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Oil leak coming from where? If it isn't leaking enough oil to constitute topping it up all the time I'd leave it alone. If you're talking about the diff seals it's actually a fairly involved job. I'd just ignore it... Here's an old tired transmission I was running until it lunched the input shaft bearing Granted, a lot of the oil by the dipstick was probably from me spilling it, but hey. You get the idea...

I follow the service manual and have never had a gasket blow after replacing it. I've never followed some other random sequence. If torquing it then releasing it doesn't do anything what did I harm, wasting 5 minutes of my time? If it actually does do something then it was worth it.

Well lubed will help, I always clean out the bolt holes. I take an old head bolt and cut grooves down it, kind of like a tap. Running this in and out a few times in each hole helps clean them up. One really SUPER IMPORTANT THING is to get all the oil out of the head bolt holes!!!!!!! You want a very light coating, no volume of oil in there otherwise you can (and likely will) crack the block from building up pressure. The oil in there has nowhere to go, you're forcing it to do something so the block can be cracked around the bolt holes.

Have you made sure it isn't a rattling heat shield? It doesn't sound like rod knock to me. Usually that starts when the engine is warmed up under part throttle between 2500 and 3500 rpm and progresses to a really gnarly noise at idle that definitely does change at idle. When rod knock is first starting it won't be there on a cold start because the oil is thicker. I wouldn't worry about it, to be honest. It's a low mileage 2.2, it has a ton of life left in it. If you're really worried, send an oil sample to a company like blackstone for analysis. They analyze the oil and can tell how much of what metals are in it, this can give you a good idea on the life of the engine. When they tell you to extend your oil change interval, ignore them. Keep doing it at around 4500 for synthetic.

If the timing belt hasn't been done, it's probably a good idea. Not only is it overdue for mileage, it's WAY overdue on time. Old bearings and rubber get tired. My 96 had 92k miles on it when the waterpump seized and shredded the timing belt. Fortunately 96 and earlier doesn't mash pistons into valves.... But yea, interference or not, it'll interfere with your day. It probably isn't your timing stuff causing a ticking, though... How loud are we talking here? Like a serious knock, or a faint tick tick tick noise? Because if it's a faint tick, ehhhh it's a subaru, it's a 2.2, they make sounds and it's fine.

How did you decide it's the rods? Those motors have hydraulic lifters which, if not perfect, will tick. The injectors also tick a little bit. Lucas oil stabilizer is terrible stuff... Unless the motor has been run low on oil or it has gone tens of thousands of miles without being changed, at 120k the engine should be in fantastic shape.

I agree with that, if you were before the point where you back off 180 degrees util it's loose, you're probably fine. But also... Imagine pulling the engine back out next weekend to do this job all over again. If that thought makes you wanna light the car on fire, probably just go buy another headgasket.

No, it won't. You need a gate from a 2000 to 2004 legacy wagon or outback. Colour options changed for the 03 and 04 years, so you won't get one in that range that colour matches, but it will fit just fine.

If you're getting spark but not fuel, I'd suspect the cam position sensor. It's the same part as the crank sensor, so test the resistance of the crank sensor, then test the resistance of the came sensor. If they differ by more than 5% or 10% I'd assume one is bad, likely the cam. In addition to making sure power is going to the high side of the injector, you should test they're firing. The proper tool here is a noid light, if you don't have one either use a digital volt meter that has a true RMS frequency counter, or just an analogue meter on the 12v range. The needle should jump up and down as the engine is cranked. A regular digital meter won't work here because they don't react fast enough to give any helpful reading.

There's nothing to drill into in the 4-bolt block. The casting doesn't include a pad to drill/tap that hole into. For what it's worth, there's no torque translated through that bottom bolt (or the top, for that matter), all the torque from the starter is put into the mounting flange. The bolt just keeps it in place. I've driven 3 ej22 swapped cars and all of them have been missing that bottom starter bolt with absolutely no issues. It's kind of a hot topic, but as long as you have the mating surfaces clean, make sure the starter is perfectly seated and the top bolt is tight, you're gonna be fine without a bottom. Otherwise you have to put a timesert or something like that into the hole in the transmission for a bolt.

If you rub the belly of the car just right you might find the G-sensor

They all have headgasket problems all the way up to 09 or 10, whenever they started using the FA motors. While you have it out of the car, change the headgaskets if you feel so inclined. It's a lot easier to do now than pulling it out of the car again.... It's honestly not a very hard job. If you can get an engine out of the car you can do gaskets.

Since they're both autos, I don't think you have to change the crank/cam reluctors. Definitely check, though!!! It really sucks doing an engine swap that doesn't start, has fuel, has spark but won't run. Then you have to take off the timing belt in car, swap parts out, and put it all back together. It's usually 1am by that time, don't ask how I learned about this.... Use the original forester intake manifold, cut the stupid EGR tube crimp it off and weld it over if possible and you should be good to go. Hopefully someone who knows more about autos can chime in on trans compatibility, I know some things changed in 03, but I deal very little with subaru autos. So ehhh not sure there.

Automatic or manual transmission? You can swap the engine, depending on exactly what you have to swap depends on which transmission the two cars has. Since I don't know, here's the general overview. Depending on year and transmission type, Subaru changed the timing belt pulley on the crank and on the driver side cam. To be safe, just use the ones original to the forester engine. DEFINITELY use the forester intake manifold. You should pull those off to change the cam and crank seals anyway, it's so easy to do it now, it's a big PITA in the car... The Baja almost certainly has EGR, since you will be using the forester intake manifold on the baja engine (you have to or it won't work) you'll have to crimp the EGR tube shut and weld it off. Or maybe just crimping it over is enough, I always weld them. Other than those few things, yea, it will work just fine. If they're both a manual transmission, the baja transmission will work in the forester. If they're automatic, I have no idea... If the Baja doesn't have any VDC stuff going on, maybe. I've heard in 03 they changed the logic for the duty C solenoid from normally on to normally off, but I can't say for sure.

The thing has been overheated a lot and has a ton of miles. Don't fix the engine. You've throw enough money into the pit, don't throw more into the headgasket pit. Research the 2.2 swap if you want to keep the car on the road. To be honest, you have an old car now. Old cars are generally only economical if you do the work yourself. That said, if the transmission shifts well, rest of the car is in good shape, it'll run for quite a while longer with a good 2.2 swapped in there. Even if you have a mechanic install the 2.2, you'll end up with a reliable car for cheaper than an new used car... Which is gonna need all the same work you've done to yours anyway.

Scrap price isn't very high, $250 sounds about. Scrap yards buy cars assuming they're just gonna crush and sell as scrap. They make profit off putting it in the pick and pull lot where people can buy parts off it. They couldn't care less what you're recently replaced, they pay you based on weight of the car. With that many miles you might get a private sale in the $500 range if you bide your time on craigslist.

You can sell on craigslist, put an ad in the paper, post it on facebook, etc. As for value? I dunno what the mileage is or if it's a manual or automatic. Regardless, wouldn't expect any more than $1000. It's an 18 year old car that isn't rare or special with engine troubles... Really comes down to what you wanna do with it. If you can do the work yourself, you can drop a 2.2 into the car for under $500 and drive it for another 100k miles.

Well, the ECU uses a combination of the crank position sensor and the cam position sensor to properly control spark and fuel injection timing. Without either of those working the engine isn't going to run. I wouldn't say either technically sends the signal to the tachometer, the computer "knows" the rpm because that's its timing base for firing the sparkplugs and the injectors. If your tach isn't working but your engine runs, the issue is with the tach, not the computer or engine sensors.

Since not all swaps are the same, it's hard to say what your gauge should be reading. The best thing to do would be to figure out the actual engine temperature, then you'll know how the gauge reacts, what's normal and what isn't normal. If it's an OBD2 swap, just use a code reader to figure out the temperature. If you don't have a diagnostic port get one of those thermal guns and point it at the metal coolant outlet pipe on the top of the engine. this will be a fairly accurate engine temperature. Anything about 210 you should have fans running, I wouldn't be happy to see over about 220 while sitting and idling. In an ideal world, your temps should probably stay under 200.

Yea but then it would be in drive when the shifter was in N, reverse in P and no park...

Does the AT TEMP light flash when you start the car? That light is basically the "check engine" light for the transmission and can be used to read stored codes. Since it happened to two transmissions in a row it may be an electrical connection issue. The limp mode in those transmissions is to give you 3rd gear so you can get the car home if all the electricals for the trans fail. Also check to make sure you don't have any blown fuses or relays.

This forum is about trying to help people, not telling them to junk their car because it needs an engine. Come on! I'm sure there's a forum member in the OP's area that can suggest a good shop to take it to, or ever help out.

All outbacks after 95 are a 2.5. If you didn't overheat the engine badly, I'd do the headgaskets. $2500 seems unreasonably high, thought. It should be like $1500 TOPS. New timing belt stuff is $250 or so for an expensive kit, since all the timing components have to come off for a headgasket job it adds literally zero times to the job. If the shop is charging you for a timing belt replacement job (ie timing belt flat rate) on top of the headgasket job, they're crooks. Find a reputable subaru shop. It's worth having the car towed a distance to a reputable shop, if the job isn't done right it'll have to be done again anyway. So do some research and find out who is gonna do a good job for a more reasonable price.

In 99 they changed to a slightly different setup in the valvebody, and IIRC it has an issue with the o-ring around the reverse piston. This causes low transmission oil pressure and eventually causes it to stop working. People say that Lucas trans-x helps fix it, I've never tried that, though. A friend of mine who spent years at a subaru repair shop said it's possible to fix without dropping the trans, but have fun there. The issue is autos from 99-01. I'm not sure why you're deadset on the resistor, I've never heard of that failing.

Those transmissions tend to slam into 2nd when accelerating at a low speed, like through town or a parking lot. They also like to slam into 3rd. You actually can adjust the 3rd gear band and the brake band from outside the transmission. There are two adjustment nuts on the driver's side of the transmission. I can't remember the exact sequence, but it's detailed in the FSM. Adjusting the bands and doing a fluid flush with filter change really helped my 98. With 265k miles it shifted like brand new.