aaulick

That sounds great. How easy are these to find in junkyards? Any pointers or links on the modification required?

I've been looking at metal skid plates -- where do they attach to the car? If they attach to the same flimsy brackets as the plastic splash guard, banging the skid plate would just tear off the brackets.

Well, if anyone was scratching their head working out how the fan could be out of place, they can stop. The fan shroud has two thick plastic locator pins at the bottom that drop into hoops hanging off the radiator tank (or bracket). Looks like the whole fan assy got pushed up and sideways until locator pins broke out of the hoops. I wonder if I had replaced the $90 plastic splash guard under the front end last time I went breaking things this way, if it would have softened the hit enough to save the radiator, or just added one more part to break on the way.

Wow! That comment just saved me $85.

The local Subaru dealer says that the radiator for my 2001 Outback 2.5L w/manual transmission is different from the radiators for automatic transmission models. What's the difference? I don't see any distinction for aftermarket radiators, are they going to fit?

So I let the front end plastic skirt of my 2001 Outback Wagon bang down pretty hard on the ground today while backing off of a ledge that was too tall, and I cracked the plastic top of the radiator. (I now go through about 3/4 gallon of water in 15 minutes, which makes nice a nice shiny radiator!) For anyone familiar with those radiators, the crack is on the underside of the join where the plastic stand-offs to attach the fan shroud meets the vaguely tube-shaped inlet distribution channel atop the radiator. (passenger-side). The passenger-side fan blade now hits the elbow bend of the upper radiator hose as well, and the impact broke the passenger-side foglight lens as well. Questions: 1) Who the heck makes a radiator out of plastic, with nice little "break me here" levers molded into it?? Is a slightly cheaper all-metal after-market radiator going to be more reliable than stock? 2) Is there any way that some kind of epoxy is going to help me here? 3) How close is the clearance between the upper radiator hose in the passenger-side fan on an undamaged car? Besides this little crack under the stand-off, I can't find anything that actually looks bent out of shape or damaged anywhere in the assembly, but the fan blades on that side now each have a good 16th-inch deep arc-shaped bite taken out of them where they hit the hose. I can probably cut/reposition the hose or a new one so that it doesn't interfere, but does anyone have a suggestion for more places to look for bending/damage? 4) Is there some variant of the front bumper plastic that I might find in a boneyard somewhere, that would attach to a 2001 outback wagon with better ground clearance than the native version? Mine has a kind of pouty lower lip sticking out at the bottom that doesn't seem to have any purpose in life besides getting beat up and scooping mud into the foglights when driving on rough ground. Thanks, ~Adam

Well, "doesn't fully return" certainly describes it, kind of like dead people "aren't fully active". But there's no spongy or unusally light feel going on at all. I think I'll see if it happens again before I go replacing clutch parts. To the guy who has it happen when clutching and braking at the same time -- as I was getting in the car I mashed several pedals really hard because my wife left the seat all the way forward. Maybe it's triggered by stepping very hard on the clutch?

The other day a very odd thing happened: I got in my '01 outback, pushed the clutch, started, and the clutch pedal didn't come back up, but it was working anyway. It had maybe an inch or two of travel, and seemed to engage and disengage just fine in that inch or two. (at least well enough to back out of the driveway and start driving off down the hill.) I was lurching the car because normally the clutch does not engage so fast. I reached down with my hand, and pulled it up. There was a little spring resistance, and then POP, back up. It's been totally normal since then. Does this make sense to anybody? I'm pretty puzzled.

I went driving in some mud puddles for the first time yesterday in my 01 outback, and while I was cleaning the muck and plants out of my foglights afterwards I noticed that the giant plastic under-engine splashguard was all cracked and held together by zip-ties. Then after stopping for gas it was dragging on the ground, so I pitched it in the trash. Are these things good for anything? Should I bother to replace it?

Looks like I'm replacing the in-dash CD changer on my 2001 outback. (Single-DIN, separate from the radio/tape deck) I'm looking for plug-and-play at junkyard prices, but it sounds like most any of the much more common, newer units will go in without trouble. I like the weatherband feature on my radio. Do any of the newer 2-DIN combined radio/CD units get weatherband? I like the feature of some changers, that in random shuffle mode the CD changer will randomly switch disks, not just switch tracks on the current disk. Do the newer combined in-dash units do that? Can I get that feature with the under-seat changer option and existing radio, or does the radio control the shuffle behavior?

After cleaning the lens, I can play ONE disk (Pink Floyd, "Wish You Were Here") about one time in four. Once it gets going it's just fine, doesn't matter which slot the disk is in. But no other disks work at all. Sounds like something is rubbing on the CDs, but I can't tell what, and it's not leaving any marks on the CD either. I took the unit out again and watched it with the lid off while it tried to play CDs. Here's the sequence: Disk spins up scratchy noise for a second, disk slows down somewhat spins back up scratchy noise again spins back up For Pink Floyd, when it works, it starts playing at this point. For other disks: No scratchy noise. Lens-seeking noises that sound like a CD-ROM seeking across the disk in steps. disk spins down and ejects. Any further suggestions? It's probably cheaper to replace from a salvage yard than bring it in to a professional.

Heh. Dealer wants $600 for the parts (including flywheel) and EIGHT HOURS labor, or 6 1/2 hours labor if I don't replace the flywheel. Presumably at something like $100/hr but I didn't ask. An hour and a half to unbolt the flywheel and bolt on a new one?? My mechanic wants $450 for the parts (not including flywheel) and $820 for the whole job including $40 labor for resurfacing the flywheel. SubaruParts.com has the clutch kit for $270, or an extra $70 for new flywheel. <Shakes head> I was blown away by the dealer quote. I don't know whether the SubaruParts.com price is just way lower than the going rate for some reason, or my mechanic just really likes to line his pockets on parts prices. I don't know anymore if my earlier statement about how I had a trustworthy mechanic is true -- I'm trying to figure a way to ask him what kind of profit he makes on parts without insulting him.

Warranty is long gone. I don't know the difference between "bad flywheel" and "clutch is done". Clutch has been slipping under load (but not in daily driving) since I got it a couple weeks ago. Now it's started chattering as well when starting in 1st, so I guess I can't put it off any longer....

I can't speak to the newer models, but I've been carrying three kids in my '01 Outback with no special trouble. If yours won't fit it's probably cheaper to get smaller carseats than it is to replace the car. If all your kids are still too small to buckle themselves in, a minivan can actually be more annoying because you have to reach into the way-back seat to buckle whoever's back there. I have two kids in backless booster seats (ages 4 and 6) and one in a giant front-facing seat (age 2). All three fit across with no trouble and don't interfere with shutting the doors. Buckling the seatbelts on the booster seats is something of a pain; I need to put the baby in the middle because his carseat lifts higher over a narrow base, this gives me more space for my arm to reach in and find the seatbelt latch. (I'm going to try velcroing the seatbelt latches on to the sides of the booster seats when I get around to it.) If you're using seats with their own harness this will only be a problem when you move the seats in and out of the car. If your existing kids are still in the giant single-piece molded tub on tilt-base style infant-40 pound reversible front- or rear-facing carseat like my two-year-old, you'll probably want to buy them one of the narrower no-infants-allowed seats. In general it seems the narrower the size-range of kid the carseat is built for, the less space it takes. As far as rear-facing infant seats, choose your carseat carefully. Some of them are so big they won't fit in anything short of a Hummer. Especially the bassinet-style ones with a detachable base. The detachable base is convenient, but the swinging arm on top wants to come WAY forward, and the hinges on the sides stick out too far. If you must have one of those, find one where the swinging arm/bassinet handle is just a handle and doesn't double as a release lever for detaching the base, so that you can leave it up while driving. I had a Graco like that that could squeeze into my '80s (small, pre-Mazda) Ford Escort.

Summit Racing wants $599 for a centerforce Dual Friction clutch kit, which is the only one they appear to stock for 2.5l subarus. (link) Meanwhile SubaruParts.com wants $279 for the stock clutch kit. (link, scroll down to "96-06 legacy 2.5l clutch kit") Am I missing something?

Why on earth did they design the engine with the TIMING belt driving accessories? That just seems bizarre.

The local subaru dealer, and SubaruParts.com, both want me to replace my flywheel with the clutch. (2001 outback) Why? Is there something special about subarus that resurfacing the flywheel isn't good enough?

<bump> So, what else is there to the "timing belt and water pump stuff" besides the timing belt and the water pump? Is replacing the water pump actually a necessary/useful thing if it's showing no current problems, or is that overkill?

<bump> So, what else is there to the "timing belt and water pump stuff" besides the timing belt and the water pump? Is replacing the water pump actually a necessary/useful thing if it's showing no current problems, or is that overkill?

I'm having a switch installed in my 2001 Outback to let me disarm the passenger-side airbag when I carry very short passengers in front. (I do this frequently.) Is there any consensus on where to put the switch? Did Subaru set up a nice wiring tie-in somewhere to make it easy?

I've got the 1-DIN in-dash CD changer (2001 Outback). It shuffles disks fine, but it doesn't play them. What's the best practice for cleaning the lens on these things? How well do they work? If cleaning doesn't fix it, is it worth finding an identical one from a salvage yard, or should I better find an aftermarket replacement?

I just bought a 2001 Outback 2.5 EX with 125K miles and a slipping clutch. So, I'm having the clutch replaced. I know nothing about the service history of the vehicle. Any tips? The clutch doesn't slip unless I really push it hard. If I wait for it to start showing up in normal driving, am I causing other damage? Is the 2001 outback sensitive to different clutch parts, or is any old (quality) clutch kit ok? Is it worth finding a new mechanic who does a lot of subarus over using my old mechanic who seems very trustworthy but is not particularly subaru-knowledgable? What else should I have done at the same time? I've heard about upgrading plastic oil separators to metal, does this apply to the 2001 model year? I don't know if the scheduled maintenance (timing belt, water pump, more?) has been done. Is there a way to tell?