RedLance

I have had pretty good luck with a product called Iron Out. Nowhere does it say NOT to use it on copper or alluminum. I have used it on 2 radiaotors so far, and it didn't hurt either one of them. Got a pile of crap out of the junk yard one, though. RedLance

Here is the scan of the picture in the magazine. I was trying to get it zoomed in enough to read the text, but got a little carried away. Least you can see it. RedLance

It's titled: Hawaii Top Truck Challenge & Show Off I'm trying to get the jankitty scanner here at work to make a scan of it...here it is: Doh! I can't just insert an image...and I don't have access to my home server from work...oh well, I tried. RedLance

Living in Nebraska, one can not go to a gas station which does not sell an ethanol blended gasoline. The Gas N Shop that I frequent sells 87 octane regular unleaded, and 89 octane super unleaded, which is 10% ethanol. The owners manul for my 86 XT specifically says that one is NOT to run ethanol blends as the primary fuel. It runs like crap on 87 octane, and 93 octane is ~.20 higher per gallon. Are the old stories about ethanol eating stuff just a myth? Or have things changed so that now ethanol dosen't eat things? I run it in all my other engines, and haven't had a problem. Anybody have any thoughts on this? Thanks! RedLance

Well, I got the engine out last night. Pull the head off, and closely inspected the #2 cylinder walls. They are as close to perfect as you can get. Mirror polish, factory cross hatching still visable. Piston looks to be in fine shape. So, I put the piston at BDC, and poured some gasoline into the cylinder, to see if it would leak past. It never did. Safe to assume the rings are okay? Also, I bolted on the old head, and did a compression check by turning it over by hand with a socket on the front. Got about 30psi, which is more then I ever got before. Swapped the rebuilt head back on and got 60psi. Had been noticing that the cam carrier didn't really seat right when I put it on. Got to looking into that, and finally discovered that the intake valve for the #2 cylinder is .045" longer then the other 3 valves in the head. Brought both #2 valves into town, so I can have the intake ground down. I think that will finally fix it. Though I also discovered that my rack and pinion needs new boots and seals, so I'll be doing that while the engine is out, along with adding an oil cooler, and remote mount filter. And new tranny cooler lines. And tranny cooler. And a new tranny filter. And probably ball joints. Oh, and a passenger side half shaft. And I need to seal my wheels, since the tires keep going flat over about a week...And the rear air shocks leak too, but I got new mounts for the compressor...I never realized it was supposed to be that quite. :-) Then I need to get the drivers door replaced, and a paint job, and I think I'll be happy with it for a while...So :moon: to those few people who suggested I give up on it. (No one on this board) Thanks for listening(reading) RedLance

GLCraigGT: Yeah, I already checked the valves...read about that saga over here. PoorManzImpreza: Why, yes, that I am! bbs53: It's only got 80,000 miles on it, but yeah, I will go ahead and check everything I can while I have it apart. I have been down to the short block, and the tops of the pistons look great, so I don't think any are broken. And I already have a full set of FSM for 1986, and yeah, they are awsome. Thanks! RedLance

Well, I can whip one up for you that you could keep, but not till Sunday, and you'd still have to get a bar type torque wrench...though those can be "rented" for free from places like Western Auto RedLance

So, it looks like I'll be re-yanking the engine from my XT, and splitting it to search for my lost compression. Anybody have any brands of bearings/rings to AVOID? I've never rebuilt anything bigger then a 4hp go-kart motor. The last Subie engine I took apart is still apart, cuz the pistons are seized to the wrist pins, and I don't have the cash for new ones. Any recomendations for pistons? Also, what's the company that does inexpensive cam replacment/regrinds? I thought I read on here about a place that would do it for under $50 for an EA81 N/A...but I might be on crack too. The cylinder walls appear to be fine, so I think I can get by with just a good hone job. Will I need oversize rings for this? Or do I just have to check the bore when I'm done honing and see what fits? And where can I get a decent inexpensive digital micrometer, for checking the crank surfaces? I have plastigage too... (Note the use of the word inexpensive as opposed to cheap) Fun fun! Thanks RedLance

Well, I know that on my girlfriends 81 EA81, I got the block far enough apart to reach in and unbolt the rod caps. Then I finished splitting the block, and pushed the pistons with rods, out the tops of the cylinders. I don't know if I can do that with this engine or not. It's only got 80,000 on it, so I didn't bother with trying to split the block. Apparently I should have gone ahead and done the whole thing. I guess it's been over heated a bunch of times. Might have fried the bearings too... What diameter rod is that tool made out of? Thanks! RedLance

Well, I haven't had the piston out, but the bore looks to be in fine shape and the top of the pistone looks fine too...I suppose I could have melted/damaged a ring, 4 years ago, when it overheated...which is why I torn it down to begin with. And if I have to tear the pistons out, I'll need that spiffy piston pin removal tool, that nobody has...Or do you guys just split the block, and pull them out the bottom? Any help greatly appreciated. RedLance

Greetings! I have been working on my 86 XT GL-10 4WD Turbo for several weeks now, trying to track down the source of no compression on #2 cylinder. It started after I torn it down to a short block, and installed rebuilt heads, and all new gaskets. It ran after this, but never idled right, and had no power until the boost came on. I thought it was a bad/stuck/dirty fuel injector, but finally, I did a compression check and found #1 and #3 had 120lbs, and #4 had 130lbs, but #2 had only 10lbs. Suspected either a bad or damaged (new) head gasket, or the head still had a crack. Removed the head, found no cracks anywhere, and the gasket looked okay too. Decided it had to be the valves. Removed the valves and found they weren't seating correctly. Hand lapped the valves, and they looked okay after that. Reassembled, 0lbs of compression. Disassembled again, bolted cam carrier to head, with head off of engine, and discovered the valves were being held open. Was told you had to bleed the lash adjusters down. Did that, reassembled, still 0lbs. #4 cylinder still has 120lbs. Does anybody have any idea what to look at next? The water pump on my Crown Vic is starting to go, so I won't be able to drive it much longer, so I really need my XT going. Thanks! RedLance

Yeah, I could do that too. I was just wanting to know if there was a way to gut it out. If I'm going to be cutting and welding anyway, I'll just wait till I get my tubing bender and make a custom downpipe. Thanks! RedLance

Until I get the time to sort through all the parts I have, and pick out something to sell, I would be willing to donate hosting space, if anybody needs it. I have redundant DNS, web, and mail servers set up, with quite a bit of HD space, currently sitting on a 768/640 ADSL line. Not top of the line by any means, but better then some. RedLance

Hmmm... It should be fairly obvious...black rectangle, about .5 inch, by about 1.5 inch, should be directly in front of the drivers side seat rail... I'll take a picture of mine when I'm working on it next. Mine are GL-10's though, I don't know if that makes a difference of not. RedLance

Just to sum up and clarify a bit: You start with no belts on, and both cam's at 12 o'clock, and the flywheel at the middle of the three marks. Install the rear belt, being sure to not leave slack at the bottom, torque the belt to 12lbs, and tighten the tensioner. Turn the engine 360 degrees, and line up the middle mark again. First cam will now be at 6 o'clock, second cam will still be at 12 o'clock. Install front belt, leaving no slack on the top this time. Torque the belt to 12lbs, and tighten the tensioner. Step 3: Profit! I may be the only one who actually torques the timing belts, but my FSM says to, so I do. I use a tool that I made myself. It consists of a flat strap of metal, about 1/4inch thick, and it's length is the diameter of the cam sprocket. I drilled two holes in it, and used broken shear pins from a 1948 New Holland HayLiner 68 hay baler as the pins to fit into the holes in the cam. Welded a 17mm nut to the middle, and off I went. Willing to replicate if demand surfaces. RedLance

Yeah, except I'm talking about the cat in the down pipe on my Turbo. There are 90 degree bends on either side of the cat. How am I supposed to get a crow bar bast the bend to knock the innards out? I just removed the second cat, which would have been easy to gut. We don't have inspections here in Nebraska anymore. RedLance

I've spent considerable time researching Subaru's Air Suspension system. Both of my XT's are supposed to have it, but only the 86 actually does. Plus, my dad's 85 Turbo sedan has it too. Anyway, my XT will sink as I add fuel, but as soon as I turn the key back on, it levels out. You have to have the key on for it to work at all. Try leaving the key in the ON position, then go sit on the tailgate. Listen for the valves to click, and the sound air entering the shocks. Plus, it should rise back up. Each strut/shock has two reed switchs in it, and a magnet. This is how it knows when to add/bleed air to/from each corner of the car. Each corner has it's own dedicated air line, from the tank/compressor assembly, so each one is independant. I'm currently trying to figure out a way to build new struts, and/or shocks for these cars, and I'm actually making progress. Hopefully they will be cheaper then the OEM units, and they will have adjustable low and high settings, so you can adjust ride height. Hope that helps. Later RedLance

On my XT's, the fuel door release is intigrated into the trunk pop, on the floor to the left of the driver's legs. Pull it up to pop the trunk, push it down to pop the fuel door. In fact, on my 86, every time I pop the trunk, the fuel door pops too, cuz when I let go of the handle, it springs down hard enough to pop it. The toggle switch is most likely something aftermarket, although it might be a replacement for the winter summer switch. Flip it, then turn the wiper on and off, to see where it parks.

I've got original dealer parts diagrams for 85 and 86 XT's on microfiche. I can make printouts at the library. What I really want is to know if I can have these digitized, so I can put them on the web. Anybody know? RedLance

These are already commercially availiable. Perma-cool makes them, as do a couple of others. Look here for the perma-cool one. Most of our older subarus will use the 3/4"-16 threads. I was surprised my self, but I found this out when I bought the pieces to relocate the filter on my 86 XT with EA82T. This means they will take a larger filter too, like a Fram PH8A, which is used on most Ford V-8's, like the 302. Did some more testing, and found that, although the older EA-81s and EA-71's call for a different filter, they are the same thread and gasket size as the shorter one the EA82T calls for. Also, the same (thread/gasket wise) as the filter for a 91 Geo 1.0 liter, as well as the PH2 that my Crown Vic uses. I hope somebody finds this to be useful in some way, shape, or form. RedLance

Well, I'm not sure. I haven't actually gotten down there to have a look at one yet. Although, it states the tubes are 3/4 inch, which is the same size or bigger then the pick-up tube in the pan, so I don't see that it would restrict flow too much... And my Subaru's only hold 1 gallon of oil, which means this cooler could pass all the oil in the engine 6 times in a minute...that seems ok to me, but I'm no oiling system engineer... RedLance

I found this oil cooler in a catalog that I get. I don't know if anybody here has priced engine oil coolers, but my NAPA told me the cheapest one they carry is around $150, and is sized for a V-8. This surplus place is right here in Lincoln, Nebraska. I have gotten lots of stuff from them, and it's all good stuff. Here is the cooler I plan to use in the spot where my intake muffler used to be. And here are all the coolers that they offer. RedLance

Andy The little brass thing is NOT a sensor, it is an actuator. Use the XT one, as it fits, leave the one wire connected to ground, as it was in the XT, and connect the other wire to the wire from your car. The smaller one, from your car, just didn't have a ground wire, as it grounded through it's body. It dosen't send to your car, your car sends to it. It's just a 12volt solenoid. When the A/C is on, your car sends 12volts to this brass thing, and it opens a valve, so your idle speed will increase, to compensate for the load that the A/C compressor adds. If you don't have A/C, just leave it unhooked. RedLance

When I replaced the PCV hoses on my XT, with the EA82T, I just used heater hose. I bought, like, 3 feet of several different sizes, and found 2 different sizes that worked out great. Hopefully, being heater hose, they will stand up to the underhood temps. And boy, are they a WHOLE lot more flexable then the ones I took off. The old ones cracked, and fell apart...Like they were thin wall PVC or something... Anyhow... RedLance

Could someone please explaine how I would go about gutting the cat on my turbo XT? I removed the second cat, and until I can get a custome downpipe bought/made I would like to gut the first cat. How do I get in there, past the two 90 degree bends, to punch out the guts? Thanks! RedLance