the_bard

From what I understand of it (all second-hand knowledge, mostly from this thread) , the 2.5L that was in there had an EGR port on the intake and dual port exhaust. These have to match up for the ECU to be happy and for the exhaust to be plug and play. I believe the only year 2.2L that had these features was the '95s... any later, and they went to a single port exhaust, any earlier didn't have the EGR port. I figure, at least. The dealer completed the engine swap already... found out when I swung by the shop to let him know to go ahead and swap out the clutch & what not. Ah, well. At least I should be able to pick it up sometime tonight.

Me again . The dealer/garage is hunting around for a '95 2.2L to replace the 2.5L in my '97 OBW with. The first one that was delivered supposedly came out of a front-end collison, and the owner of the garage could tell (that's probably not a good thing). While he was waiting for the first 2.2L, he pulled the car into the garage and pulled the 2.5L out. In the meantime, while he's waiting for a second 2.2L, I think he's trying to maximize his time... he called last night asking if I wanted to replace the clutch this time around, while he's got the engine out. I figure this is probably a good idea, while the engine's out, since I have no idea how many miles are on this clutch, and the engine's out anyway. Haven't had any problems with the current clutch, however. Anything else I may as well swap out while he's in there? And is it worth it to inspect and replace, or just replace? I figure I'd have him take a look at the clutch, throw-out bearing, pilot bearing, pressure plate, and rear seal. I'd rather inspect and replace if necessary, since I don't have an unlimited budget (all of this is being taken out of the money set aside for my new computer system).

My wife tends to like using the fog lights on her '00 OBW, since she's got bad night vision, and it helps light up the area immediately in front of the vehicle, making it easier to see the lines. I will admit that they make it easier when driving in wet weather, when the water on the road makes it hard to see the markings. Not crucial when I'm in familiar territory, but when I haven't already been there, it's a pain to try to figure out where the lanes are.

How 'bout we all agree to make sure our lights are aimed? As long as they have their fog/driving lights properly aimed, I don't mind seeing oncoming SUV's with them on. Aimed at me, however, they get really annoying really quickly. Same applies for a set of normal headlights... if it's misaimed, they're blinding. Same goes for those gawd awful blue lights... they're a hindrance, not a help (blue light scatters more easily). They tend to hurt my eyes, too... nothing I can't cope with, but it's a pain in the arse to be trying to drive at night and deal with a pair of complaining eyes. No more ranting, I promise ;o)

I'd look for a '95 EJ22 and swap that in there... check out here. I picked up a '97 OBW back in August that had previously had a 2.5L blowing steam in it. One of the conditions of me picking it up was that the dealer swap the engine in it (his decision, soon as he heard I was interested in the car). The car continued having overheating problems (possible clogged radiator, possible bad headgaskets), and I toasted the engine. I got lucky with my choice of dealers, since he was good on his word to cover it under his verbal extension of the warranty. It's spent the last month or so down at his garage while he looked for a replacement engine... supposedly the best he's found is an EJ25 with 160k miles for $2,200, which includes replacing the headgaskets and machining the heads down by default. Instead, I talked to him about putting 2.2L in it instead... he called some other mechanic who confirmed the feasibility of the swap, then vented about the quality of the 2.5L, and agreed to swap out the 2.5L for the 2.2L.

I was planning on throwing together a system together to play my mp3's on, gather data via the OBDII port, maybe provide GPS too. I've got a fairly recent laptop that has a suspect IDE (hard drive) controller on it, along with a trashed keyboard. Display's still good though, along with the USB ports and the optical drive. I figured I'd slap it up on the dash somehow, and use it with a trackball to control the sound and display the data provided by the OBDII port. Like ferret, it ought to make diagnosing problems easier. I could see how easy it'd be to rig up an alert system, too... if any of the data exceeds a safety value, the laptop gives a warning through the car's speakers. Sounded like a good idea, but I still haven't gotten into it much... had too many other projects, and I still haven't gotten my OBW back from its engine swap. You might want to check out www.mp3car.com. They had quite a bit of good information on their forums.

Pppppphhhhttttt. No snow yet in Albany... I rather miss western NY for that.

Check out http://www.wegotused.com/. They've got info on the right side of the page, specific to Allentown. I've thought about makin' a run down there once or twice, just haven't gotten the initiative together yet.

Yeah... sooooo.... everyone remember that overheating problem that my '97 was having? I managed to toast the engine really well a couple of weeks ago. Check engine light was flashing (that's a first for me, btw), engine would stumble under load and under idle intermittently, and it would belch dirty exhaust at about the same time. Smelled something horrible, too... like a hot engine mixed with burning oil. Talked to the dealer/garage... the owner said "Can you drive it back? If it dies on the way here, call me, and we'll tow it back." I managed to get it back in (after dropping the air "burp" radiator plug down into the lower radiator mount, where I couldn't retrieve it), and parked it. Ran my thoughts of a plugged/stuck radiator past him, and he said it's a definite thought, and he'd look into its condition. Also said he'd take care of the engine, repair or replace as necessary. I stopped by a week ago, and he outright stated he'd replace the engine, and cover it. On the down side, he's got to find a replacement engine first. He is taking his time to find one, but that's better than yanking any ol' engine out of whatever junkyard he runs across. Considering that I'm driving around a Geekmobile, I can afford to wait a bit. I'm starting to think I found an honest-to-goodness reputable shop, located in Troy, NY of all places. The "armpit of the east coast". I don't plan on keeping my hopes up, but things might just work out this time. It'll be really nice to know that I haven't gotten burned yet again by trusting someone's word. P.S.: I'm not going to reveal the name/location of this dealer until this little adventure has had its run... no sense jinxing myself.

My wife's 00 OBW has a bit of rust on the underside... more than I'd feel comfortable with for a five/six year old car. I don't have the time this fall, but next spring I figure I'm gonna take a couple days off, knock off as much crud & rust as I can with a good wire brush/power drill w/ wire disk, then slap a bunch of POR-15, dismantling & reassembling parts if need be. Ought to give me a good chance to take a look at the bushings, bolts, etc., and replace as required. I'll look into this Rustcheck stuff, and see about applying it over the POR-15 instead of the typical rubberized undercoating that I was going to use. My '97 is just about rust-free... and if this stuff works, maybe I can keep it that way.

The problem with these comments, with the exception of the last one, is that they're all subjective. I can't say that I've driven an '05, but I have driven my '97 and my wife's '00. I like the heavy feel... gives me the impression that the car is solid. My wife's auto tranny doesn't seem slushy, since it picks right up without any problem. I don't believe either of my OBW's have that fbw throttle, so that's moot. I love the seating, personally... but I'm comparing them to my wife's old Saturn

I do have to wonder about the women the reviewer is seeing... that hole in the grille is really too large to be comparing it to certain portions of female anatomy . I can't see the fallopian tube reference in the interior... well, I can, if I push my imagination. But it's a stretch. On the other hand, I'd have to say that anybody who turns down a Subaru for the way it looks doesn't deserve a Subaru. My ol' Loyale was ugly as sin, but she sure had what counts, far as I'm concerned.

I do have to worry about the women this guy has been seeing, since he's comparing the front end to their anatomy... that hole's rather large. Might explain why he's so... ornery? Anyway, it's kinda growing on me.

So it should be possible to get the y-pipe off a single port EJ22, and get it welded in place of my dual port y-pipe?

I picked up a set of pads for my wife's 2000 OBW from Autozone, just the plain jane Wear Evers. The "guide tabs" were just a tad bit too large, making it a pain in the arse to get them installed. I suspect they were the reason the brakes locked up on the left front about four days after they were installed. After that, the wife has pretty much demanded the brake pads straight from the dealer. More expensive, but it also came with replacement shims and guides. Made it worthwhile to pick up the set from the dealer, even if I did have to admit the wife was right.

$4,500 is a fairly decent price, as far as I'm concerned. I picked up a '97 OBW with 126k on the ticker, just a month and a half ago. That price included an engine swap, since the previous engine had been overheating constantly. The dealer attempted several repairs, gave up, and sat on it 'til he found a buyer who'd be willing to pick it up with an engine swap (when I took the "test drive" prior to the swap, the engine was throwing a LOT of steam out the exhaust). Dealer verbally extended the warranty from one to three months without me having to ask or press the issue. Downside: It's been randomly & unpredictably attempting to spike the temp. gauge since I picked it up, roughly once a week. It's in the dealer's shop right now, getting looked at. Got another thread or two hanging around concerning it, too. I've been looking around the area, comparing. I've found two other '97 OBWs for sale. The first was in a dealer's lot, 100k, asking $8 grand. The second sat in someone's yard, had obvious front end damage & the word "rebuilt" in the description written in glass chalk on the windshield, and the owner wanted $4,500 for it. Ppppphhhhttt. On the whole, even with the maintenance/repairs that are built in, $4,500 sounds very reasonable to me.

I might have something laying around back home that might work for you. I'll check tonight, after work.

I removed the petcock completely... still just a trickle. I might just try the wire trick, then the flush additive. Depending how much that all goes, I might try taking it to a radiator shop.

I took the lower radiator hose off... and it went down alright. Most of it ended up in my makeshift bucket. I did get everything switched around alright, let it sit throughout the day, then bled it tonight. Tomorrow will be the first time I'll have driven it since the 'stat swap. I've got a bit of coolant left over from the thermostat change... thinking about taking it to a local radiator shop and see if they can't pressure flush it, while sealing off every orfice but the draincock and wherever they're forcing coolant into the radiator. Or backwards. Or however they attempt to clean radiators internally.

I can't get my '97 OBW to replicate the overheating problem for the dealer. So I dug into it myself just now, frustrated, figuring I'd swap the thermostat, get as much air bled out as I can, and go from there. Funny thing is, though... I'm used to opening what I call the draincock... that faucet thing on the bottom right of the radiator (standing at the rear of the car looking forwards)... to drain the radiator, in addition to opening the cap and the bleeder cap. Opened that up, and got about 20 oz of coolant, all at a trickle. It was still trickling when I closed it up to post this, but it's definitely a trickle. If I open the radiator cap, I can see fluid just sitting there. If pop the cap back on, and blow into the bleeder hole, it spurts out, but returns back to it's trickle. There was a bunch of gunk in the channel of the draincock... left over from oil in the coolant from the last engine, I'm thinking. Makes me wonder how much other gunk is in the radiator, and if that's what I'm looking at. A clogged radiator?

http://auto.howstuffworks.com/question122.htm

Yeah...soo... I'm kinda pissed off at the moment. So far, I've been the nice guy from the country, who takes people's words at face value 'til he starts getting burned by them. I may not be getting burned at the moment, but the temperature's rising, and I'm not comfortable. Dropped the car off yesterday morning to have the dealer take a look at it. Only left a quarter tank of gas in it, so the dealer said he didn't have much time to drive it around, but it didn't overheat during the time he did. Looks like he went through a 1/8 of a tank of gas during his test drive, plenty of time for it to heat up. Kinda hard to tell though, honestly, once it starts getting close like that. So I picked up the keys in the middle of appointments (I work as a Double Agent for Geek Squad, driving 'round to people's houses, fixing computers), and let the dealer know I was going to pick it up tonight. He let me know the above, and also stated that the oil leak was caused by a plug in the block that hadn't been tightened down. Incidently, anybody know of a plug in the block that will leak oil if it's not tightened down? I don't know of one, but I haven't stripped down an EJ25, either. Anyway, I walk back to the GS Bug while the wife starts the OBW and drives it to the gas station. I wait 'til she passes, and notice... (wait for it... c'mon, you know what I'm gonna see...) STEAM. Lots and lots of STEAM. Out the tailpipe. Can't miss it. Rather like a smoke bomb. Very similiar to what the previous engine underwent, actually (gotta wonder if that's merely coincidence) Surprised the wife isn't opening the door and diving out (albeit, into oncoming traffic), thinking the car's gonna blow up or something. The steam dies off by the time we drive the two tenths of a mile up the road to the gas station, but it's still pretty obvious. Park it, get gas, drive it back to the dealer, and park it. I'll talk to him tomorrow morning. Incidently, I'm going to end up doing some side work for him by installing a wired network so his two shop computers can share the same repair data, etc., and so he'll have a data backup on a regular basis (he just had his system in for service through one of his kid's friends, who managed to toast the data on the hard drive, and wipe it clean. 3 years of records gone, no backup, no reasonable method to retrieve them. Doh). Now it's going to be very dependent on how the conversation tomorrow goes. If he agrees that there's a pretty big problem, and he'll take care of it right away, I won't have any problem continuing my generosity. If he puts up a fight, I'll offer to get the network set up in return for him swapping the headgaskets and getting the heads milled (equal work/cost, I figure). If he refuses... well, I'm gonna be one pissed off... whatever. Pissed. Livid. Angry. Mad. Erg. I'm still willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. There's always that chance that, up 'til this point, he's missed all the signs that I've been seeing. Assuming it steams up tomorrow morning when I start it up (it'd better), he'll have the evidence right in front of him and me. He wants to start beating around the bush then, and I'll have an issue with that. I don't like issues. If he wants to take care of it, then I'll feel better. More relaxed. Calmer.

I had the understanding that this was the case on the older Subie's, but not on the newer ones. I just did the front's on my wife's 2000 OBW (dual piston), and just pushed the pistons in by hand, mostly. Next month is the rears (one piston, I believe), but I can't imagine they'd be different.

So I gotta find a MY '95 Impreza or Legacy donor... cars101.com says the Legacies were all 2.2L, the MT Imprezas only had the 1.8L, and the AT Imprezas might have the 2.2L or the 1.8L. I'd go CCR, 'cept I don't have the cash. What if I've got a manual transmission? Obviously no torque converter there... I'd have to find a MT EJ22 to get a EJ22 flywheel if it matches, or do I use the flywheel from the EJ25? I assume I get to keep the EJ25 clutch. So by saying "everything bolts up", all my "engine accessories" from the EJ25 will carry over to the EJ22? It'd be nice knowing I'd have all these viable spare parts... Charcoal canister. Check. Gotta find someplace to mount it. Oh yeah ;o). Been driving the OBW for a week, and I already want to take it apart, change stuff, and put it back together.

I'm going to start looking around for a '95 EJ22. Regardless of whether the dealer swaps the EJ25 or not, I don't feel comfortable at all with a replacement EJ25, considering the trouble I'm having, and the trouble a lot of other folks are having. I wanted a '96 OBS for the noninterference EJ22 to begin with... couldn't find one, so I settled for the OBW. I'm gonna take it back to the dealer, find out if he'll do the h/c test. If he says it comes up negative, or refuses to do the test, I take it to my normal mechanic for a second opinion. We play it by ear after that. While all this is going on, I start finding a replacement EJ22.