tforce

Before I go the route of just replacing the rear ext there's one question that's been nagging at me. I've read a few posts about the tube that sends fluid to the rear ext housing coming loose. I'm not clear on that one. Does it come loose inside the tranny or the rear ext? I'm hesitant to take the chance of putting together a good ext housing and then find out that the problem is inside the main part of the tranny.

That would be handy. I'll see if I can put together a decent Ext housing and maybe try that first. The tranny does have some other signs that make me wonder though. Shifts have been a little rough when it's cold and it takes awhile before it will shift from 3rd to 4th as it warms up. I did have to reseal the tranny pan recently...maybe it's leaking again and the fluid is getting low.

On the passenger side of the tranny right behind the bellhousing. Pictures here. http://autorepair.about.com/library/faqs/bl833h.htm

I saw this in another thread so I decided to try it just out of curiosity. I jacked up the drivers side of the car, unplugged the TCU, started the car and put it in neutral. Both wheels started spinning forward. I hit the brakes and after that, just the front wheel spun. I could move the rear wheel by hand in either direction while the front wheel was spinning and I could stop the front wheel by hand. There wasn't enough power behind it to move the car. Putting it in gear only got movement out of the front wheel. I plugged the TCU back in and tried it again. Same deal except the rear wheel didn't spin this time. I got a tiny bit of movement out of the rear wheel for just a second when I put it in Reverse. I have no idea what that means aside from fluid flowing where/when it shouldn't and I still need to swap the tranny. Just thought I'd share.

No TB in limp mode. Time for a tranny swap or maybe just time to get rid of the car and move on....or maybe I'll just park it till spring and work on it then. Anyone want an LSI for a project? It's got a few dings and rust spots already and it needs suspension work so it's a prime candidate for becoming an offroad toy.

I do have the old speed sensor so I'll have to track down an analog meter. The AWD did work at one point. I replaced the old tranny with a used one that had TB. I swapped the old rear ext on after grinding down the grooves on the clutch. Everything worked fine till the speedo bounce showed up. Replaced the speedo and that seemed to cure it...pretty much. AWD always seemed to be a little off after that but it did work for the most part. I'm curious to see what results I get from test #1. I doubt it's the sensor because I replaced it with the one from the old tranny and nothing changed but I'll test it anyway. Thanks John.

Well, the AWD has stopped working again. The first hard snow hit the other day and........suck. No indications as to what the problem is. No CEL, AT Oil Temp Light, Torque Bind, Speedo Bounce....nothing. Just no AWD. Tranny is shifting fine. Just replaced the pan gasket and the fluid looked fine. I little bit of sparkle in the bottom and some gunk on the magnet but no burning, metal fragments or anything else obviously wrong. Getting tired of working on this car. Was just about to put in a new steering rack, halfshaft and reseal the oil pan. Needs new struts and assorted suspension bushings too. Anyone have any deeper insights on what could be causing this issue? I have access to another tranny but I'm not sure I really wanna keep pouring time and money into this thing.

I would love to know where you get them for $20. Most of the local yards wanted $70+ to bring them in from another yard cuz they didn't have anything out back. I finally found a lot that had one left (out of 5 or 6 cars) for $35. Front end wreak so it wasn't in the dash anymore and the bezel was hosed.....don't know how long the thing was exposed to the weather.....and they still wanted the full $35. Luckily it still works. No more speedo bounce and the AWD seems to be working. Waiting for one last snow storm to really test it out. Thanks again for the help.

Gauge cluster was fine. No loose screws. VSS isn't stripped. I'm assuming I need to replace the speedo....is there anyway to test it to make sure it's bad?

Auto. Parts are from the old tranny and worked fine before it was pulled. Haven't checked the gauge cluster but will do that next. Thanks for explaination on the speedometer system Woods.

Didn't want to start a new thread so I'm hoping someone will pick up on this. I have swapped out both speed sensors and still have speedo bounce below 20mph.....doesn't tend to happen when the car is cold and first driven. Pan bolts were loose so some fluid had leaked out. Tightened em up, topped off fluid and things seem a little better than before. AWD seems to be decent above 30mph or so but barely there at driveway speeds. Rear left and front right wheels spun when I had the car lifted. Wandering where to go next. TCU, ECU, gauge cluster, pressure test the line to the tail housing? Just say screw it and put in a cheap tranny that I know is good?

Subaru recommended using a Vacu Bleeder.....never seen or heard of that but assuming it's a powered vacuum device of some sort. I just bled the system like you would a brake system. Only got a few small bubbles. Seems to fine working fine at the moment....weird. Can still push the slave cyl in by hand and pump the system back up to normal working pressure. Any recommendations on brand or place to buy a calibration box?

I know it's been awhile but I finally got the car fixed. I found a 03 Forester tranny at a shop in Bend, OR for $650. He got the tranny with torque bind and put a rear ext from another used tranny on it. The Forester has different inputs for the front driveaxles so the guy swapped the Forester inputs for the ones off my tranny and kept my old tranny for the work. There was nothing obviously broken in the old tranny but there was small flecks of metal scattered throughout the transmission....mainly in the teeth on some of the pieces in the rear ext. As far as we can tell the front driveaxle seals were leaking and the transmission got too hot. There were scorch marks in several spots. The most noticeable was on the areas between chambers where the carrier bearings sit. Car is driving great but there are two issues looming. 1. The speedo gear in the tranny is different then one on the Legacy my speedometer is reading 5mph higher than my actual speed. Anyone ever swapped one of these or know if can be swapped? I wouldn't care except I'm planning to sell the car. 2. Either my Master or Slave cylinder on the clutch system is failing but I don't know how to figure out which one it is. No leaks anywhere. No air in the system. The system randomly loses pressure slowly but can then be pumped up and then it's fine for awhile. I can push the plunger on the Slave cylinder by hand and recreate the pressure loss. Takes me about 30 secs to pump the system back to full pressure.

I can't seem to find the right wrench for pulling the front VSS. Crescent wrench is just going to strip it out. It's not a 17 or a 16mm, not a 5/8ths. 16.5mm maybe? Anyone have any tips on getting this thing out?

The oil seemed fine. The clutch is good. Do I need any special tools to open up the tranny?

Fair enough. I've got one of those on the spare tranny too!

Ok. You obviously have some experience with this. What do you think it is? Instrument cluster.....bad connections?

No speedo cable....yay! I unplugged the front sensor and the speedo didn't work at all. So, I happen to have spare tranny and am going to rob the rear speed sensor from it. If that doesn't fix it I'll be back with more questions. Any tips or cautionary words on replacing the rear sensor?

No flashing ATF light. I'll check on the cable tomorrow and go from there. Thanks for the quick response Nipper. Too many car issues lately and I really need to focus on the house. It's reassuring that it may be a quick fix.

Any good way to tell which one has failed?

Never really got anywhere on this before I got busy with other things. Starting to think about it again so I thought I'd try to revive the thread. The car rolled just fine with the clutch disengaged. Pulled it out of the car and the clutch is fine. No metal in the oil that I saw...nothing big and shiny anyhow. Really hard to move through the gears. Talked to the Subaru Guru in Seattle and he said ring and pinion failure before I even finished telling him what happened. Anyone torn one of these apart? I'm wondering if I can fix this thing myself. I can get a rebuilt for $1700 but it would be really tight on the bank to drop that right now. Junkyard tranny with decent miles is looking like $1000 - $1500. Maybe I could drop in a tranny from an older GT? I just want to get it running and sell it. It's killing my garage space and I really want to move onto finishing my EA2EJ project.

95 Lsi Sedan AT AWD 170k'ish Speedo bounces from 0-20mph. Gonna check tomorrow and see if I have a cable or not. Started doing it this summer. Car still seemed to run/drive fine so I didn't think much about it. AWD quit working. No CEL or AT lights. Did a tail housing pull and grind gooves repair last winter to fix torque bind. Worked great all winter. Did not replace my Duty C.....oops? I thought I noticed something off about the AWD this summer on some gravel hills but I never got stuck or anything so I thought I was just imagining it. Started up my snow and ice driveway last night and had to try 3 times before I made it. I've got really good studded tires. No help at all coming from the rear wheels. Gotta get those babies back in the game. Duty C? VSS? Bad AT Temp light not telling me something is wrong?

Pulled the engine out of my 95 legecy and R&R'd all the oil seals, resealed the oil separator cover, new water pump and thermo, timing kit, oil pressure sender, inner pass side timing cover. Got the engine back in and it wouldn't run for SH(#. I'd start it up and it would run rough (missing) for a few seconds and then die. CEL was on and would start flashing if I tried to rev it up. Turns out that water had pooled around the spark plugs when I hosed off the top of the engine to clean off all the oil from the leaking Oil PS.....Ooops. Runs great now but I forgot to shift the timing tension plunger to the left before I pulled the pin. And I maybe should have replaced the driver side HLA's but the tick really isn't that bad.

Didn't bother reading the whole thread but I did have a similar problem with my 2002 Lego. Car would try to stall sometimes when I pressed the clutch in but corrected itself before it died. Turned out to be a combo of a bad IACV and a fried shunt in the ECM. Replaced both and it pretty much went away. Every now and then it will throw a CEL with the same code but without any stalling or any other issue.....just throws a code randomly. Turns out that some of the ECM's were programmed with too narrow of a parameter set associated with the IACV. Supposedly you can get your ECM flashed to widen the parameters and cure it. But it's really hard to find a dealer that knows about it. Gresham Subaru in OR had to dig into their troubleshooting laptop to find any info on it for me....wasn't on any bulletins, etc. Haven't bothered yet cuz it only throws the code once or twice a year and caused zero problems.....no reason to spend the money.

I have that hard shifting issue from 1-2, but only when the car is cold. And once it's made the shift the 1st time, it's smooth from then on. I'll check the grounds and see what I find there. I had a 99 OBW years ago that started having major tranny problems and it was due to a wiring problem under the dash. I didn't know #$## about cars at the time so I got overwhelmed and just got rid of the car. Kinda wish I still had that thing.