idosubaru

Clanking - if it’s piston slap, ignore it. Wont be fixing that and it’s benign.

Prop open throttle plate, disable fuel pump (there’s a plug on pump under car in front of p/s rear wheel) test. Or pull the fuel hose in the engine bay and place it in a bottle surrounded by a towel so you can see what the fuel looks like at the same time. I doubt I’d bother, whatever issues it has won’t likely be compression. Or, if it is you can probably tell by seeing if the radiator is full or empty/antifreeze or water or it’s been abused.

I wouldn’t bother on those early CVTs, the trans itself doesn’t have the cleanest reliability record. I guess the flip side is if you think the trans is in awesome shape or has been lightly used or fluid was changed, you know it’s history, maybe it’s better than a an unknown used one. Yes, you can remove front diff, but it’s a beastly job very few people do to begin with. There’s a good chance you only need a bearing, one of which is $100. If that’s you then it’s a relatively inexpensive repair. And I think you can just retain all the clearances by installing all your caps and fasteners exactly as they were, no measuring needed if you swap used diff you can try to retain all the clearances of the donor as you install it identically to how it was installed previously. That’s been done before though exceedingly rare. if you’re replacing with new go price it out first - $800 ring and pinion, one bearing is $100, it could easily be well over $1,000 just in parts.

Check radiator. Sounds like its running a fairly consistent temp but can’t dump enough heat - could be slightly plugged I’m assuming a few things since we don’t have a fuller description but original factory installed ez30 Hgs rarely do what you’re describing without additional symptoms or details. If they were just replaced that changes things.

Too review the current knowns: 1. Two TCUs both flash the Power light. 2. The current TCU drives without issue so far (although you haven’t driven it much?). 3. The first TCU went into limp mode sometimes and had drivability issues. Some unlikely guesses: Make sure to read codes on the cycle immediately after symptoms. Maybe you’ve only tried reading codes when the intermittent codes aren’t set? They were set and flashing and then when you went to read them they had cleared? Doubtful. Both TCUs are problematic. This is like the 3rd 30 year old Subaru TCU issue I’ve seen this month. Internal trans issues.

It may be right, it looks like it is. I don’t know why but it’s easy to go through those steps and not get it to show codes. It may be timing - need to do each step in 1 second - and you do one in 1.2 seconds or one step doesn’t register because it was too quickly done, or maybe it’s due to age, TCUs fail in that way, I have no idea. It just happens all the time on these older 4EATs. It’s so much the case that I’d be surprised if someone did the steps and got the code the first time. It is by far the least consistent code acquiring Subaru system out of all years and ECU TCU ABS SRS VDC, all of it, hands down. Those older TCUs are nothing like all those other systems which consistently give up their codes. The TCU is for the correct vehicle right? I doubt it matters because you’d have encountered something if it was wrong but did you run the parts number on the TCU through a Subaru parts site to verify years/models?

Last I saw Subaru’s 0% financing ends Sept 30. Maybe Sales people stiffen up close to that, Knowing that some people want that rate and will sign rather than loose it. In some areas, and outside of known excellent urban dealers, the more rural or less high ended communities around, the better your chances are at getting away from cash flushed places that see so many people with open wallets that you’re just a nuisance. I’ve seen this play out in a number of locales in different states around high priced communities which NY has plenty of. They see so many customers that pay whatever and some tire kicking lowballers, most who know little about cars, that they unfortunately treat you poorly if you don’t fit one of those molds. I don’t know your dealer but I’ve seen this before and heard from long time dealership staff (not just Subaru) that this is the case.

I’ve never seen any hint that the ones I’ve replaced might not be original. Most customers don’t trust shops enough to pay for every little suggestion, and those open their wallets to shops will be very few and don’t want to think about cars, or join this forum, once they walk out the door.

Good luck! Salesperson whackamole

Do you mean a service schedule? Like listed required maintenance? Or an invoice?

What are you looking for? $20 part and $130 labor = $150 should be the most you pay Many places charge 1 hour minimum which can run $130ish per hour. Lesser amounts will depend shop rate, how the shop charges, and if they’ll bill for partial hours. Ive replaced PCV valves preventatively or preventatively/mitigating/eliminating issues. They’re pocket change and take 10-30 minutes. If you’re still married to your original question you may want to post year/make/model. some are simple, others like H6s are a little more involved. Though as the 10-30 minutes suggests, they’re all easy.

There are TCU codes - that's what the 16 POWER light flashes at start up indicate. Getting it to flash the code(s) is a work of art. It's usually a shock if you get it to work right, not the other way around. Double check your procedure and make sure you're not missing a step or there's not multiple ways to interpret a given step in which case you try the other. Some of the steps if you're being very meticulous to details, do have some ambiguity in them.

Oh salespeople, good grief will they never stop? Rust free, runs, drives, northeast, fall - your old one should sell quickly at $2k right now if you could list it yourself. You could try listing it on subaruoutback.org. Facebook is easy to sell stuff, just be prepared to ignored all the low ballers and trade offers.

Pull engine. Remove all timing components and front and rear timing covers. Remove valve covers, intake manifold. Remove heads. Remove pistons and clean and reassemble with new rings. reassmble. Get the Subaru FSM if you’re serious, this is a huge job most DIY folks don’t do and you’d want the Subaru specs and steps. The FSM are great and easily found free online.

2017+ for forester, I’m not versed on crossteks specifics but I’d lean that way too for crossteks too. Issues to research and somewhat avoided by later models: CVT oil consumption Crosstek valve springs