psychocandy

Trying not to start any new threads since this is a common issue. I feel like I'm just throwing parts at this CEL (but they've been cheap parts, so not too concerned). Still, I'd like to get rid of it. Don't remember any work done on the car or changes made to it before the CEL came on. with the P0440 code. It's a high mileage car with ~170k on the engine. I have checked the fuel filler neck. There was a bunch of dirt/crud under the plastic cover, but no visible rust. Compared to some pics/vids I saw on the internet, it looked to be in VERY good shape (CA car, so it stays in a pretty dry environment, no salted roads, etc.). I also checked all the hoses attached to the neck. Again, dirty/dusty on the outside. But still nice & flexible, not brittle at all. Also, the gas cap rubber seal looks brand new and the top of the filler neck is also very clean. I did replace the charcoal canister. I removed & weighed it and I think it was over 4 lbs. The replacement came from the pick-n-pull, so no real guarantee that the one I replaced it with wasn't past its prime either. I have not checked the fuel shut of valve attached to the side of the fuel filler neck. If this valve was bad, would it throw a P0440? How do I test this? Also, reading this thread again, I think I should also check the solenoids for the vent valves. I understand that there are some green wires under the dash, but can't seem to find a tutorial/step-by-step for this. I have a 97/98 Impreza Outback with the charcoal canister at the rear of the car. Can anyone point me to some either a step-by-step guide w/pics or maybe even a YouTube vid about how to check these? Much appreciated, thanks in advance!

Holy thread resurrection. I replaced the little tiny filter on top of the engine. I removed by charcoal canister. It weighed 4.5 lbs! I'll either go to the pick'n'pull & look for one, or try to find one online. Then report back if it clears the code. How do you inspect the filler neck? I looked down it with a flashlight. i don't think I saw anything. Previous posts imply that it's obvious if the filler neck is rusted out, but I'm still not sure what I'm looking for. After all, there's that little flap that makes it hard to look down the gas-hole. And can someone link to instructions on how to test the valves from under the the dash? Perhaps with pics?

Before I do it all over again. Or decide to just take it to a mechanic. I have some simple questions for those possibly more in the know. Is it possibly just a tooth or two off? I read in a timing belt how to (specific for my car) that being 1/2 tooth to 1 tooth off might not actually be that noticeable. This time, it is definitely noticeable. Idle is rough. Car drives sorta OK, but hesitates a tad when I take off from a stop. There's also hesitations when the AT shifts. There are moments when it almost feels like it's about to stall. Also, would I smell unburnt fuel or something from the tailpipe? If it was a vacuum leak, it would likely throw an error code, right? I took the airbox off to get access to the torque converter. but there's only a couple hoses that connect to the airbox on the bottom. I didn't unplug anything else and I took a pretty good look to see if there were any random hoses that got disconnected. I haven't driven the car long. But I did drive it for a couple miles. And at surface street speeds it was hard to tell anything was off. I don't really see how one could keep driving the car like this, but I've read some threads on other sites where people drove their cars for a while before deciding to do anything about it and discovering their timing belt was off. I guess that r/r of the timing belt isn't such a big deal. Compressing the tensioner is really the hardest part. Also, knowing now that I have a non-interference engine is cool in a way.

Ugh. There's def. something off. Hopefully it's just being a tooth or two off on the belt. Well, I wanted to replace the old tv belt covers anyway. Sigh...

I replaced the plugs, wires, and even the coil pack not that long ago (less than 2 years). It's about due for an oil change. Aside from the power steering fluid leak. Car ran swell. In fact, even though there's evidence of a ps fluid leak, the steering is fine. Anyone have any links to an illustrated how to for replacing the o ring that commonly goes bad in the ps pump? I've read some threads about it, but haven't found a good how to. I replaced the tb cover rubbers to make for a better seal against any fluid getting on to the tb. I might try to look for some tb covers on eBay since there are some small cracks in the tb cover that can't really be sealed up.

At some point on this car, the engine was replaced. I think the rest of the car is MY 1998. The replacement engine must be a 1997 or earlier. I've never had a car lose the timing belt. With an regular interference engine, losing the tb while the car is running will munch the engine, correct? I've done the belt 3 times in the past couple days. not stoked on possibly having to do it again. I had all the correct timing marks lined up when I put it back together this time. Would a degree or two off cause more vibration at idle? Otherwise, it revs easily and smoothes out once it gets gas. Just wondering if I'm being more sensitive to engine vibrations or if it's a result of the repair. It's not throwing any fault codes, and the engine wasn't especially smooth to begin with.

What year was the switch from non-interference engines to interference? I was using the incorrect timing marks. Car now starts and runs. It seem like the motor vibrates more than it used to at idle though. However, it smoothes out once the RPMs go up. Ideas?

The crank rotates all the way by hand. I checked before making any attempt to start the car. I have bent the valves on a motorcycle engine. So I made sure to put the crank through several revolutions by hand with the belt on.

I put car info at the end of the post: '97 Impreza Outback, EJ22, 4EAT, Black. No spoiler. When I did the tb, i got a full kit and replaced the idlers as well. This is the cars's 3rd tb. The one I put on before this that snapped was the car's 2nd. I lined up the arrow on the mainshaft to the cutout/mark that is slightly to the driver's side from the center. I lined up the timing marks on the driver's side pulley with the cutout/mark on the top of the rear tb cover. The passenger side was little weird as there appear to be 3 timing marks on the pulley. Still, I tried to get the middle mark lined up with the cutout/mark on that tb cover as well. I doubt the timing is off. Still, I've heard that being off by 1/2 to 1 tooth might marginally affect performance, but should not create any error codes and the car should still start.

OK, here's the long story: I was driving along, Check Engine Light came on, and the car immediately lost power. I checked the code and got the camshaft sensor fail (P10304, or somethign similar?) code. I figured the sensor had to have gone bad since the timing belt is less than 30k miles since replacement. I replaced the cam sensor and cleared the code, but still nothing. I took of one of the side timing belt covers and I found a shredded tb. WTF!* Anyway, I got a new tb and tested things out. Turned the crank through several revolutions and things seemed to be OK. It did not appear to have bent any valves (i know what that feels like, I've bent the valves on a motorcycle engine before). However, now that I've put it back together, it still won't start. I charged the battery up to full again to make sure it wasn't due to running the battery down, trying to start the car and failing. Still nothing. The engine is not throwing any fault codes. Any ideas on what next steps should be? '97 Impreza Outback, 2.2 Auto trans, *Pretty sure I figured out how/why the tb shredded. There's a leak from the power steering reservoir/pump. I think ps fluid leaked onto the tb cover, got inside, and weakened the belt until it just popped.

I'll just go with the pair from my like model then. Something like $30 for the pair. Guess I'll have an extra.

Hey all, I blew a front speaker. For about the same price, I found a set of front door speakers off a '99 Outback (definite fit) and and '04 Forester. Seems like the newer Forester speakers might be nicer/newer and have a similar triangular 3 bolt pattern for intallation. Anyone know if the Forester speaker will work? Or if it's an "upgrade" at all. They're OEM speakers, so we're hardly talking audiophile quality.

Got the bolt extracted, put my old tensioner back in. Night & day difference. There is MUCH more tension with the old style tensioner. I guess those new style tensioners are good for one use. What a bummer. The old style tensioners are cheaper to boot when you get them online. Buttoned everything up, blue Loctite on the tensioner idler bolt, cranked the camshaft bolt down with the torque wrench, rotated the engine a few times. It's all good. Well, except I didn't get the A/C compressor belt tight enough. Forgot to turn the A/C on while I was checking/test-driving. Turned the heater on on my way home from work 'cuz it was FREEZING (well, for California, anyway). SQUEAL! It was too cold and dark to fumble around with it, so I guess no heater 'til the weekend! Thanks for all your help everyone! Seriously, y'all saved my hide. For whoever's keeping track, chalk another broken bolt up to aftermarket parts. I'll probably check things out under the TB cover either this weekend or next just for ************s & giggles and my own self-assurance. And again whenever I get around to finding a driver's side rear TB belt cover, still need one of those.

I got the kit from Mizumo Auto, an eBay preferred seller. I forget if I got the recommendation from this board or Outback.org. While this makes me feel a little bit better that chances are it wasn't ME that screwed the pooch, that is kinda scary and disappointing. Luckily, I still have the old bolt. I found a machine shop and will be getting the cracked bolt removed today and should be able to button everything up.

^^^ yeah, used the hardware that came with the kit. didn't Loctite the tensioner bolt. will definitely do that this time. there's always the possibility that i didn't torque that particular bolt to spec. i'm a shade tree mechanic, i'm not infallible. but it was my first time doing the TB job, so i was VERY thorough. either way, i got lucky and am thankful for that. even if i bought the part new at full stealership markup, it'd be cheaper than the RIDICULOUS quotes i was getting for a TB job from some of the shops around here*. but, like an earlier poster said, he/she has heard of this problem before. * quotes i got were all >$1000! even from independent shops! i had to do an engine swap and that was ~$1500 for parts & labor! even with OEM parts, the quotes i was getting for a TB job would've included ~4-5 hours of labor. it took me ~4 hours to do the TB the first time. without air tools and just one r/r TB and idlers under my belt, i'm confident that the next time i need to do a complete TB job, i could do it in ~2 hours!

$100? Where are you at! $160 from the stealership 'round here. If I can't get a machine shop to take care of this first thing in the AM, I guess I'll hafta bite the bullet with the $160 new part.

UGH. Came home, tensioner still has play in it. Looks like I'm gonna find a machine shop to fix the the old tensioner bracket tomorrow morning. Shoulda done that in the first place, I guess. The only 2 Subies at the Pick And Pull were the one I took the new style tensioner off of and an old Loyale or something.

Spent a good chunk of last night trying to extract the bolt. The bolt is hardened steel. I was able to drill into it, but I blunted a few bits and still wasn't able to get it out. So, I went to the Pick and Pull today and pulled one out of the same year/color/trim level as my car. LOL! The donor car had a new style tensioner. So I pulled the bracket and the tensioner from the car. Looking at it all, I can sort of see why people might prefer the old style tensioner. The old style DOES seem to be higher quality all around. Anyway, I've re-installed the TB. I do have a question about the tension on the TB. How much give should there be? Pressing on the TB to the right of the tensioner (if you're standing in front of the engine looking at it), the tensioner has some up & down play. However, when I actually try to lift the tensioner with my bare hands (compressing the hydraulic tensioner piston), there's quite a bit of resistance. I'll take some advice on the above and see if the tensioner firms up when I get home tonight and spin the engine (with a ratchet). If all goes OK, I should have this buttoned up tomorrow morning.

Yeah, I came home and pulled it off. That's exciting news. Unfortunately, I tried extracting the bolt. I SUCK AT BOLT EXTRACTION! AAAAAARRRRRGGGGHHHH!!! The part's still usable, I just need someone else to extract the bolt. Here's a question though, mine doesn't have that little ear on the bottom right that attaches to the TB cover. Is my cover and that cover interchangeable? Most of the ones I'm finding on ebay have that little ear. And I can't for the life of me get a straight answer on the internet whether a) the parts are interchangeable, and whether there's a different part number for the one I have vs. the one shown above.

OK, so I'm at work right now and can't look at my car, but I want to be extra super duper idiot proof clear (for my own benefit). Forget about the actual tensioner. I have removed that already. There are NO problems there. The tensioner idler pulley bolts into a bracket? Are you effing kidding me? If that's the case, OMG that's effing great! Please confirm or deny this. I'm looking at the pics I posted above, and it DOES look like there are a bunch of bolts holding something on, but I thought the tensioner idler pulley bolted directly into the block. Is that what this is:

yeah, moot point, like I said, broken bolt is the one that holds the tensioner idler. seriously though, anyone in the Oakland, CA area with a recommendation for a machine shop?

old style tensioner. i'll upload a pic in moment. it broke inside. i need to take it to a shop. my hope is, since it backed out, it can't be under a lot of tension. hopefully, an easy out and a professional can take care of it. it's not the tensioner, it's the idler pulley. can a new style replace the old style? i guess it doesn't matter since the new style will still use the same bolt to hold the pulley, right?

HOLY EFFING SH*TBALLZ! The bolt holding the tensioner idler backed out and snapped! I need an emergency screw extraction & threads recut!!! Northern California Bay Area Subie peops, any recommendations? I usually go to Automasters, but need this is more something for a shop with a good machining capabilities!

Thanks all, going to take everything apart now. Shoulda been clearer though, when I said I did the TB, I mean I did the TB, all idlers, and water pump. No half-assing!

I did the TB not long ago, torqued everything to spec. I will definitely check under the TB covers. As far as diagnosing goes, one thing to remember: the noise goes away after car warms up a bit and only occurs between 1200-2000 rpm. That's what makes me wonder if it's not just some random thing that is not potentially catastrophic. The car sounds and runs great EXCEPT when cold at those rpms. This was NOT occurring before I recently changed plugs, wires, & coil pack. However, can't see ANY way those things could be related.