daeron

please either fix the fuel leak immediately, or replace the wires before starting the car again!! You are saying you have a massive fuel leak AND poorly insulated spark plug wires; do you at least have an extinguisher in the car? I am not trying to browbeat; but seriously, have you ever SEEN a car fire?? they are F$^&ING SCARY.

Amen. Give Me Duct Tape or Give Me Death! No; its not like paint at all. Its more like a sponge; if any of this foam is open to the atmosphere it will wick moisture up into the crevasses in question. No way comparing work like this on a new vehicle to work like this on a rusty soob is apples to apples.. one hasn't had a chance to even get dirty, the other is already rusting out. Unless EVERY ASPECT of this repair area is dried out (mojave dry) and sealed up (space shuttle sealed) this will lead to major rust. Will it happen quickly? No telling; but living in a swamp it is the LAST thing *I* would do; I would sooner ignore the rust and let it get worse of its own accord, at its own rate. Is it worth it to anyone else? that is for them to decide based on atmospheric and road conditions, value of the car, and how well they think they can seal the foam off from the water in the rest of the world.

Bah. Fast forward ten years and its the same shapes used in the MR2, the XT6, AND it was virtually identical with the contemporary Volkswagen 914s that were sold staeside as porsches. Of course, since the 914 got the "p-word" put on it, the idiot americans gobbled it up, but the TR7 is ugly? Don't get me started on that one.

nissan maxima alternator is good for 90 amps as well; you just need to find a shop to help you put a v-belt pulley on it, spaced out the right amount, and you are set. If you go this route, go to the JY and get one there; snip the wiring harness off the car with it, the plug is different on the maxima alt. Your stock unit is an internally regulated hitachi 60 or 70 amp unit. If the parts stores dont have one and cant get you one quickly (or if its uber expensive) try asking for one from a 1982 non turbo nissan 280ZX; should be virtually identical.

is that a porsche replicar in your avatar?? if so, is it VW powered or soobie??

if taking the radiator out intimidates you, then you need to find someone else to work on your engine. For most of us, taking the radiator out is a five minute affair that we do simply for more room to work.

I have been meaning to look into that; I know most vehicles with a flapper-type AFM incorporate a switch there that energizes the fuel pump relay (which is also energized by the key going into the "start" position) but since mine is a hotwire MAF type (as is all SPFI) it is almost definitely switched inside the ECU. My guess is that the ECU is signaled by the CAS? In any case, I am not entirely certain, nor does it matter (as long as I continue having no fuel pump issues, heh.)

first off, it should be a GL-10. Secondly, did you have the green connectors plugged in? that is necessary for setting the timing; think of it as "disabling the vacuum advance" on a carb'ed car.

list of problems in 40,000 miles (106K-146K) for me: I got the car because it needed timing belts. Put them on, no preparation, no book, only my bare skull wrench to get me through the job. Rear brakes (haynes books lists the 4wd specs for rear castle nut torque under "specs" and fails to mention 2wd models have much much lower torque rating, which leads me to...) Rear Wheel Bearings Alternator (easy fix, just some $$ because I was 40 miles from home and had no choice but to buy from the parts store that had it) Starter (I RE BUILT the one in the car after it completely died, and all I did was disassemble, clean, shrug and hope that the worn out brushes would work better after the cleaning, and it worked great for about four months of pizza delivery starting ten to twenty times a day; then a JY starter went in and no problems since) Ignition switch (I opted to install a relay and do the job "right" where most just throw in a pushbutton switch. I have had enough electrical fires; I will take the relay thankyouverymuch.) Throttle position sensor (this one was a simple piece of cake, just involved some disassembly) Separately, in order, a thermostat, then radiator hose, then water pump, then head gaskets (replacing the radiator along the way) Only I can be blamed for this. I was ignorant of the "don't let it overheat" rule; in the process I went from being a hack to a real mechanic, in about 20 hours of work, total, spread over six or seven different "instances" and then there was my spark plug problem. To me, a used car is GOING to have issues. I bashed one tie rod end on a curb, but that was my fault and the rest were problems that A. were bound to occur in an old used car AND B. were VERY easy to isolate, diagnose, and repair. Look at alternator locations on cars in the junkyard. Look at starter locations. MAYBE a head job is a bit simpler on your standard I4 FWD econobox, but thats pushing it. if the EA82 has a "problem-prone" service life of 200-350K miles or higher, than I will STILL take it over a honda, an escort, a cavalier, a toyota.. even a similar vintage Nissan, and I LIVE by the Rising Sun (and its accompanying blue bar ) "Reliable" is a dangerous word; it shouldn't carry an aura of "no-breakie!" with it, it should only mean what I said above: easy to isolate and diagnose and repair problems when they occur. Problems WILL come up on any car; and any model WILL have individual "lemons" so to speak, but in the end I wholeheartedly love the design and engineering that went into our little trapezoid mobiles. and I don't even own a 4wd!!! EDIT I left out the single most PITA job I have had thus far!!! The DAMN TURN SIGNAL FLASHER!!! took me over three hours to find that piece of crap!

get the smaller one, the first on the page you linked; Ishino brand. It used to say it, but that IS the OEM part.

alot of the time you can simply bend the tabs on the underside of the oil cap down. The key is bending them down enough to tighten the fit without making it too tight to put on. If you need a new seal, those are more commonly available than you might think.. easy to find one in the junkyard at least.

did you tap the starter with a hammer while holding the key in start? If that works, then you need a new starter; or you need to rebuild the one you have; its a solenoid failure. You could also splice in a relay, as explained here: http://www.ultimatesubaru.org/forum/showthread.php?t=74632 It is long but it spells everything out; if you understand parts of it you can skim that, and if you know nothing about electricity you can read it all and figure the problem out. but most people go with the simpler, pushbutton solution. The relay is something along the lines of fire insurance.

check for AC voltage at the battery, step one. Rule out every thing that has not been independently ruled out as the possible source of this problem. You say you have all new wires; I say you have a bunch of un tested connections until you have independently verified them as good, given your current problem status. You ran a new charging wire from the alternator to the fusible link block as a part of your alternator retrofit? or as a part of your SPFI swap? The charging wire typically goes to the link block, and thence to the battery; they share a common connection point to the car's electrical system at the fusible link box if I am not mistaken. (I may be, I don't know YOUR car in particular.. I am just trying to help, not browbeat ) The last thing to do is rule out the simple stuff "intellectually" without testing it. Thats how I beat my head against a poor running engine for two months when, the whole time, it was a beautiful set of spark plugs that I didn't have the money to just replace to cover my tail, that was causing all my grief. (They didn't show up as sparking yellow until the car practically refused to run, and I was out of work for three months surviving on Ramen Noodle. Stop Laughing! )

hey listen lady.. I have been awake FAR TOO LONG to take any of your jibber-jabber! :-p

Wagon??? PM misledxcracker before it goes to the boneyard! if memory serves he is currently in Arizona, no clue how near or far from you.. Sorry, I don't have any wiring diagrams. :-\ I hate to seem like a vulture, but I saw that you were in AZ so I had to say something, since gloom and doom was being strewn about. Finding shorts in wiring can be a MAJOR hassle, but it isnt impossible... how badly do you want to save this car, and how familiar with using a multimeter are you? I can try to help; but it is too late right now for me to write one of my book length posts about electricity that cover all sixty million bases, especially if you are familiar with a half dozen or so of those bases... you get my drift? PS it really isnt THAT complex; just respond

Well, you bought it with blown headgaskets, yet it developed HLA clatter when you fixed it? So it ran before, without making lifter noises? The only O rings that should matter are the cam case o rings, one per side, and they should be replaced every time the engine is apart, with OEM brand only. Good news is, OEM brand is available thru thepartsbin.com for uber-cheap. The OEM ones are metal re inforced. It sounds like you MAY have already known all that, but I had to make it abundantly clear from the get go. I just went and re read the procedure in the FSM, and when the hla's are not supposed to be able to be depressed more than 0.5 mm when sitting in a cup full of oil. The book says So, maybe you need to install the new HLAs after all; you said that they moved very freely, which sounds to me like more than 0.5mm, but maybe I am misinterpreting something. http://ch601.org/engines.htm Subaru EA82 parts 1 and 2. Its from the FSM for an 89 GL, but the engine is still the same.

heli-coil, and lots of loctite. Not as cheap as the 7/16ths (?) stud fix, but less than welding the head. Or, cut the flanges off the Y pipe, rotate them 90 degrees, and use the other set of stud holes? EA81 have them? Again, not as cheap as the standard stud fix, but it could be worse.

Beat me to the bunch, good show old bean. Cam Case O-rings. They are metal re-inforced O-rings that go in between the cam case and the cylinder head proper. They seal up the passageway that the oil travels into the camshaft lube channels from the lower portion of the cylinder head, and the first units were not all metal re inforced; nor non OEM replacement parts. They are available from thepartsbin (OEM brand) for ridiculously cheap.. Patience DOES often pay off, too.. but don't ignore a real problem by telling yourself "I am just being patient." In other words, I am not saying th Cam O ring IS the problem, but I am not saying that there is NO problem either. If you truly feel that this issue has persisted without finding its proper cause, thats the last place to check after mickey mouse seal, poor oil pressure, and the rest are ruled out. Once you have ruled out the cam case o rings its time to presume you have bad lifters, although they CAN be "checked" with the cylinder head dismantled. See the FSM for that procedure.

Logic, why don't they teach Logic in these Schools!!! I always thought it Ironic that a company tries to sell magazines that tell you what is the best product to buy. I don't put too much faith in anyone trying to sell me something.

Sorry, but I gotta ask, since the GL-5 has always interested me (seeing as how I own a GL 9.5 ) Is it a GL-5 because its only got the 1600 cc engine? IE, with an EA81 the same car woulda been a GL-10?? or am I TOTALLY off base with that?

@ Loyale 2.7 Turbo for the pics. Problems have Solutions.....

whoa, I was useful! That looks exactly like the first XT I ever rode in; somehow I lucked out and got to go with Mom and Dad when they went for the test drive (in Boone, NC) before the old man bought his '6.. IIRC, the test drive car was an 88, and I *want* to say it was an EA82 XT (of course I didn't know it as such at the time; just that it was the four cylinder instead of the 6) but I may be wrong about that.. I can't recall IF the 6 even came in an 88 model year. I know the test drive car was an 88 tho... I say "lucked out" because it was one of the very very VERY few things that I got that my two younger brothers didn't while growing up.. My older brothers each received privileges of age in turn, and it seems like when MY turn came around, my little brothers' came at the same time.. (birth years were 72, 74... 80 (me) 83 and 85, so I was sort of the eldest of the youngest and as such got screwed on alot.) Anyhow, it is GREAT to know that I helped revive an XT6, in whatever way! Congrats, now go find some twisties!!!!!!!!!

could also be a decaying charging wire, a bad fusible link or connection, bad battery cable/terminal... with the car running, jiggle and twist and bend every plug, and every inch of every wire between the battery, alternator, and fusible link block, as well as wiggling all fusible links in their plugs. Have someone watch the volt meter, or better yet go to harbor freight and get a multimeter on the cheap (under five bucks.) Home depot has the same cheap multimeter for around ten bucks, maybe 15. Even a cheapo multimeter is an invaluable tool to have.

+ a billion, I know a guy who almost got killed doing just this. NOT that his scenario is a likely one, but it is a DISTINCT possiblity... at LEAST as real as the chances of pulling out onto the freeway and getting killed. In other words, don't be scared; but be aware.

IIRC, most of the horsepower difference cane be accounted for byt lower compression, and EA82 SPFI pistons swap straight in.. SO if you wanted to get some pistons, and rings, and do a refresh on the motor, in the end you would have what many feel to be the best blend of the two. Lots of EA81s in hobbyist airplanes; not many EA82s. Timing belt snapping on the interstate, == aww crap. Timing belt snap on the jet stream == ker-plat. They (apparently) are a bit less prone to overheating (and therefore headgasket) problems as well. ALSO, if memory serves, the EA82 intake manifold is a bit better flowing?? there is some reason that many will swap it over, at least. It is a slightly narrower engine.. but other than those differences they are VERY similar for all practical purposes. From what I have read (I have no firsthand experience with the OHV motor) the 81 is probably the better engine for an exotic project motor like your trike.. but the difference is piddling. course, you COULD go for the LPG high copression blowthru turbo OHV setup.. THAT would be fun...