's just not that hot. It keeps the car warm in 30-40F weather, but at -40, it barely keeps the ice off the windshield. All of my other wagons did much better for heat output.

My '92 Loyale doesn't put out much heat, even with everything cranked up. The thermostat is working fine, I just tested it. The engine is also warming up fine, and it warms up enough to kick the electric fan on when it's been idling for a long time. The hoses going to and from the heater core get hot when the car warms up, but there still just isn't enough heat coming through the vents. My only theory is that the heater core is plugged/corroded solid on the inside. I'd rather not have to replace the heater core - is there any good way to clean out the heater core while it's still in the car? Anything I should try before I pull out the dash and dig down to the heater core?