rmmagow

Thanks Guys. I'm pretty good about fixing my cars and think that this task is probably going to go OK. I just did the driver's side axle, now this one on the other side. Some very bad service on the car caused a wheel to fall off. The wheel went under the car destroying the ball joint stud. Apparently this also caused my non-subaru axle to self destruct. Axle, ball joint and with some luck back on the road. I'm kind of old so I might have to wait until spring which sucks. On the other hand, I may just buy all the parts and find a decent, easy to talk to shop about fixing this for me. Really not a super hard job, just tedious while laying on the piece of cardboard.

2001 Forester, 160000 miles. I searched and did find some info about removing the Ball Joint pinch bolt in order to replace the BJ. My concern is getting it out if I have to break off the head of the existing bolt. Picture this, bolt head snaps off. Which side do I try to drill into, broken head side or the other side? do I need a reversible drill and left hand bits? Am I just using progressivly bigger bits and drilling through to weaken the bolt's remains? I know Easy-outs don't actually work, I don't want to wreck the knuckle. I replaced this knuckle about 3~4 years ago, the head broke off then but since the knuckle was bad I didn't care. I need to replace the BJ and the axle on the left side front. I have a pretty good idea how to get the BJ out of the Arm, no so much out of the knuckle. The BJ stud is damaged and might be a problem but I am hoping there's enough castle nut remains to get it off. Thanks

When the wheel came off my kid was just pulling away from a stop light, the wheel went under the car. I would guess the wheel is what wrecked the BJ stud. The place that caused this issue did replace the wheel, brake rotor, caliper, wheel studs on the other three corners. I don't think the LCA actually hit the ground. My plan is to fix this myself. I hope there enough left of the BJ nut that I can get a socket on it, get the BJ out of the hub, replace BJ and axle and maybe be OK. I will be ordering an LCA just-in-case but it looks good. Worst case I might have to cold-chisel the BJ out of the arm but I'm hoping it'll come out. Strange that the car has basically been OK for a few months after this fiasco. Although I am not inclined to sue these folks I will have to super bad-mouth them via the Internet and word of mouth. Not only did the shop ruin my car, their sister shop gave me this bogus rear trailing arm diagnosis. Bad outfit to do business with. Almost makes Jiffy Lube look competant :-)

Kind of half broken. The "castle" part of the nut and part of the stud were broken off. The BJ is now only held by the remains of the castle nut. Car is off the road 'till fixed.

I owe you 10 bucks bud. I took the car to Subaru. The passenger side ball joint stud was broken off, this was due to a shop screwing up a simple tire rotation and causing a wheel to come off. This in turn apparently damaged the axle on that side too. Way too much slop at the inboard joint. I'm going to start another thread regarding how to fix this. The Subaru dealer want $700 to replace the BJ and axle. Yeah, there's some nasty labor involved but even if the ball joint is so screwed up that it can't be removed from the LCA, a new Suby LCA is only $100, BJ is $37. Fixing it yourself ....priceless :-) Since that BJ was replaced only a couple of years ago I think it will come out of the hub OK. I had coated it with anti-sieze when I put it in. I will have Subaru replace the rear wheel bearing, that's just to difficult to do correctly. Thanks for the help, thanks for beating me to death about the axles. Lesson learned.

I am getting the WB replaced at Suby. It is making a noise, whirring a bit, but not any kind of crunching type noise. With the car on the ground, the rear trailing arms really have a LOT of slop, both ends on both sides are pretty bad. I can get new trailing arms with the front bush for 72, rear bush, another 24. Yeah, the axles, but really they just aren't showing any kind of play and zero noise with the wheel turned totally tight. This morning when first driving the car (cold) it was OK for about 8 miles then it started shaking. I'm thinking the bushings were cold and not slopping around as much but after loosening up I'd feel the car acting up. I really don't want to be yanking out good axles if I can avoid it. Regardless, the rear will need to be fixed anyway so if after that I still have an issue I'll put in a couple of new Suby axles. Junk yards can't tell if the axles are suby or not.

Yeah, the rear trailing arm thing didn't give me heavy warm feelings. The kid did check the front axles and declared them fine. He drives a wrx sti and has owned suby's for a long time. That sort of gave me a better feel. I'm in conversation with subarupartsforyou to be sure I order what I need. Looks easy to do but I may still let the shop do it. It is not bitter cold here yet, but any day now. I did notice the car didn't shake a lot when I initially drove it this morning, only began its shake after about 8 to 10 miles.

OK. The problem is the rear trailing Arm bushings, both sides front and rear. They showed me on the lisft where these have become detached. Now, they also quoted me a price of $500.00 to fix them which seems very excessive. They look easy to remove and replace to old bushings. I am having a lot of trouble finding the parts I need for a 2001. I saw some split design poly types on Ebay but not for my car. Am I missing something here? The job doesn't look very difficult. Can one buy new trailing arms with new bushings and just bolt in the new? It just doesn't look that hard to do. They also found a bad rear bearing (surprise!), $456.00 to fix which seems high too since I think I can get this done by Subaru for less. I'd greatly appreciate any pointers to suspension parts. Wheel balance was perfect. The shop I went to is NOT know as a rip-off but they do work mostly just tires etc so they may not have felt comfortable about the pricing for this job. Thanks Much

This seems much more likely. I took the car into the front yard and made tight circles while my wife stood outside the car and I had both windows open. No clicking or binding. Grabbing the drive axle, each side and looking for any kind of play, nothing, both are tight with no extra movement. I hope I am right, but I am thinking it might be nothing more than a fallen off wheel weight. I'm bringing it to a shop and have them scope it out. The main center drive axle will be looked at too. Failure there sounds pretty much terrible.

SteelSeal is a little different than other HG magic sauce. I've used it to seal an HG in a Mazda and it is still not leaking after 3 years and 50K miles. No radiator plugging. I agree that the true fix is to replace the HGs but on an old car with limited life remaining I'd rather spend 100 that 5~600 for HG. Depends a lot on your love for the car too. I've had the HGs changed twice in my Forester, next time it will be steelseal and drive till it drops.

SteelSeal. Used in My old Mazda (still ok after three years) and in my Son's 318 Dodge truck. Fine. Don't know if it'll work OK in suby, but for a turn around it would probably be fine.

Never sell a car to a friend :-)

Lucky Texan, You are right, the clank and vibration existed before I replaced the axle. I only replaced the axle because the inner boot was torn and I figured that was a reasonable place to start. The vibration seems to be felt strongest through the floorboard on the front passenger side. Feels much like typical out of balance wheel except it is a LOT stronger vibration under acceleration. I downshifted the transmission while the car was vibrating and it didn't affect the frequency of the vibration. This sort of tells me the transmission isn't causing the vibration. The "clank" going into reverse or into drive leads me to suspect the main driveshaft. It is a CLANK, not a CLUNK. Metallic sounding. The rebuilt axle is fine. I've used them before. Can a bad front axle cause this kind of vibration issue even though the boots look good and there no popping or clicking on sharp turns? Can a wheel out of balance feel much worse under acceleration??

I did replace the axle that had the bad boot. No, I didn't use Subaru or rebuild the one I had. The passenger side front axle was replaced many years ago with a rebuilt unit. Although the boots are intact, could that axle be bad? I do not have any clicking noises when making sharp turns. My original question was regarding the Drive Shaft that operated the rear wheels. I do hear a "clank" when putting the car into gear. Do these drive shafts fail at high miles? Can the car be converted to FWD by removing this driveshaft? How hard is it to replace this drive shaft. Regarding the other front axle, how can I tell if it is OK or not?? I did grab onto the axle and try to move it around but it feels pretty solid? Thanks

2001 Forester 160,000 miles I started to get a serious vibration upon acceleration from about 45 MPH and above. Felt a lot like an out of balance wheel. Driver's side front axle was blown, ripped inner boot. I replaced it but the vibration remains. The car has had a "clank" noise when putting it into gear (automatic). This noise has been around for at least the last few years. Can't really say 100% if it's worse over the years. My question, the clank makes me think maybe my driveshaft is going bad. I can't feel much play in it but..... Would an out of balance wheel make a much worse vibration under acceleration? I put the car in gear with the brake on, hood open and pressed on the gas to see if there was excessive engine movement but it looks OK. Opinions? Is the driveshaft replacement job ridiculously hard? Can I do it on 4 jackstands? I am an old geezer on top of all this but the car is my kids now and I'd like to get it back on the road pretty quickly and in a safe condition. ANY and ALL Advice very appreciated.