robaru

Rear main seal leakage is very common. Definitley replace it. I have put in a clutch from Napa and was happy with it. Seems like the price was $150 ish for the kit. Since the motor is out, are you going to replace some of the other seals? Be a good time to do it.

Your right, plate moves, not rotor. Back to the TOD first. From my reading here most people suggest first trying MMO, Marval Mystry Oil or something like that in the oil to try to clean the oil passages. This can work sometimes. If it does'nt solve the ticking then pull the oil pump and check the Micky Mouse seal. If its deformed reseal the oil pump and put it back in. If that does'nt solve it, replace the oil pump. And finally lastly, pull the lifters and clean, replace the bad ones or one. Ive done this on three subs and have had the best luck with replacing the pump. Timing belt covers can be left off to make all this easier. Lots of people on here leave them off. But then there is the chance that the knock isn't the lifters. Lifter knock as far as I know won't make a car stall. I'm not very familiar with the 2 hose disty. Mine has just one. I have read on here about distys that have worn out. Can you bring it back to idle buy pumping the throttle? Could the throttle cable be sticking?

Sounds like your do for a reseal of the oil pump or new oil pump. If you take the oil pump off and the mickey mouse seal is bad, do a reseal of the pump and see if that fixes it. If the seal looks fine then spring for a new oil pump. If your timing belt covers are still on, leave the outer ones off until you get this fixed, or leave them off permanently as many do. It will be tons easier to get back in there. This should fix your ticking. If it does'nt then your stuck with pulling the heads and checking the individual lifters though this is probably the least likely culprit.

Brand new lifters are way expensive. It's pretty easy to check them. Take them out, put them in a bowl of oil making sure that the small oil hole on the side is submerged and pump them a couple times. If they still depress after pumping on them then they are bad. I don't think that good lifters would solve your idle problem though. I think that is something else.

So does the knocking cause the engine to die at idle? If it does then I would'nt think it was lifters. The erratic idle could be caused from a malfuntioning distributer. Make sure the vacume advance on the disty holds vacume. They have a tendency to go bad over time. Pull the cap off and stick a hose on the nipple and suck. You should see the rotor advance and hold. If you replaced the carb with a new one, I would'nt mess with the idle or air screw yet as it should be set from the factory.

There's lots of info on this site on lifter ticking. If it's still apart, you could clean all the oil passages out with carb cleaner and then make sure you prime them all with oil before your re-intall it. The lifters are sometimes hard to get out. I would'nt bother taking them out and cleaning them out unless they tapped before. If your surfaces are nice and clean, you don't need to put RTV on the valve cover gaskets. The rubber ring should seal it up fine. The only place I have found the oil passage O-ring was at the Subaru Dealer. Good Luck.

I don't know what a multi stage thermostat is. Perhaps it just means the higher the temp, the bigger the opening gets. I always throw mine in a pot of water on the stove and watch it open as the water begins to boil. Also when you add new radiator fluid, you can park your car heading up a slight incline and while running keep adding fluid to it until the bubbling goes away and its full. then make sure the overflow is filled to the line and your usually good to go. 180-190 degree would be a good temp thermostat for where you live I would think. Make sure your radiator is in good shape as well.

I think backfiring can also be caused from leaks in your exhaust. I would also look at the timing advance on the distributer.

Have you tried a couple squirts of carb cleaner down the throat of the carb? Other than that It could be a sticky choke, or vacume leak perhaps. How long did the carbs set?

Did you replace the head gasket? If not, do a compression check on the cylinders. You could try parking with the nose of your car up a pretty good hill and making sure you have all the air out of the system. Pockets of air will do some weird stuff. If you do take your thermostat out, put it in a bowl of water and put it on the stove and bring it to a boil. The Thermostat should open just as the water starts to boil. It kind of sounds like you still have air in the system.

Which car is having the problems? What motor is in it?

I have never rebuilt a carb from a ea81, but have done a couple for my ea82's. Seems like a rebuild kit goes for 30 some bucks if I remember right. It is abit time consuming to do it right. If you don't have a mannual, make drawings as you take it apart so everything goes back in the same place. Throw a sheet over your work bench so no dirt gets into the carb as you reassemble it. Use lots of carb cleaner and compressed air in all the passages and jets also. And of course rule out all the possible easier fixes: fuel filter, plugged pcv valve, failing disty. This also assumes that a simple tune up: cap, plugs, rotor, wires, didn't fix the problem.

Compression test it.

Yep, I concure. When cold, pump the throttle once and then start it. If if revs to hi, >2000 rpms give another pump while running and that should bring it down to close to 1500 or so which I think is supposed to be the cold idle rpm.

Your tapping noise on start up is probably the hydraulic lifters not keeping pumped up. Could be time to reseal your oil pump or try some MMO. The clunk when you start your car, that's abit more strange. You might want to look at the teeth on your flywheel or starter.

Knock sensor retards timing 5 degrees if it senses knock if I remember reading correctly. I hope you cured the tick. I recently cured mine with a new seal kit for the oil pump. Mine would start to tick if I drove over 65 for awhile. I found that the oil seal was spinning with the rotor and would suck air when I got going fast enough. Strange.

Ditto Erik. Timing light is the way.

Red is bad, my vote is to replace it. Did the old thermostat have that problem?Do you have all the radiator fluid topped back up to the proper level.

There is lots of info here on lifter ticking, Do a search and you find tons. Very common problem. I'd suggest you re gasket your oil pump before you worry about pulling the motor. Replace the mickymouse gasket, oil seal and o-ring. Put a little bit of gasket sealant on the micky mouse gasket to hold it in place when you install the oil pump. don't twist from side to side when you put the oil pump back on, push it straight on. Also put just a bit of sealant at the top and bottom of the micky mouse gasket where the two joining lines of the block meet. Good luck. Though there are many more causes of lifter noise, this is probably a good place to start since you've tried the oil cleaner.

I had a similar problem with mine. I took my dash a part twice before I found that the cable goes down right by the throttle pedal. You may have something hung up down there. Its hard to see, but crawl down and look just above the gas pedal, the end of the cable is attached to a bracket. Hope this helps.

There is an idle speed adjustment screw on the botttom of the carb. Don't confuse it with the air screw. Turning it in should increase the idle speed. Try it after you warm it up. Did you wash the motor when you washed the car? You might check the disty cap for water.

Just wanted to update this post. I pulled the air cleaner off, and there was yuck in the tubes. One was completely full. I cleaned them all out and put it back together with new pcv valve, air filter, and a fresh oil change. No more problem. Thanks to everyone for your advice. It must have been condensation, mixing with oily air over the years.

Thanks for the replys. I'll replace the pcv and air filter and oil, and filter. So could be just condensation forming in the hoses? I sure hope thats it. It has been foggy here for weeks it seems.

Well, I got home and looked at the pcv valve. It was clean and jiggled back and forth. The hoses comming from the valve covers have lots of white oily stuff in them. This seems to be where its comming from. Also the inside lid of the oil cap is covered with a white oily jelly. I'm starting to get nervous now. I compression tested the cylinders and got 150-160psi in all. Plugs look good. If I lost part of the head gasket, could I have got oil mixing with antifreeze in the valve covers? Probably should drain the oil and coolant to check for mixing. Any other directions? I usually think the worst and do way more than I should.

If I were having a bunch of blow by, wouldn't I get some blue smoke on startup? I don't have any of that and I'n not noticing any burning of oil. The only other strange thing is pretty high oil pressure, which I never was to concerned about because it was still within range, and I know the gauge can be off abit.