dltrial

My 91 Loyale has a noise which sounds to me like road noise. It starts at about 30 mph and gets louder as I drive faster. It doesn't seem to 'speed up' as rpms increase like a bearing noise. But it does get quiet when I turn right sufficiently sharply, which I have seen with bearing noise before. The noise may be in the front end since I raised the front end and ran the engine with the car in gear and it seemed like it was making a noise but not nearly as loud as when driving. It's not the tires, since I put different tires (on the front) and the noise still exists. I can't feel any heat in the hub area after driving which I might if the wheel bearings were going. What else can I do? any suggestions are welcome.

Changing the cam seals, I was tightening the bolts on the retainer. I forget the proper torque, something like 6 or 7, but using a torque wrench to set the torque, one bolt on each cam tower never reaches the set torque, they just turn. I removed the screw and looked in the bolt hole; the threads don't look bad, no aluminum filings inside and bolts do get fairly 'tight', but I'm worried that they might work loose. What should I do: 1 Tighten them as far as they will go and call it good. 2 Use some thread locker. How hot will the cam tower get when engine is running? 3 Use thread inserts. I don't really feel like going back to the junk yard for some cam towers, and who knows they could have the same problem?

Gents, I have a 91 Loyale with SPFI. How do I set the idle? I have seen at least 3 different methods in various manuals. One says to disconnect a line ( I can't figure out which line) and 'clog' it. One says to disconnect a connector (not sure which connector), set idle to 550, reconnect and check that idle is 700. I forget the third. What is the procedure for this?

Thinking about while driving around doing errands today, I realized that they can only go one way. I will have to look at them again, but I think that makes that question moot. But staying on the head gasket subject in general, I've seen some references to retorqing the heads and that the Subaru manual specifies that that should be done. Can anyone give some details? Just turn it on and run it until the coolant gauge shows its hot?, drive it some number of miles? Can you do it by taking the valve covers off or do you have to remove the cam towers?

Bolting on heads yesterday and I don't know which way they go on. I see no sign on the gasket itself for 'top', 'front', left right etc. They are DNJ gaskets if that means anything. The metal rings around the cylinders are separated on one side and joined together on the other side. On the joined side there are sort of rubberized beads around the coolant passages. Does this side go towards the head or the block or does it matter? I bolted one on before I thought that it might make a difference. If I have it on wrong can I remove it and put it on the other side or do I need new ones? Car hasn't run obviously. I bent one corner of both gaskets trying to get it out of the plastic package. Will that matter? I have seen on this board that folks say not to use sealants on the head gaskets. What is the reason for that? If one did use sealant, what would be the best kind?

I resurfaced my E82 heads following the method discussed here. It took days and hours per day to accomplish. One of the exhaust valve guides was out of place in each head and after trying to press one back into place myself and cracking the guide, I took it to a shop to have those two replaced. They inform me that there are cracks between the valves and that they all have to be ground out and welded, and then the heads would have to be resurfaced since the heat op the welding would warp the heads. After reading up on head cracks on this forum I could see that the cracks went in pretty far so I went to the junk yard and procured two heads with only the beginning of one crack. Now I am resurfacing the heads again and many hours into the process. I start with 150 grit sandpaper and even put about 5 pounds of weight on the head to increase the pressure and it goes soooo slow. I see from the original thread that people were doing a head in just minutes. What the heck am I doing wrong? Also how much of the fire ring needs to be removed? That is the last thing to go and it takes forever. Lastly what else sould I look for on these heads? I never heard of the crack thing until the shop pointed it out (and they didn't look like cracks, they looked like a casting seam or something). Is there something else that I should look for that might render the head bad?

Well they are flat and look something like a washer, yes, so maybe I have the right part. The old ones that were not 'metal reinforced' - they just looked like a standard o-ring?

With the heads off my 91 Loyale, I was scraping carbon off the pistons then turning the crank to withdraw the pistons and wipe out the cylinders. Doing this a couple of time, I noticed that the front two cylinders always have some oil in them after turning the crank so that the pistons are in. That doesn't seem normal to me. Oil scraping rings shot? It was burning a lot of oil. I figured after seeing the heads that the majority was coming past the head gasket and some maybe through a bad valve seal. But maybe that is not the whole story.

I've read on this forum several times that the genuine Subaru cam tower o-rings on the Loyales was metal reinforced or something? I just got a pair that I ordered using a part number that I got on the forum here and they cam in little sealed bags that seem to be genuine Subaru o-rings but they have no metal. They are entirely rubber and they came from Subaru Parts Warehouse. Did I get scammed? Maybe they no longer make them with the metal? Maybe I misunderstood all along what they should look like. Mine is a '91 and the o-rings that cam out were all rubber (brittle but rubber).

Looking at the EA82 heads which I recently removed I see that one valve guide is not in the right position. Looking from the combustion chamber side the guide is flush with the head so that it sticks out more on the cam tower side. I don't know what happened. Did it somehow work out of place during operation? Was it not seated correctly in place during installation? I didn't notice any damage to the valve but will have to look more closely. Has anyone ever seen a case like this before? Do these valve guides move like that? I was going to lap the valves and surface the head myself but now I will have to have a shop install a new guide. But will a new guide move again or do I need another head/

Well the engine has 300,000 miles on it and they do make some noise. It was burning oil, which looks to be due to oil leaking into the combustion chamber past the left side head gasket, but as long as I had it apart I thought I would check everything that I can get to. I was just going to replace them all but seeing how expensive that would be even to just have them all rebuilt, I thought it would be better to evaluate them if possible.

I have the heads off my 91 Loyale engine and was able to remove one lifter. I can't see how they are supposed to work - should they compress, expand or what. Should one be able to induce movement in them at all? see wear? How do you assess the condition of these things?

I can't see any play so I will have to look into the alignment, I guess. Are you talking about toe in and saying that it should be toe out?

Is there a place to buy bushings for Loyales? Not the bushing for struts which seem easily available but the other bushings in the steering system. In general the availability of parts for Loyales on line (at places like NAPA, ROCK AUTO) seems very poor. The stabilizer bar that runs front front wheel to front wheel, I can't think what it is called, has two sets of bushings an inner set and an outer set where it bolts to the lower control arm. The inner set seem to fit very loosely. Are they supposed to be that way? My 91 Loyale tends to suddenly veer across the lane. It will steer straight for a while then suddenly veer the other way. On other occasions it will steer left to right to left and repeat, not much but rhythmically. What could cause this? The usual first suggestion is the tie rod ends but I can't see any looseness there. Is there a good way to check that?

Thanks Gloyale. Does the putting the parking brake on change the position of the hill holder cable? That is, does the parking brake need to be off to adjust the cable?

Ok, mystery solved. I could only turn the crankshaft through a small arc because of the cooling fan. I had it in too low a gear to see the stub axles move. When i put it in 5th then I could see that they do indeed move so the clutch is connecting the engine to the transaxle after all. I think I have the clutch cable put properly back in place, now I have to figure out how to adjust it in order to verify that the clutch will disconnect the engine from the transaxle. Thanks everyone for thinking about my problem.

jono, The stay rod is in place. You may be right that the clutch friction plate cannot be bolted in the wrong way, I don't know. I would have to try it. However, it is the only thing I can think that could be done wrong.

TallonX, it is easy to move the clutch fork so that the throwout bearing is not in contact with the clutch plate. jj421, yes, pilot bearing is in place and I'm pretty sur that the clips are ok. I guess I will put it in neutral and different gears or connect the clutch cable as you suggest. I don't know what else to do other than to remove it again before going any farther and if I don't see anything wrong, then what?

Yes, in gear. Unless ther is something not straightforward about connecting the shift linkage.

Well I'm pretty sure that the throwout bearing is installed correctly. In any case the throwout bearing would only come into play if the clutch pedal was depressed. I want the clutch to be engaged so that turning the engine drives the transaxle. Do you see my logic?

No the clutch cable is not connected. I figured that with no clutch cable the engine is connected to the transaxle. I would only need to connect the clutch cable to depress the clutch and sever that connection.

Hi, The clutch was slipping on my 91 Loyale so I bought a new clutch, removed the transaxle, bolted the new clutch onto the flywheel and bolted the transmission back into place. I connected the shift lever and put the transmission in gear then used a socket on the crankshaft pulley bolt to turn the engine. I expected to see that the axle stubs (whatever they are rightfully called) coming out of the transaxle would be turning. But I don't see this. Was I wrong? Why would they not be turning? How can I check that the clutch is working at least partially before putting everthing together and trying to drive it? If the clutch is not working, what could I have done wrong besides putting the friction disk in the wrong way around? I am "sure" that I put it in right. I stared at it and read the 'this side towards flywheel' print on it before putting it in but I have put directional parts on wrong before in exactly the same way. Derek

Well, I'm pretty sure that it is an exhaust backfire. What are the possibilities? Either kind could be due to timing or valves, right? What else?

How could one tell? As far as I know its in the exhaust system. As mentioned, I am guessing that a backfire blew a hole in the rusty exhaust tubing. But if the noise actually originated under the hood, I might noty be able to say.

There is one fairly steep and long hill that I have to drive up on the interstate each week. Lately my subarau (91 Loyale wagon, 5sp manual, 330,000 miles) has been backfiring once every time I drive up it. It started as a little hiccup and developed into a full backfire. Monday night I drove up the hill and shifted down into 3rd, travelling at 55mph, to see if that helped it get up without backfiring. However on schedule it backfired loudly and then lost power. Even when I managed to get up the hill onto the flat, it still continued to make a series of little backfires and to lose power slowly. The temp gauge was showing a little hotter than usual, and the oil pressure seemed a litle lower, so I pulled over and stopped, and added oil. The temp usually varies somwhat in the lower third of the normal range; this time it was up to nearly halfway up the normal range. It leaks enough that it keeps catching me out on the oil and when I checked it, it was lower than it should be but still on the dipstick; I have had it not showing on the dipstick and still not affect the oil pressure or seemingly affect how the vehicle runs. I started it again. After starting it did not start up and run strong but hesitated so I gave it a little gas and it idled ok. Then I drove it home with no more problems. I don't know if the oil pressure was just lower because it was loosing power and had nothing else to do with it. There is a section of flexible tubing covering a gap in the exhaust pipe and that tubing has developed a hole and the exhaust is leaking and getting loud enough for me to know about it just the last few days and I have no idea if the loss of exhaust back pressure might have anything to do with it, other than that one of the last backfires probably blew out a bit of rusty metal to cause the visible hole. So the question: what could be causing this? Could it be as simple as a timing issue or is the engine on its last legs? Derek T.