EmmCeeBee

Hey, loyale, it seems you're lagging me by a week or so with maintenance. I did oil seals and oil pump a couple weeks before you posted about them, and now I've just finished the exhaust gaskets, O2 sensor By "tin", do you mean removing the heat shields? You don't have to remove the shields to get at the sensor, if you get a special socket (borrowed mine from AutoZone for free....) Just out of curiosity, I tried to see if I could get the O2 sensor removed without dropping the Y-pipe. With the special socket, I got it loose, but I think i woulda broke something if I tried to remove it entirely. I was planning to drop the Y-pipe anyway, so I went ahead and did that. I removed all the exhaust shields (loosened the bolts while they were on the car, 'cuz it took a LOT of torque). This wasn't necessary for the O2 sensor, but I wanted to check the condition of the cat/exhaust pipes. Mine is an '88, and the whole exhaust sytem back to the mid-pipe still looks like a baby (as long as I own my sub', I'm not moving to the east coast Y'know, I didn't get a "donut gasket" for the mid-pipe joint (it's 1/2 inch think, looks like a lead ring). Normally I replace any gasket I take off, but I didn't know about that -- never took apart that part of the exhaust. I'll find out this weekend if the old one's still OK. -- Mark

Yeh, good luck!!!! Not that you'll need it for the T-belt, oil pump work -- just takes a few hours of wrenching. But good luck on hitting the cure for the lifter noise. One other thing I find indispensible for this work. No air compressor, so I always have a few cans of "air blaster" (like you get at Radio Shack) on hand. After solvent cleaning, you want to keep crud off the work area..... and for making sure bolt holes and mating surfaces are free of grit. Keeps the cat away from my tools, too -- Mark

Why rear-to-front for the fan? Other than that's the way it's mounted, stock. I think at 60mph you're gonna have competing airflow. How about just wiring the fan up backwards to see what difference it makes? It would be even better to mount the fan backwards so the veins pull more effeciently. At slow speeds, I'm sure the airflow is easily overcome by the fan, but it seems that >50mph, you're probably driving the fan backwards as it is... -- Mark

Sounds like the water pipe that fits into the water pump body. It's silvery, and leads to the radiator hose. There should be an O-ring on the pipe-to-water pump side -- I also found a goodly layer of silicone sealant on the original when I pulled mine. If that's what it is, it shoulda been tested before the original shop let it out their door. I don't think I'd even want to let them put a wrench on my engine again, even to check the heads.... -- Mark

Hey, overkiller -- go down the list a few postings, to "What tools do I need to replace T.Belt?". Oregonloyale is doin' the Oil Pump seals and we talked about the steps. http://usmb.ultimatesubaru.org/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=3204 It's not tough, in fact the worst part of the whole thing is cleaning all the parts before reinstalling. The seal/gasket kit for an EA82 has a seal (for the oil pump drive shaft), an O-ring (for the body of the pump that inserts into the boss in the block), and a Mickey-Mouse gasket for the mating surfaces. 5 bolts hold the pump on; there are two cut-outs on the rim of the drive sprocket that, when you line them up properly, let you get the two worst bolts out. Clearances for the pump rotors are almost zero, they float on a film of oil. So cleaning is critical, don't want any grit in the pump or the rotor housing. Wipe a film of oil on before bolting 'em back in. -- Mark

The first lesson of electronics is that you never let the smoke out. I thought you guys knew that -- Mark

How about that, my memory is going already, and it hasn't even been 72 hours. No, I used the plywood sandwich for the sensor. I used a carpenter's vice (you know, the two wooden blocks with hand screws) to get the drive sprocket off. The oil pump drive shaft has the drive sprocket on one end (12mm nut), and the 4-lobed rotor on the other. I took a square piece of old inner tube and laid it over the rotor, put it into the carpenter's vise flush with the pump's mating surface. Then torqued the vise tight. (Rubber on wood couldn't hurt a steel rotor....) With that resting on the floor, I tackled the 12mm bolt. Wasn't easy -- I darn near shredded the carpenter's vise. But I didn't mar the rotor or the pump body If anybody knows of a better way to do it, I'd sure like to hear. -- Mark

No, you don't have to remove the oil pan.... But it seems one of the obvious "seals and gaskets" to change for this job. The oil pan gasket always is the first to leak. Two tips for this job -- since all this stuff is so fresh in my head from the weekend. I found that one of the camshaft sprocket pins was loose. (There are 3 bolts and a pin that align each cam sprocket.) One pin was loose, and that allowed about 5 degrees of play in the sprocket. If could easily have missed this and had valves/distributor off by 5 degrees..... I took out the pin (about 1/2" long), expanded it and tapped it back in. Don't know if this is a common thing, but check for play in the cam sprockets when you put 'em back on. The other is that the oil pump is a bear to disassemble. Once you get it out (5 bolts), all you've got is smooth aluminum mating surfaces to work with; the drive sprocket is held on with a 12mm nut and there isn't anything to hold onto to torque it off. I used two pieces of soft plywood, sandwiched the pump in a vise, and c-a-r-e-f-u-l-l-y gorilla'ed it. One slip and you can gouge the mating surfaces. Once the bolt is off, it took a few drops of PBBlaster and tapping on the pump drive shaft to break the sprocket free. Used the plywood pieces again to get the pressure sensor off. The oil pump seal was the worst leaker on my engine, so it was actually the target for all this work. -- Mark

You gotta tension the timing belts, so you need a tool to torque the cam sprockets. Like other guys here, I rigged up my own..... used a steel plate (from an electrical junction box) and four short bolts, plus a 5th one in the center to torque on. You'll see what I mean when you get the timing covers off. If you make your own tool, use a piece of paper as a template on the sprocket holes. You also need this tool to lock the cam sprockets when removing the three mounting bolts. This is to remove the sprockets for changing the oil seals. Someone in a previous thread mentioned a way to "eyeball" the belt tension, but this is a crucial step and the tool gave me that confidence. OH -- and you need a cardboard sheet to tape to the radiator. Saves the rad fins, and your knuckles I'm doing this same job now, and the only other new tools that come in handy are a flex socket extension and 1/4" u-joint socket for the oil pan. Last time I did this, without these tools, I used up 6 months of patience on those 18 bolts. -- Mark

I need some reassurance here..... I'm replacing the front seals on my EA82 -- camshaft, oil pump, and front crankshaft seals. The camshaft and oil pump seals weren't hard, since I could pull the parts off the shaft. With the seals off the shafts, I gently pried them out. I'd never pulled the seals before, and they were cooked in pretty tight. But the crankshaft seal's gonna be a bear. I don't have the luxury of pulling the crankshaft (and I'm doing this work without pulling the engine). I've heard that you can tap a sheet metal screw into the seal and pull on that. I tried drilling into an old camshaft seal to see what it's like..... It seems there's a 50-50 chance of gettin' it right, or hitting the block. That's a pretty tough steel ring imbedded in the seal. Any pointers or reassurance before I take my chances? What's the best way to get that sucker out? -- Mark