NorthWet

As I mentioned to the OP on another thread, I am considering going COP on my EA-series engine. Besides the "cool factor", my interest is to reduce/eliminate high-tension wiring/circuit issues that have annoyed me over the years, especially in the EA82T. So, what is behind your desire to switch to coil-on-plug?

I have commented on Tweety's thread regarding supercharger and carburetors. The basic upshot is that, depending on the pulse characteristics of the SC, your mixture's A/F ratio could be all over the place. I have no personal experience with Roots/lobed-rotor SCs, but from what I can tell they process air in gulps rather than a relatively smooth, continuous flow. These gulps cause vacuum/pressure pulsations that a carburetor handles poorly: Generally, dumping loads of fuel into the mixture during the high vacuum phase, and tending to spit fuel out the carburetor airhorn ("standoff") as the reflected pressure pulse hits. IMHO, better to use fuel injection, and have a large plenum, between the SC and the Mass-Air-Flow sensor, that can dampen/smooth-out the pulsations.

All too often, instead of providing information that was requested, we post our opinions... even when it is contrary to what the OP specifically asked us NOT to do. (Yes, the OP did "ask for opinions", but I think not in the way we tend to offer them.) It would be nice if we could provide the OP with useful information on the requested topic. Even if it means being blunt. Admittedly, the OP didn't say what criteria he/she had in mind for the word "ultimate", but this topic USUALLY means increasing the power. On the EA-engines, you can shift around the peak and slope of the torque curve, but you won't increase it to any significant extent. Doing stuff like port work or manifold changes is a futile effort. ("Polishing a turd" may be a little harsh, but reasonably accurate.) There is no major power increase to be had without forced induction, and cooling will rear its ugly head. Best bets? Increased compression. The engine will feel torquey-er, get better fuel mileage and reject a little less heat into the coolant. If it is carbureted (I assume from the year that it is), swap over to SPFI. It will be a pain, but the drivability will be greatly increased. Have the head surfaces machined to remove the HG's fire-ring groove and other imperfections. Cooling... see my previous post.

Is the Zeal board the most popular? Are there other common ones? (I slip on my Devil's Advocate disguise): I noticed that the Zeal uses the LM1815 IC for the VR signal conditioning. The posts that I have seen so far on other forums (reliable source for all information, right? snarkmark) tend to prefer the MAX9924-series as giving a more reliable signal. Based on that, I have been looking at the MAX9926 rather than the LM1815. If people are happy with the Zeal board, I probably should do some more research. (I remove my disguise.) Another website to browse around in!

The previously mentioned resistor pack only controls the slower speeds of the blower, no tht top speed. If you have the control on "hi" and it doesn't work, the problem is elsewhere. The ventilation blower lives in the right footwell, directly above your passenger's right toes. If you remove the dash trim-piece underneath the glovebox, you will have better acess. The blower is held in place by 3 (10mm???-headed) bolts spaced equidistant around the motor housing. There are also another 2 screws that hold the resistor pack in place, and these usually need to be removed... and are often rusted/gummed in place. There are also a couple of connectors, which should be obvious. Common issues with the blower itself is the squirrel cage actually having squirrels (though usually smaller rodents and their nests), the commutator area being caked in carbon dust from the brushes and copper from the commutator... or the commutator being abraded down to uselessness. Don't forget to check fuses before digging in too far. The blower is easy, but fuses are easier still.

Good start! It is interesting to see the approaches used by the MS folk.

OP's reported transmission symptoms are more likely gummed up governor valve then damaged driven gear. Damaged driven gear would tend to prevent getting into 3rd gear.

Nothing is magical about programming for process control... pretty straightforward stuff. It is harder to disassemble/reverse-engineer code. Disassembly tends to be an iterative process, trying to find the figurative beginning of a thread to grab on to so as to unravel the rest, reaching the end of that unravel, and searching for a new thread end to tug.

Tallonx: The EA82 uses "wedge" combustion chambers rather than "bathtubs". Not a bad design for a 2-valve CC. Still, it can't compare to a proper shallow-angle pentroof. SPFI pistons are probably the best bet of the original higher-compression EA82 pistons. Later-year turbo pistons (they have what looks like more strength and support around pin bosses and lands than earlier t-pistons) are probably ok for forced-induction... or look at EJ20-turbo pistons, and decide how to deal with the larger pin bosses. There are (AFAIK) no NA EJ20 pistons in USDM engines, but can be gotten from people getting JDM EJ20's and changing-out the pistons for turbo ones. Other Makes' pistons might be doable, such as Nissan VG33 +.50oversize pistons. Spider manifolds will mount to any 2-port (MPFI) head. They look cool, cause you to loose space for your spare tire, and probably don't do jack with stock heads. Stock heads are the main bottleneck for increasing power. You need increased RPM to get significant HP increases, and you need increased flow to make power at RPM. The ports have issues, and the semi-shrouded 2-valve CC would limit whatever gains could be made by port changes. And improvement assumes that you are starting with the dual-intake-port head, which has its own issues because of a tendency to overheat the port divider in the exhaust port, causing ruinous cracking. I have a mad idea involving EJ heads. Lots of work, and really proves nothing other than anything can be done if you try hard enough. (The EJ block is a FAR better place to mount EJ heads.) Cooling. Devise a plan to improve cooling, and I don't mean external to the engine. I am in a very small minority (of 2, apparently) that contend that the EA82 block has an inherent (and inherited) inability to flow enough coolant to handle significant power increases over the 1985 carbureted version. All the coolant that passes to the right-side of the engine has to pass though a small transom-port at the very top of the engine. In my mind, this cause problems on several levels, as 1) the port is small to begin with and resists coolant flow, 2) the flow-pressure it sees is also seen by the much more free-flowing path to the left side of the engine. The flow would be proportioned by the ratio between the inverses of the 2 resistances to flow. (Flow drops off dramatically as a path becomes more restricted relative to the other.) 3) A lowering of coolant level (e.g. from leak) could make it so that less coolant is available to pump to the top of the engine and through the transom port. 4) Localized overheating in the right-side could generate higher-pressures and steam, both of which would tend to further restrict flow through the transom port. 3 and 4 could cause a runaway overheating event. (I personally believe that this is the cause of most progressive-onset, as opposed to catastrophic coolant loss, overheating events in the EA82. Other, often wise, members tell me that I am full of it.) Improve the coolant flow: Route coolant to the heads first (they are what suffer the most from cooling inadequacies), and provide alternate means for the coolant to leave the block halves. Or, at least, ensure a good supply of coolant to the right-side bock, possible through the coolant drain on the bottom of the block. Increase the oiling capacity (pressure/flow available). Provide an oil cooler. A lighter flywheel will probably just make it less drivable around town.

I wouldn't reuse unless it was your only option. I do not remember what size they are, just that when I blew 2 of them out all I had to do was take them in to a local auto parts store (NAPA) and they quickly matched it to a common core-plug from Dorman. If you have a reasonably non-deformed old plug in hand, a decent parts store should be able to help. If they are not competent enough, ask them to let you look through their drawers of Dorman parts (or equivalent supplier); match the outside diameter and you should be good. IIRC, you should coat the edge with Loctite (red???). I could be wrong on this, so research a little.

IIRC, the regulator is set around 35psi, pump is same as MPFI and is good for 50-65psi. In "The States", Ford has a good, cheap (US$35 or so) replacement that was used on their 90-ish large cars and light trucks. Edit: A place to start looking for Ford pump info: http://www.ultimatesubaru.org/forum/topic/38235-ford-fuel-pump-installed-on-an-ea82t/ Cheers!

OP started two identical threads (I assume accidentally at SUBMIT time). More active (and serious) version at: http://www.ultimatesubaru.org/forum/topic/139389-ultimate-ea82-build/

Have you tried starter fluid/supplemental fuel to see if that makes a difference? Have the fuel lines been taken loose and reattached? (easy to reverse feed and return lines). How did you see the valves move on 1/3 side? Did you pull the cam cover? The "sounds like it might start" is common with 1/3-side timing belt failure... and with loose distributor rotor. (You did actually grab the rotor and see if it could be turned or removed, right?)

You double-posted this thread. Might want to discourage others from posting on the second one. For EJ pistons, you would need pistons from an EJ20, and then have to deal with different piston-pin dimensions.

Which are you calling cylinders 1 and 3? 1 and 3 are non-distributor side cylinders; cam for 2 and 4 drive the distributor, so if the rotor is turning that belt isn't broken. Belts could be skipped, broken, or could have been installed with one 180deg off. You can check for broken belts by removing the rubber plugs over the tensioner-bolt access holes.

Thanks, Steve. While tracking down some information for another thread, I ran across an SVX site that has what should be some interesting/useful information on the EG/EJ ECUs and TCUs, along with resources (cables, software, how-tos) to make information-gathering more practical. In case anyone is interested: http://www.alcyone.org.uk/ssm/

Clean up the engine surfaces as best you can, run it, and look for oil trails. On Subes, all oil and coolant leaks eventually end up on the exhaust pipes. Due to the number of vertical gasket surfaces, these engines have a lot of potential leak sites. The cam-cover/cam-case(tower) sealing surfaces are the usual suspects for an oil leak. It is a minor pain to re-seal these (tight clearance to get at cam-cover bolts), so it would be worth your time to at least see which side is leaking.

For EJ pistons, you would need pistons from an EJ20, and then have to deal with different piston-pin dimensions.

I can't find my FSM-on-Disk, but here are a couple useful links for SVX tech stuff: The Subaru SVX World Network > How-to Docs & FAQs http://www.alcyone.org.uk/ssm/ I hope that this helps.

Oil smoke is slightly blue-tinged, ATF smoke is white, gas smoke is black, and coolant does not produce smoke but rather vapor that dissipates into thin air rather than, like smoke, just spreading out and thinning as it is diluted by the surrounding air. Non-turbo/MPFI engines do not get coolant cracks in their exhaust ports, or at least I don't think that anyone has ever reported one. Oil drain-back into the pan was probably compromised, possibly leading to some oil starvation at the pickup. Luckily, idling does not tend to stress things much. The drain-back from the heads might have been compromised enough that oil pooled around the valve seals, and you may have sucked oil past them. Or oil may have pooled in the downhill cylinder bores, flooding the rings. Oil may also have found a way into the intake from the PCV system. Could some of the noise you heard be from detonation? Any oil in the intake mix can bring on detonation.

Year and model would help. Assuming it is an Old Gen, pulling the cylinder isn't that hard, and then you can either deal with it or let a locksmith do it. I have removed, cleaned, and reinstalled several locks cylinders, and the only complicated part was making sure the pins get reassembled in the proper places.

Preaching only works on the converted... otherwise, it is information that is either interesting or not. There are many that will find your information and experiences interesting, as (I hope) some will find mine. Sharing of information is the only way that progress is made. Witness on! I am also looking into a COP conversion on my EA82s, as the distributor-style HT on the EA82Ts have given me much grief over the years: Driveability issues, such as big dips in power at different parts of the RPM range, or HT collapse following the use of injector cleaner that seemed to be caused by expecting too much from aging HT leads. I do need to remember the issue that was over-looked by a person that converted his EA82T to MS w/EDIS: Oil-pump-side T-belt broke... Please continue to share.

Too far away for me, but the tranny should be easily and inexpensively fixable, if you are interested, The externally-accessible governor valve is likely in need of de-gumming. If car manually shifts in 1st and 2nd, but does not automatically shift in drive, that is the usual culprit.

Thanks for the info. Hopefully, many will find it useful. Regarding lack of interest, sociologists (and the PR folks that misuse the data) would probably tell you that "interest breeds interest", or, the more something is talked about the more people will talk about it. Humans are pack animals, more like sheep than wolves, and will follow most anything they hear about. "Social networking", "the buzz" and "currently trending" owe their popularity to us being sheep. (sorry for the lecturey/preachey tone.) Get some interest going, bang a drum, talk about it, promote the idea. Post new developments, cool stuff. It would be great to get a dialogue going. If the "NEW WAY TO BURN WATER!!!" crowd can regularly get lively discussions going, something that actually works and makes life more interesting shouldn't be too tough. I'd be willing to help get the buzz going in most any roll you would like: Devil's Advocate, Straight Man, Audience Shill. It might be fun and informative. Anything is better than "Burn water in your car" threads. Cheers!

Hey Sam, I have a suggestion that would be a good thing for me, for other members, and for the MS community. How about doing a write-up on MS: What is currently available, community support, some links, some of your experience and thoughts. As I mentioned earlier, there does not seem to be much practical experience or information on MS on this forum, and I think that we could use some. So, what do you think? I am looking forward to a good read!