joediesel

It's a good chance that it's the filler pipe that's leaking, not the tank itself. If you pop the tire off and remove the plastic shield around the filler pipe (I believe 3 screws), clean off the road dirt that's accumulated and look at it you'll be able to see if there is seapage. If it is the filler pipe it costs about $100 at Subaru and is fairly easy to change out.

mikaleda, what damage can occur running without a thermostat? I've got a scangauge in the car with the water temperature being monitored so overheating won't be an issue. I ran it yesterday for about 80 miles and the temp never got above 185, in the colder night it actually stayed below 150. Thanks, Joe

Excellent idea The_Bard! I'll probably putz with it some more this weekend (when it's a little warmer), for now my son is driving it without the thermostat. I've changed the engine, timing belt, etc on this car so many times that I have few bolts left holding the fans and radiator in, I can pop it all out in about 5 minutes. Joe

Have you tried tapping the starter? I used to carry around a 2 ft piece of rebar that would be used to reach in and gently tap the starter when it wouldn't start. My kids called it "the starter assistant" when they needed to use it. Eventually I poked a hole in the starter with it and had to replace the starter. The copper contacts inside the starter are replaceable, the only thing is you have to remove the starter, take it apart to get the contacts out and then go searching for a match for them. Joe

I ran the car for about 50 miles without a thermostat. Temperature never went above 185. How can I test the radiator for blockage? Again, since it happened suddenly after running fine for months makes me shy away from the air issue and to some degree the radiator blockage. I would think that radiator blockage would be a creeping issue over a period of time. I checked for air bubbles in the coolant and there aren't any so I'm thinking the head gaskets are still good, I just did them at the beginning of the summer and this was the first and only time there has been any increased temperature. I'm going to run it without the thermostat for a few days and re-assess. I appreciate everyone's input and look forward to more. Thanks, Joe

The water pump is turning and water does get pumped out. Scangauge is giving real numbers on the temp and the fans are kicking on also to confirm heat. Did real good job of bleeding it (on ramps, filled through passenger side, etc) so I don't think it's airlock issue. Thanks, Joe

What I've done today: I wanted see if the water pump was spinning properly. I took the cam sprocket cover off and could see that the belt was spinning the water pump pulley. I then took out the thermostat and while turning the crank with a wrench I looked up into the water pump and could see that internally the pump and impeller were spinning (not sure that it would spin as well under full load but can't really test for that). So I put the thermostat housing on without the thermostat and set it up based on grossgary's suggestion (see photo, Rube Goldberg would be jealous). I filled the radiator with water and as soon as it reached the top on the cap side it was coming out of the passenger side (where I had disconnected the return hose) so that leads me to conclude that the radiator isn't blocked. I then ran the car while pouring water into the radiator, as expected the water came out of the return hose and into my bucket. The only concern I had is that it didn't flow out of the return continously, it would flow, then stop, then flow. I'm guessing this is fine because it did remove as much water as I put in. Next I'm going to put it all back together without a thermostat and drive it to see how the temperature performs. I'm back to where I started, not knowing what the problem is. Any thoughts based on the latest observations? Thanks, Joe

No air bubbles and the heat is hot and strong. The thermostat is the Subaru oem so I'm pretty sure it can't go in the wrong way. Again, the fact that it only started yesterday makes me think it's a mechanical failure. The water pump is about 15-20k miles old but is an Advance Auto part. Thanks Joe

I've done that as I was filling and bleeding, not visible flow. I considered blockage in the radiator but when filling it lows well and when squeezing the upper hose I get good movement in the right hand tank. Also the fact that it appeared as a problem all at once makes me think some kind of mechanical failure. I'm thinking that before I pull the water pump I'm going to run it witout a tstat to see if I get flowing water.

Hi All, Have a dilemma with my 98 OBW. Car went to overheat yesterday on my son and he immediately pulled over and called me. When I got there the upper radiator hose was collapsed, I opened the radiator (no pressure, cool water) and the radiator hose immediately expanded. I put coolant in and got it back home with the heater going and the temperature didn't move past mid-point (15 miles). The lower radiator hose is not getting hot (barely even warm, I'd call it cool). Scangauge is telling me the temp is getting up into the 205-210 range. I took the thermostat out figuring it was malfunctioning and replaced it with an OEM stat from Subaru. Before putting in the new stat I tested both old and new and both opened in a pot of hot water. Put new stat in, bled the system while on ramps. Have excellent heat, upper radiator hose gets hot, fans kick in, temperature still goes into the 205-210 range (I don't want it to get any higher so I run the heat full blast and get back to the garage). I was thinking maybe the water pump is not working so I took off the sprocket cover on the right side and checked to make sure that the timing belt is turning the water pump which it is. The water pump is about 15k miles old and this problem only started yesterday, been running great since I did the headgaskets this past summer. Any other thoughts on what to try before I rip the water pump out? Thanks, Joe

Thanks for the link. I live in CT and didn't realize we had someone that was Subaru-savvy around. Joe

I was having a similar sporadic problem last year on my 98 OBW and it ended up being the plug connecting to the coil. There are 3 wires on it, one of the wires (happened to be the red one) wasn't seated well in the connector and wasn't carrying the voltage for half the coil. Joe

Final verdict: I replaced the "new" front cat with the original Subaru cat I had taken out in the fall (@ 170k miles) and it solved the problem. Once I took out the cat I could hear the rattle in it, the interior was completely dislocated and bouncing around in it. Thanks for the help everyone. Joe

It was the catatalytic converter(s)! Davebugs, My plan to test the restricted cats was based on another post I had read which said the vacuum should drop while holding a constant 1500 RPM if the exhaust is restricted. Also, a few posts back in this thread Nipper had posted a link to http://www.classictruckshop.com/clubs/earlyburbs/projects/vac/uum.htm which gave some diagnostics based on vacuum readouts. I just jumped online and found this article: http://www.all-catalytic-converters.com/techtip2.html which gives the test procedure: Another test, using a vacuum gauge, is to measure the engine vacuum at curb idle and at 1600 RPM. If engine vacuum is 21 inches at curb idle and 15 inches at 1600 RPM then there is a good possibility your catalytic converter needs to be replaced. That article also gave me another test procedure, take out an O2 sensor and run the car. Sure enough, I popped out an O2 sensor and ran the car down the road and back, it's a little loud but all the power is back. Now I just have to wait for it to cool down and in the morning I'll put the original cats back in the car (yes, I've still been holding on to them since the fall). Since I had removed those thinking they were bad but it was actually the timing belt having jumped a few teeth that caused my problem then I'm guessing they are still good and will be functional. All it'll cost me is about 30 minutes to swap them in. Thanks everyone for the help. Joe

Latest update. I changed the fuel filter today, yep the hoses are a major PIA to get off but I took the suggestion to squirt some PB Blaster in there and it did help. Unfortunately that didn't help the problem at all. The cats were changed for brand new ones from Rock Auto. Of course that doesn't mean they couldn't have failed also. Before changing the timing belt in the fall these new cats had glowed red a couple of times themselves, not sure if that would have adversely affected them. I've got my wife swinging by Harbor Freight to pick up a vacuum tester so that I can hopefully rule out the cats (or blame them authoritatively). The alternator is still an unknown. The voltage does not rise above 14 volts and after taking it for a test drive with the new filter it had dropped to a constant 13 - 13.2 volts. I've got the Scanguage set to read voltage constantly and it's just not getting up there. It's hard to fathom that it would be causing this problem but stranger things have happened. If the cats test out OK I'll next look to the alternator. The other items further down my list are the knock sensor and ignition coil. Since the engine seems to run well without misfires and no pinging plus not throwing any codes I'm not really thinking those items should be an issue. Any other thoughts would be welcome. Thanks, Joe