starfox5194

Took Some photos. I saw two cracks in the knock sensor. There amount of contacts on the MAF sensor does not match up. I took a bunch so let me know what you see. The MAF sensor looked clean from what the human eye could see. That doesn't mean that there aren't microscopic debris on it. Right now, my money is on the knock sensor.

Olnick, I used the vacuum hose that went from the pcv valve to some other three way connector that two other hoses went into. I couldn't put in too much at a time otherwise the engine would stall. I had to have a second person lightly pressing the gas so the engine wouldn't stall either. The seafoam was sucked up pretty fast. I will look into borrowing a vacuum gauge from auto zone. Maybe not tomorrow. Will be pretty busy all weekend. I still think my MAF might be a big culprit. And the front O2 sensor. Probably the knock sensor too. MAF cleaner is cheapest so I'm trying that first lol.

I'll post photos tomorrow. It's too dark outside now. Any requests of certain spots to photograph? Thanks for the reply though. I totally forgot about the MAF sensor. Anyone know how much a MAF sensor costs/good place to get one online? I did a quick google search and as I assumed, it seems to be better to replace it rather than clean it out. But I'll buy some cleaner for it tomorrow anyways. *EDIT* Just found out a MAF sensor is 200$. No thanks. I also checked out the hoses on the car a few days ago. the only hose I saw was a tiny cut hose going through the firewall on the passenger side for A/C. I had a feeling that was how the hose was supposed to be though. Just for those curious about the history: the car was originally owned by my uncle in maryland who is very good with mechanics and took awesome care of the car and got all of the latest and greatest stuff for it. At about 75K it was given to my grandparents until about 118K. In that time period, the car suffered a little neglect. a crash to the right driver side door was repaired and so was the clutch. Cheap leaking tires/brakes were done too. My dad made sure the oil was always changed. I think the spark plugs may have been done too. At about 118K the timing belt and front and rear axels were done so the car would be safe for me to drive. power steering pump was replaced about a month ago and I put in two out of the four new shifter bushings. I couldn't reach the front two. The shifter is better than it was though. The car has been leaking oil for a while now. I'm not sure when it really started though.

Put 1/3 of a can of seafoam into the PCV today and another 1/3 in the gas tank. Waited 15 minutes. Revved heavily. I could barely see any smoke. There was a decent amount of smoke while I was putting the seafoam directly into the PCV, but after I restarted the car there wasn't really any. I had a second person keeping the rpm at around 1.5K while filling the pcv because otherwise the engine would stall. The car seems to run a little better, but it could definitely just be my mind playing tricks on me. There is definitely a lot of oil running through my PCV tube and the brand new valve is filled with oil once again. I did a quick google search and I read this is normal. I just filled my tank today. Put in nine gallons of gas. did some quick math. 16.8999 MPG. OUCH. Went to the auto parts store. A new knock sensor is 50$. I couldn't dare ask how much an O2 sensor was. I have a hunch that I may have a blown head gasket? Remember, totally just a hunch. I don't know much about head gaskets at all. But what are the symptoms? I also think I am "burning oil". Not too sure what this means exactly either, but I assume that somehow the oil gets mixed with the gasoline? My muffler did have some white smoke coming out of the tailpipe which *might* have stopped after using the seafoam.I blamed it on the cold weather though. I live in connecticut and mostly drive to school in the morning so it's dark and cold. I put in a remote started so the car has plenty of time to warm up. Any ideas on where I should go from here?

And I don't have to change any fluids after? It just does its cleaning process and leaves when it's all gone?

I had a mechanic check my vacuum hoses at 118K miles when I first got the car and he said they all looked fine. I checked my brakes to see if they were rubbing twice today. First drive was about 3 miles. I didn't use the brakes at all and had the car roll to a stop. Put the car into reverse and shut off the engine. Left the E-Brake disengaged. Touched the metal discs? Plates? And they were just as cold as the rims/the rest of the car on this cold winter day. I took the car out again this time driving about 8 miles ranging all the way up to fifth gear. I over-revved the engine a few times and did all I could to get those brakes hot without actually stepping on the petal or pulling the E-brake. I touched the shoes and discs (forgot about the shoes the first time) and felt no heat whatsoever. I will talk to my uncle who knows about brakes this weekend and ask him what he thinks. I didn't have time to check the mass air flow sensor, but that will be the next thing I will take a look at. I'll try to check it out tomorrow. Hopefully I will take a look at the knock sensor too. I don't know if I have an extension long enough to get at it though. I just found out about seafoam about 5 minutes ago via and I'm thinking about trying it. What does seafoaming just the brake booster do? Thanks for everyone's help. This is a great forum.

I checked out ecomodders. Seemed cool but not what I'm looking for. I'm not looking for extreme MPG solutions. I'm trying to find out why my car is not getting the same MPG as people on this forum with a similar car. Checking to see if my brakes are dragging is a very good idea. I will try that when I get some time this week or tomorrow. If I do discover that my brakes are warm/hot after driving a few miles without braking, how would I go about fixing that? My brakes are old and probably need to be fixed. I never thought they would affect my MPG. I was looking at replacing the knock sensor too, but i wasn't sure if it really had a lot of MPG impact. Caboobaroo. Sorry I didn't mean to mislead you about the tune up. By tune up I meant that I tuned up the car myself by changing the fluids and replacing the PCV valve. I've tested my MPG with varied driving habits. It doesn't seem to make as much of a difference as I would hope. The most MPG I have been able to squeeze out of my car CITY DRIVING was 19 MPG. By coasting as much as possible and accelerating as efficiently as possible. I probably hurt my brakes a little.

I've got a 95 Legacy outback wagon with a 2.2L 5MT. Car has 124K on it. I just did a tune up. Original MPG at about 118K miles on the car 17-19 (varied driving habits city driving) MPG before oil change 17-18 no matter how hard I tried(fuel quality lowered in CT and Lucas Oil leak protection additive city driving) Changed engine oil to fully synthetic Valvoline Max Life with seal conditioners. Changed transmission and rear differential fluid put in redline MT-90 Fully synthetic. Now at 124K Got about 18.5MPG in mixed driving. I was pretty frustrated. Just replaced PCV valve and still have to drive a bit to see if that helped. Old one was clogged with oil. I just had my timing belt done at 118K So it's NOT being taken apart to fix oil seals. I'm thinking about changing my O2 sensors. All of them. I think there are 2 or 3? I don't think they were ever changed. I have a K&N air filter which looks clean probably last changed at 50K. Looks brand new though. My tires are topped off with air biweekly. They lose air pretty fast. What else can I do to my car mechanically that will increase gas mileage? I'm expecting miracles from my O2 sensors. Are my standards set too high? I'd like to get this thing to at least 21 or 22 mpg city.

Sweet found it. Thanks! For anyone else who ran across this thread, here is a link to an excellent tutorial. http://legacygt.com/forums/showthread.php/change-heater-control-lights-95-99-legacy-26408.html

Similar thing happened to my 95. I hope this will apply to your car too. I pulled apart the master switch on the drivers door and found that the contacts needed to be bent to make proper contact. Windows work perfectly now. Hope that helps!

Can someone post me a photo of their AC head unit from a 95 Legacy outback? A bunch of my AC lights are starting to go out, and I don't know what is actually supposed to light up on it. http://i189.photobucket.com/albums/z146/1992Roo/Subaru%20Legacy%20Trashwagon/2010_0412Test0014.jpg Photo stolen from TheLoyale. Hope he doesn't mind. Anyways he has the same AC head unit as I do. It would be nice if someone could post a photo of a totally working one in the dark so I can figure out what is supposed to light up. I'm planning on opening my unit up and replacing the bulbs or LED's or whatever they put in there. If anyone has a better solution, feel free to comment. Thanks guys!

Just did some reading on high-compression. I've never heard of it before? It looks like you replace the pistons? Could one install high compression pistons on my EJ22? Would that shorten the life of the engine? How would it effect the engine?

http://www.horsepowerfreaks.com/partdetails/TOMEI/Turbos/Turbo_Kits/ARMS/14799 This looks like it would work, but I can't help but think that not all of the parts needed are included.

I'm pretty new to my 95 Subaru Legacy outback L 5MT. And actually cars in general. I'm not afraid to do any work that doesn't require lifting the engine (due to lack of the tool). I've replaced timing belt, water pump, power steering pump, remote starter. Basically how hard is it to put a turbo in my car? I'm not totally doing it for speed or efficiency or the cool factor. I just like to learn about cars and I think installing a turbo on my own would be an awesome learning experience. What parts would I need and where would be a good place to get them? Would it be a good idea to go to a junkyard and get a bunch of parts from a WRX?

A somewhat similar thing happened to my 95 when I took off the roof racks. The roof of the car was no longer grounding the lights correctly. Solution was to make sure all screws were tightened correctly and make contact with the roof. To check for this try pushing the plastic panel that makes contact with the roof and see if the lights flicker on. If that's not your problem, you could check out a wiring diagram and find out where your dome light wire is and trace it back to the lights checking for anomalies.