hohieu

Does it click just once or repeatedly?

I acutally had tire noise and a bad rear wheel bearing simultaneously. After replacing the bad rear wheel bearing, the roar from the rear went away, but I still had a wump, wump, wump and a slight vibration transmitted to the brake pedal that were particularly noticeable at slower speeds . At first, I thought it was the driver's side double offset joint (inner) as I had recently rebooted that halfshaft. I replaced it with a good used OEM unit, but the noise was still there. It finally went away after I replaced the tires so I now have a good spare half shaft ready to go back onto the car. BTW, my bad rear right bearing had no play or apparent roughness. A good way to check, though, is to put one hand on the coil spring while rotating the wheel. Even slight roughness in the bearing will be transmitted to the coil spring. You'll need to have all four corners off the ground and the car in neutral to check it this way. To be sure it's the bearing, you can also pop off the brake caliper. I replaced my wheel bearing with a Hub Tamer #6490. It had everything I needed to perform the service on-car, and its low force bearing installation minimizes risk of deforming the new bearing. If you already have a bearing separator and hub puller, the kit from Harbor Freight will also work.

Make sure you have the respective piston at TDC by using the alignment marks on the cam sprocket. You can also stick at a ratchet extension into the spark plug hole as an indicator of piston position, just make sure the extension is long enough.

How did you check the bearings? I had a rear right wheel bearing making noise for over 40K miles before I replaced it, and there was never any play or perceptible roughness in the wheel when turning it by hand. I could feel roughness in that corner only by placing a hand on the coil spring while rotating the wheel. As mentioned by AC, removing that lateral link bolt is the toughest part, especially if you live in the rust belt. The rest can be done on-car if you have Hub Tamer type tools.

Just a minor note to you as you're looking for a replacement -- 99 Foresters don't have an egr valve.

The kit I have is from shozone/buyclutch, and it looks like a decent kit. Correction: PHL (Peyong Hwa Co.) is a Korean automotive company that supplies to Hyundai, among others. Valeo has been globalizing their manufacturing through joint ventures to supply different regional markets. Korea is putting out some decent stuff these days so I'm guessing PHL's quality control on pressure plates is good. Heck, South Korea industrialized under US direction after the Korean War, and especially during the Vietnam War. In any event and as mentioned, the other important parts in this kit are Japanese. NTN is a reputable bearing company and supplies Subaru with half shafts, wheel bearings, and in this case, the T/O bearing. Clutch disc in the kit is supplied by Aisin/ASCO -- makers of virtually everything under the sun for the automotive industry but specializing in transmissions and drivetrain components -- with part # DN-103 and looks like organic friction material. The link I sent you seems to contain the same components, except the pressure plate is made by and for Valeo North America.

I bought a clutch from them. The kit arrived without any problems. Throwout bearing is NTN, disc is Asco, both made in Japan, but the pressure plate is PHL Valeo, which is Valeo's joint venture line produced in China, supplying parts for auto manufacturring in the Asia market. At almost 140K, my clutch still feels great with a broad friction zone so I don't know when I'll pop in the new one. Nonetheless, I thinking the kit will work just fine, but if you want a Valeo kit with all components coming from Japan and the US for another 20 bucks or so, check out this link: http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/_Car-Truck-Parts-Accessories__SUBARU-IMPREZA-FORESTER-LEGACY-OUTBACK-CLUTCH-KIT_W0QQitemZ180276134813QQadnZCarQ20Q26Q20TruckQ20PartsQ20Q26Q20AccessoriesQQadiZ2865QQcmdZViewItem?hash=item180276134813&_trkparms=39%3A1%7C65%3A1%7C240%3A1318&_trksid=p4506.c0.m245&timeout=1218818263375 I've never used them, but their feedback score is good.

Just a thought: If your bearings aren't making any noise and there's no play in the wheel, you may just try regreasing the bearing and replacing the inner wheels. It all depends on your situation, though, because once you get things to this point, replacing the bearing is fairly easy. A good way to check for bearing roughness is to turn the wheel with your other hand on the coil spring. Any roughness will be transmitted and felt through the spring.

The Hub Tamer works very similarly to what you were doing with your sockets. It's a professional grade tool set that t allows you to replace wheel bearings without removing the the knuckle. It's listed for use on FWD cars but will also work in the rear of our Subies. The only thing that didn't work for the rear when I did mine was the hub removal assembly. Instead, I had to used one of the puller screws from the kit to tap the hub out. If you already have the tools to remove the the hub and the inner race off of it, then the kit from harbor freight will also do the trick. Otherwise, I think it's worth to get the nice tool set, especially if you can find a used one on either Craigslist or Ebay. http://www.otctools.com/products/detail.php?id=1736 http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/displayitem.taf?Itemnumber=45210

With the right tools, it's not difficult. If you plan on doing more bearings, a hub tamber kit will pay for itself after one bearing replacement. I don't know how much salt your car has seen, but the lateral link pinch bolt can get corrosion welded inside the the bushing collars, and if this is the case, removing this bolt will be the most difficult part of the job. Ultimately, I had to cut mine off when I did the job last year on my car.

The boots and rubber ring on the tip of the lock pin can swell up and soften if you use a petroleum based caliper grease, though your car may not come equipped with the latter. For the guide and lock pins, I use a synthetic permatex grease that the manufacturer says is safe even for the caliper piston seals. In my locale, it's available at Autozone in little green packets and 8-oz. bottles. A silicone grease will also work, and I believe OEM Subaru caliper grease is just this. Petroleum caliper grease is fine for the contact surfaces of of the pads. However, also avoid contaminating the friction surfaces of the pads and rotors with grease, which can also cause squealing and grabby brakes.

Nope, no leakage at all so I now have a spare lying around in event of an uncommon failure. I looked for a rebuild kit for the Master Cylinder, but there were none to be found. When I took the old one apart, the aluminum cylinder bores were perfect. Though it's a softer metal as compared to the cast iron slave cylinder, I can't imagine the rubber seals can cause all that much cylinder wear. Anybody know a supplier for just the piston seals? They seem like pretty standard parts for a 5/8" bore. One nice feature on the new master cylinder was a bleeder valve on the front, which makes bleeding the system a whole lot easier.

According to consumerreports.org, Black Magic Liquid Wax rated the highest in their long term test. I bought a bottle and it's relatively easy to use as compared to others I've used. Previously, 3M liquid wax worked great for me.

Well, the symptoms returned and were worst after the car had been parked in the hot sun and while diriving the car at slower speeds, which seems to confirm that extreme heat was the culprit. Pedal action would return to normal after I drove the car for about 5 to 10 minutes at highway speeds. Bleeding the sysytem several times did not fix the issue, and as far as I could see, there was no air in the system nor were there any fluid leaks. But rather than deal with the continued agitation, I decided to renew the entire hydraulic system and replaced the clutch hose and master cylinder. The old hose looked fine, and it's hard to imagine how this alone, unless ruptured, could have such drastic effects. I see in the TSB that the WRX is exempted from hose replacement, which must only mean that they come equipped with steel braided ones.

I ordered new radiator hoses, which came in a sealed bag with two twin-wire clamps. I'm wondering if this is standard for most places. I usually order my parts from 1stsubaruparts.com and think the world of Jason, but I needed some other parts on my order ASAP and, hence, placed the order with www.hondasubaruparts.com based out of Kansas City, MO, which is closer to me. If you want only the clamps, the part # is 091748014. They're only 91 cents apiece. McMaster prices for this style of clamp start at $6.50.

Yes, I've read about the Fram horror stories but feel that many of these tales are a bit over-alarmist. If you already have them, use them, but there are better filters out there for the same or less money -- purolator premium plus to name one. This is the best forum I've seen for technical information. I'm on several others, all different makes both American and Japanese. I have just a couple of questions: 1) Why are Subaru owners such gearheads? And I want to confirm an intutition that I've not seen explicitly stated, perhaps because it's so darn obvious: 2) Are horizontally opposed engines more durable because there's always some oil in the heads even after the engine is shut down?

Yes, thanks for the reminder OB99W. It's the first thing I do when changing the oil. I can usually fill it up at least a couple of times. Even on my other car, on which the filter is not ideally mounted, I fill it up once to let the oil soak into the filter media before installing it. I wish Subarus had oil pressure gauges. I've never had any issues with the Supertech filters, which I think are decent filters and certainly better than Fram filters. After I ran out of the Supertechs, I went with the Purolator Premium Plus filters, which were identical to the older OEM Subaru filters. But with all the summer oil & filter deals, I caved and picked up a bunch of Mobil 1 & PureOne filters.

Yep as grossgary says, they are the same. When I ordered a Felpro valve cover gasket set (valve covers & rubber grommets), I had to order for a 2000 Forester because the '99 came us as a Phase I DOHC kit. As for the timing kits, the only part that Subaru revised was the lower smoot idler pulley from was a single row, lipped idler to a double row bearing identical to the other smooth idler.

Yes, and a little acid base chemistry with comubustion byproducts and fuel running down cylinder walls. These buffers do wear out as well. Much has changed over the past few decades in oil and engine technology along with everything else on the planet. What hasn't changed' date=' however, is that most engine wear occurs duing cold startups. What's interesting about the link in my original post is that although they report a continual climb in absolute engine wear, rates of engine wear were highest during the first 3K miles of an oil's service life. The initial wear makes sense after an oil change as the oil system is completely drained. The loss in pressure when the oil is drained from the pan causes all the oil passages and channels to drain down as well, similar to what happens when a brake bleeder tube is removed from used fluid in the collection container. It takes a bit of time for the system to repressurize after an oil change. Without that, this is all rather anecdotal, especially at this early point. It would be great to have a long term test in which a "control" vehicle followed me everywhere I went -- this may be a good case for cloning...

At 136.5K miles, I just adjusted the valves and replaced: - PCV valve (OEM) - valve cover gasket, washers (Felpro kit) & spark plugs well seals (OEM) - spark plugs (Bosch coppers) & OEM wireset - Air filter (Purolator PureOne) The car was running just fine, but I decided to go ahead perform all the maintenance because all 4 spark plug well seals were leaking oil. The gaps on the old NGK plugs were still well within spec. and could have gone another 30K miles, and the PCV valve was clean as a whistle after over 60K miles of service. The valve heads were also clean as could be. I'd post some pictures, but the ones I took are too big, even after I resize them. I have just a couple of observations on the valve adjustment, which was not unlike other screw adjuster types on which I've worked: - It's always hard to find TDC using the alignment arrow on the cam sprocket so I stuck a ratchet extension into the spark plug holes and watched as I turned the crankshaft. - Intake valves tend to loosen up over time, while exhaust valves tend to tighten up.

Earlier Foresters also had issues with rear wheel bearings. I think Subaru rememdied the situation in 2003. If you hear any odd noises from the rear, here's a good way to verify a wheel bearing issue: With all 4 wheels off the ground, rotate the wheel with one hand and feel for any vibration with your other hand on the spring coil. May as well check the front ones while you're at it.

Any long-life coolant will do. They all share the same basic chemistry.

Your car is relatively new, but sometimes repeatedly running the fuel low can clog a fuel filter with sediment from your fuel tank. Unless Subaru changed the location, it is located next to the left (driver's) side strut tower behind the wiper fluid reservoir. P0303 code indicates misfire on cylinder 3 P0404 indicates malfunction of the EGR valve (Do the newer Subes have one?) If, on the other hand, you meant P0304, then this is code for a misfire in cylinder 4. Otherwise, it's good to check the usual suspects: ignition wires & spark plugs.

OEM slave cylinder is made by Nabco. At 1stsubaruparts.com, the rebuild kit is 12.88 plus shipping. The cylinder doesn't really wear out, and the kit comes with all the parts that do. I ordered it along with some other parts a while back, hence had it waiting for the day to come, and sure enough, it did.

I rebuilt my slave cylinder almost a month ago and posted a thread. Here's the link: http://www.ultimatesubaru.org/forum/showthread.php?t=89447