smelly_cat

I had the wackest short to the wire to the shut off solinoid . it would wiggle and then make the spark plugs miss or something. I did not figure it out so I changed the plugs and the wires....it did not help. When it finally broke and shorted out, the whole ignition fuse blew while I was goin 55mph. No lights in the dash at all. Just sort of coasted to a stop in a state of confusion. Like a Atom Bomb fried all the electonics I taped the wire . and took the little needle /pin out of that solinoid . Now my car wants to run for 10 seconds when I turn it off. Does this hurt anything? Are those Carb gas solinoids sold any where? sc

Al right, got the wires for 14 bucks. Put em in. pretty nice. Car still runs like manure. It runs even worse when it rains, really worse . So do you think the dist and cap is bad. IS there supposed to be a rubber gasket between the dist cap and te dist body? My other thought is I got some bad gas SC

I got out my water squirt bottle and layed the magic tap water spray on the vac lines. no sputters, except on that breather thing that goes to the float chamber. Then it got dark , so I ran the engine and the coil wire to the dist was arc'n all over the place. I routed it over air cleaner. maybe that will help. I do believe that its time to replace the factory plug wires. SC

Well , I had a good few months but now my sweet Gl with a 1800cc 5 spd Carb engine is acting funny. Starts Good. idles great. When I accelerate it feels like its missing. The car does not conk out and it will pull me over a hill, but it stumbles and misses. I think its spark related but the Tachometer is smooth and I thought if it was missing it would make the needle bump around a bit. The plugs looked fine. So I gapped them and put them back in. What do ya think.. SC

Bucky, Deal, but instead of brakes, get my 85 toyota van going. I changed the head gasket and and I can get it started. I wish it had a carb and not FI. SC

Replace pads and turn front rotors on 83 GL SW How I spent Saturday by SmellyCat The ole GL was was locking the right front wheel when braking so I decided to fix it once and for all... Brake jobs are easy on toyotas and Hondas, so I figured 2 hrs tops, What could go wrong? I have replaced the pads in the GL a few times but never turned the rotors. Now I know why! First loosened the wheel lugs, which had been last set by the tire store and bent my tire iron and pretty much set the tone for this day. Set the E brake , loosen the 4 bolts holding the rotor to the axle /lug plate. Then there is a great big nut holding the plate to the axle, I dont have a socket and can't find my big adjustable wrench, Raid my neighbors tool box. nothing, Decide to abort this job. Then find a big monkey wrench used for turning pipes. Presto.. off the jumbo nut came, Feeling pretty proud of myself until i discover the lug axle plate is pressed on. ARG!. I hammer on it a bit. Spray some liquid wrench, pry with a crow bar. decide to abort. But no, I'm no quitter. Drive to town, go to autozone, they rent tools for free. Nuckle head store clerk and I go look at the tools they have and he says they dont have a puller that will work. Goto to Advance, nothing, then i go to this cheap china tool place and splurge 9 bucks for crappy puller. In business again. Drive home, Figure out how to use the puller. nothing. then spray, hammer,tighen puller. BOING! off comes the rotor. Oh yea!. release E brake and take off pads . jack left side of car and Discovered that I should have loosened the 4 axle /lug plates bolts and the big axle nuts on both sides before I took the rotor and pads off the right side. Somehow go them it loose. While using my new 9 buck puller , i hear a crack. now the puller is in 3 pieces, Grrrrr. Back to town with the rotor i did get off. Maybe an example of what I'm doing will score me a free rent puller at advance. I see the 1st store clerk but ask a diff one . He says ya you need a ABC puller or something like that. we go to the shelf. I pay a deposit, go home , BOING off comes rotor 2. I am in hour 4 of this job by now. Back to town, with my worn rotors, THe store that has a turning machine, first makes fun of my little subaru rotors. they thought they we so tiny and cute. and decide to let the girl clerk turn them. Its her first time turning rotors. then they decide to measure the rotor wear, I say "Im paying cash" and "Im not buying new ones", just turn them $%##%& rotors. (maybe I'm starting to get frustrated). Im in luck, no rotors need to be done ahead of me so they start turning righ away. By the way new rotors cost 31 bucks each and have to order. I go to eat , shop at goodwill, Bought a industrial vacuum cleaner for $4.99, My old vacuum was destroyed when one of my kids was sucking up loose change and quarter lodged in the impeller and exploded it. 20 hard black plastic blades fell out out of the vac and the motor smelled like an electrical fire when you ran it anyway. Back to Brakes. 45 minutes later. I get to the rotor store and they are still turning the first rotor since it was tapered, (I have had worn rotors and warped rotors and glazed rotors, but tapered is new. They had to turn it 3 times, Now its the width of grahm cracker, but I dont care., I decide to hang around till the 2nd one is done, While waiting i wander thru the Chevy dealer car lot and consider crushing the subaru and spending $39,000 on a new 4x4 truck. 40K for a truck!, can you believe that? Back at the brakes..Got 2 freshly turned rotors, I can see the front wheel bearings with all the stuff removed, and they don't look all globbed with grease , my chilten book is worthless on the subject, I post a question on the site, " should I smush a handfull of wheel grease in there" and wait. ding, some one viewed it, no answer, Ding viewed again no answer, So i give up, start putting the rotors on. Smashed my thumb. WHich still hurts today. When I'm finally done , i see that I got a response 2 minutes after I gave up on the post question, . Just part of this great day . Yes put some grease in there OK.. start puttin in the new pads ...Oh yea.. I need to screw in the brake cylinder, I can't find my channel locks. GO to 3 neighbors before I find one I can borrow. Start screwing the piston in , It turns maybe a 1/6 of a revoulution each time. My hands are tired , the channel locks slip and I squeeze the side of my hand in the channel locks, What a pretty red blood blister. I get it all together, bled the brakes. They are squishy, but they stop, I'm just pumping them a few times when I stop. I figure the brake cylinder needs to turn it self out and close the gap I made when I screwed it in. Its Sunday, the start of a new day. my hands really hurt, maybe some cold beer will help. Thanks for reading this! I feel much better now... Smelly cat

Point taken. SC

Darn it 2 minutes after I gave up on anyone telling me what to do. Then I put it all back together. and Cuda tells me to stuff it full of grease. Next brake job I will reload some grease . thx. sigh ..Oh well. SC

THis is what i do. get a buddy, tell em to pump the pedal 3 times slow and then hold the pedla to the floor. Then you turn the bleeder nipple and it squirts fluid out. in a rag or on your paint, in your eye , or if you got some fish tank airline hose. stick that on and it will channel into a cup.. any way do that a couple times. CHECK the brake resevoir. FIll it up. Now do the whole car. Start at the whell farest a way back pass one. do the pump pump hole it. bleed - tighten it repeat then the other back then the farset front the the driver sid front. KEEP refilling the fluid resevoir or you will be pump air in to the lines and it will make you sad Oh ya. My brakes are crappy too (after turning rotors and pads today). But I expect the cly to screw itself out sooner or later. just drive carefulle and think a ahead. Just in case you got no brake. Maybe practice stopping withe E brake to get practice. E Oh ya make sure the Emergency brake is off when you bleed the lines. Cheers. SC

Guess I will put is back together.sc

I guess you have to drive around a bit or something. Stomp the pedal. I am doing the same brake job right now and I figure the mast cyl will get tight after a while . Maybe take the emerg brake off and see what happens. Bleed the line get the air out. then drive slow ..see if U stop

stop stop You have to screw the cyl in . get some channel locks and start turning that piston in. I did the same thing once and still feel like a %$# for it

Right now I have the rotors off and I am about to put it all back together, Therr does not seem to be the gobs of wheel bearing grease in there like I usually have in other cars. Is it proper to smoosh a handfull of wheel grease in there before I put the rotors and new pads on , or is it supposed to be so lightley greased. sc

Since i parked it under a tree in 98 and Got it runnin in 2006, I have not even looked at the plugs.. I did rebuild the carb. what a mess that was. I also have never set the valves. what do ya think? Should the valves need a tweak ? SC

I have the 5 speed, drive about 9 miles to wark 3-5 stoplights. so maybe 25-27 is pretty good. th sc

i drove 376 miles and only got 25 mpg. is that good? SC

Well thanks guys. I did alot of checking and wire pulling etc but now the car is running fine and not going dead. Oh Oh Oh is magic, I also learned I have a gremlin and not a goblin. must me goblin spring break. . SC

I put the meter on the charger. just for fun. set to AC. I got like 23 volts ac. I thought huh? so I went to the store and got another charger. metered it and got 23 ac volts. So I guess the meter on the charger just reads that and that is ok. Yay I have 2 chargers now Good Idea Couger . I will chek the ac on th battery tomorrow, It does look like the battery is gassing some so its on its last leg probaly

Hey everyone thanks for the wisdom. The car was stone dead this morning. I charged it for 20 minutes and Vroom.. which seems like to short a time to get that much juice in the battery . I multimetered the GL Battery ,,engine off 12.2 Battery ,, engine running 13.9 The Alt gauge shows its charging I found the fuse links, I think. Are they braided red and blue cables in a little box near the battery? I pulled them out and put them back in to clean the connections. I have wiggled and pulled on lots of wires and things Gloyales comment made me think that maybe my battery charger is going fruity and pouring AC in with the DC when it charges and that maybe why I saw all the wierdness. . I need to meter the charger. I am starting to think that my starter has had it.. When i give the battery extra juice and assistance with the charger , the starter turns over like a champ/ But that does not really explain the complete deadness that just started occuring SC

10 4, I'll give it a good look in the day. and post the result ac

My 83 GL SW went dead as a post. No light, no buzz, no reason. ..nothing. I put a charger on the battery and it drew very few amps so I think the battery is ok. While the charger is on. , I turn the key. The wipers start going , even though they are turned off, the RPM gauge read 4000 rpm and the engine is off. Just a weak click on the starter when the key is turned. What the heck? So i try 5 minutes later. Vrooom, alls fine. drive around no problem. , I try to restart and nothing . same thing. So I change the battery, nothing.. but ghost wipers and phantom rpm gauge. I hook up the charger to the 2nd battery. 10 mintues. vROOM. RUNNING. ANy ideas?. SC

Well it took me 2 months but I finally checked the wires. when i ground them . the reserve light goes on or the the gauge goes all the way to Full. So it appears the sending unit is a POS. I just reread, I need to check the ground . BRB SC

This is a great post. Since I saw a picture of were the EGR is. I am going to check it out and see why my ECS or egr light comes on after driving 15 minutes. SC

GD, You are way above my repair intellegence. Your FI HTML was very cool. I might be able to change a Carb but converting to FI is too awsome for me. I'm impressed that it can even be done. I am intriqued to get a Carb rebuild kit from Subaru to see it the &&*%$$%%$ float valve will start working with a OEM. Oh, does my 84 GL have a computer somewhere? I have not found it if it does? I do have a ECU light that comes on after about 15 minutes that maybe from a CPU. SC

Lithium grease in a spray can. close your eyes and blast all pedal hinges S/C