CNY_Dave

Found 4 brand new (hundreds of miles of wear max) 225/60R16 Dunlop Winter Maxx tires, $225 (plus an hours drive each way). I hope they are as good as my Graspic DS-2s were. Dave

In reverse it can seem worse too since you can get a larger front/rear turning circle mismatch, or at least it's more likely you'll turn tighter.

There is a preload washer/shim (or several) that goes onto the back of the clutch to set preload on the 4EATs up to '04, if this trans has that setup also it could be the thickness is too great. (The shimming is used so with no pressure the clutch doesn't drag, but not a lot of movement and it's locked up) Here's a question or a few- Does it get worse in 1, 2, R? If you park but leave the shifter in N and shut off the gas, does the car lurch or act like some pent-up stress was suddenly released? I'll reiterate our '05 forester has the tightness you describe, has been that way for about 100,000 miles now (since we bought it used), if it just feels a little tight but doesn't lurch when making tight circles and there's no other ill effects, I would call it in the normal range.

The TCU can sense the connection is open or shorted to ground, usually either a broken wire or a wire pinched to ground rather than the solenoid itself.

Not oin a sube, but I have removed similar from a cylinder by shooting compressed air in through a skinny metal line, put it way down in the cyl and move it around...

Yep, both rear wheel ones go through there, they go down, go to a mounting/junction block, then one goes to rt wheel, one to the left. Probably the other one is ready to go to. My drivers side rear line went out, nothing usable all the way over to the connection at the control arm. I patched in new up top.

FWD light does not come on / FWD mode not engaged when trans has an error that causes the flashing. The fuse is ignored in that case.

Fuse applies =12V I think, but yeah, it's just a signal line telling the TCU to feed +12V to the solenoid.

The trans vent, or the front diff vent?

I think the risk from overtorque is from distorting the races, severe risk from undertorque or putting weight on it before torquing. No crush, just 2 races meeting face on setting the race-race clearance just a wee bit smaller than the ball diameter.

If it's just a little scuffing and stiff-feeling on only almost full-lock turns I would just leave it. That's a little tighter than normal but not 'binding'.

The binding going away with the fuse could mean everything is normal except that the plates are gripping each other more than normal, due to previous mis-match tires or something. There is no feed back in the system, if the clutches 'stick' to each other 'better' than normal, it'll bind. Could also be plates are fine but clutch basket is grooved. We have an '05 forester X auto, the AWD is pretty tight on it, it fights parking lot turns just a little bit, has been that way since 35k miles or so, hasn't gotten worse now with about 130k.

Could be the rubber mounts for the rear diff too, thay are visible if you look from the rear.

Deep well is available http://www.amazon.com/Bolt-Grip-1859147-Irwin-Tools-Performance/dp/B00LFRS0DG That's an impact set, Irwin also has non-impact deep ones. Could always weld/braze one inside a piece of pipe too!

On my '03 a front wheel bearing made noise the opposite of the usual diagnosis... they can be tricky. It was the left front that was bad, and it was quiet when it was on the outside of a turn (more heavily loaded).

Looks like the assembly has been partially pulled apart to allow the slack, almost no way to tell if good or not unless really obviously bad...

The strut tops only make noise when you hit a bump that removes all the weight or a lot of the weight (quickly) from the wheel. You should be able to jack up the front and push up on the wheel and see if everything moves up.

Could be the strut tops, the little 'hat' where the strut attaches to the body.

My trans code was on the fenderwell under the hood. I think.

Always start with checking battery cables and grounds.

Just the solenoid.

If the light id flashing it means the voltage seen by the TCU on the wire is too high (open) or too low (shorted).

Probably a grounding issue, or pinched wire.

Copper can work-harden if it can vibrate, can get brittle and break.

2 things to try- 1) crank with gas floored- better = leaky injector or fuel regulator 2) turn key to run, wait a sec, turn off, repeat 3 times then try to start it- better = low fuel pressure