idosubaru

very much unsafe. even across town i'd recommend against it, driving long distance or highway is very risky. it can be done but the risks are substantial. soobs are not up to towing other cars. you are risking not only your cars, but your own personal saftey and others. not ethical nor an option in my oppinion. but it can be done in the simple terms of if it could make it. i asked the same thing earlier this year and am glad i listened to everyone else and did not do it.

anyone know the length, width, height? trying to have one shipped. think it's over 36" long x 24" wide x 12" high?

throttle plate sticking or not going any further? probably not, that shouldn't affect fueling like that and you'd likely see other issues, but easy enough to check.

if you have a hotwire MAF be very careful, those internal strands going through the air flow will break easily. a good check for older cars is to go over every piece of sensor harness wiring, i've found a few abd spots in wiring this way that caused intermittent issues. with the car running, start at the sensor harness and keep massaging the wire with your fingers/hands as far back as you can go...usually a foot or two of wire. roll, bend, twist the wire through your hands. a bad spot in the wiring will show itself when the engine starts bucking, coughing, shuts off...or sometimes starts running great if it was otherwise rough. replace any wire that causes these symptoms. tune ups are always good too......plugs, wires, cap and rotor are excellent ideas. i chased a rabbit two years ago on my daily driver...couldn't figure out a stumbling problem and bad mileage. felt like i had done a recent tune up. swapped every sensor in the car...finally realized that while i did a tune up a little over a year prior it was probably 40,000+ miles ago eventhough it didn't seem like that long....replaced the plugs and all was good. all that trouble shooting for nothing.

dropping the HLA won't hurt it. i would immediately store them in a bag of oil though if you ever plan on reusing them. keep them from rusting at all. rotate the motor over by hand and as you're doing it, keep pressure on top of the pistons (do one at a time obviously unless you have 3 or 4 helpers!!)....you're looking for any play in the pistons as you slowly crank the engine over. rod bearings and the piston pin are good things to keep an eye out for, but hard to really get a look at without splitting. some of these guys will have some good ideas on what to look for.

is anyone not messmerized by the $340 dollar charge to drain the coolant? they got completely slammed if that's all they did for $340. never, ever take your car to these people again. 2,000 + for head gaskets is insane as well. i wouldn't assume anything they told you is true or correct...i'd start over and take it somewhere else and also file a complaint with the BBB after you find out the results from somewhere else. you're in colorado, would you consider a rebuilt SOHC 2.5 from CCR? that's your best bet if you can afford it.

no.

right on nipper. the only one i had go bad was in my 1989 XT when it was about 4 years old back in 1993.....now i've owned a bunch of 15 year old XT6's with 200,000 miles and haven't had another fail since! i've sold a couple to people that had them go out. so like nipper said, they fail. i probably have one i can sell you if it's the same as your car.

friend of mine just fixed a 2.5 that snapped a belt. only needed to replace a couple valves and all was good. basically a valve job, basic head work, only had to purchase a couple valves. not a big deal at all. everything else looked fine. dealer in Hanover, PA told me they rarely see catastrophic damage in the broken timing belts they have in the shop. i don't recall if they were talking 2.2 or 2.5 though. they even told me that just as often as there is damage there is also no damage. i don't consider that reliable since i don't know them and i do all the work on my car so i've never dealt with the shop. but their parts guys have always been great to work with. though i heard the experienced guys left in the past couple weeks and it's all newbies now. don't know why they'd lie to me, i specifically asked them about the 2.2 and 2.5 liter interference motors.

sounds like you got the problem solved...would installing the water pump pulley "backwards" intentionally give you any more/less room to work with?

blower motors go out fairly often. give it 12 volts directly and see if it spins. sometimes it's even just clogged, picked up insulation or something and can't turn. or just replace with a used unit for a couple dollars. not familiar with your car, but in my car it's below the glove compartment box and only held in place by 3 bolts, easy enough to get to. the controls can be to blame as well, buttons, levers, etc.

ramps fine to drain, have flat to refill. a good many people here ask questions about cars that aren't in their sig's so it's not a bad idea to post sometimes. i have 8 different subarus, 3 different models and forget to post which one i'm asking about from time to time.

make absolutey certain all the tires are the same and pressures are where they should be. change transmission fluid. drain and refill your trans fluid about 3 times to get it all out. one drain doesn't get it all out as fluid lies throughout the trans, trans cooler and lines. i do like 3 fluid drain and refills for a change.

agree with the above, i've replaced 90,000 mile timing belts that still said Subaru on them and looked *okay*. i would never trust a visual, there is really no alternative to replacing it, only mitigating risks and taking chances. until parts come with odometers attached there's no substitute for replacement. anything else is just taking a chance. you feeling luckY?

cool thanks guys.....now i just need to find an EA82 y pipe of any kind.

thanks shady, so the EJ lifts include a front strut extension to the top or bottom? can you post a picture of how this extension attaches to see if it'll fit the XT6 strut and i'll verify if the EJ struts bolt up or require swapping strut tophats. looks like EJ front strut extensions and EA rear strut extensions will work. (i know nothing about lifts). any diff hardware for the EA series should work. what else is there...transmission or engine hardware too?

definitely replace the distributor cap and rotor. start with that. this is a really good thing to check: pull your brake pads and make sure they are wearing evenly. what you want to do is make sure the caliper slide arms are all greased really well. swing the caliper arms up and notice the rubber boots on both ends that the caliper bracket slides on. these boots have the metal rod going through them (don't know the proper names). pull them out and stuff all sort of grease in the boots and all over the slide, then insert it and work it back and forth a bunch of times. wipe away excess grease and don't get it on any rotors or pads. install everything. this makes sure the calipers move in an out very easily and will prevent them from riding against the rotor when you're not braking. most of the 10+ year old subaru brakes i pull are completely bone dry with no grease and dont' operate very smoothly. making it possible for them to constantly drag more than they need to. you probably have rear drum brakes so you'll only have to do this to the fronts. these previous two items are very important, particularly if you're having a serious drop in mileage. after that i'd consider having the fuel injectors professionally cleaned, but that is expensive but most old injectors will be dripping. still having issue - do a compression test and make sure you're not chasing somethign you'll never find. if you have bad compression somewhere then all the tune up and spending in the world won't help unless it's focused in the right place. if you did the plugs yourself you can test compression too. borrow a tester from a friend...autozone has the tool loaner program, they may have those as well. some will say fuel filter and that's not a terrible idea but i've yet to see one affect gas mileage even a little. i'd save the money for an extra tank of gas unless you don't know how old it is. O2 sensor isn't a bad idea, just buy the generic kind and splice it in yourself and save 40 bucks on the OEM plug in kind. never had one of these make a significant difference in mileage either. i've run without them before, disconnected and/or removed with not a ton of effect, though those weren't great running vehicles to begin with in all fairness. look for a 3.7 final drive transmission, they make for better highway gas mileage.

visual is all you can do, unless you can find the shop that worked on it or ask the previous owner for details. even so, i feel much better after doing the job myself and inspecting the bearings. some mechanics could case less what shape the bearings are in, it won't be their responsibility if the car fails in a year.

regular out of the box 1/2" socket wrench on the rear and a regular socket on the front (just like draining your oil). i wouldn't open up the rear diff, usually it's wet from something up front leaking and blowing back....trans, diff, oil...anything. over many years doesn't take much to build up and gunk things up. no need to open up a diff and clean it. drain and refill with synthetic and be on your way. check the level from time to time. kind of tricky to do, but just add more fluid in after a couple months and see if it takes any. how the car sets has a lot to do with how much you get in there since there isn't much clearnace to pour the bottle in. and yes the gasket sealant is out of the tube type.

interference 2.2 liter motors started in 97. anything prior is non-interference, including all 1.8 and 2.7 liter motors as well. there are on-line resources but dont' know that i'd trust them, sometimes they are convoluted. dealer or here is your best bet to find out.

for XT or Xt6 specific info www.xt6.net is a good resource as well. for your motor and trans and most things you'll get all you could ask for here though, much larger membership base.

look under the car - if you have rear axles to the wheels then you have 4WD or AWD. if there's nothing, then you fot FWD. best to clean the underside really good and see where the leak comes from, see what starts getting oily first.

SVXpert may be interested. he is roughly around the philly area, south jersey. he is on the board, look him up and email. he's a good guy, i've bought parts from him and met him once to get parts. don't drive it very long like this, depending on the leak, prolonged driving can damage the heads. (been there, done that). i drove mine for 10,000-20,000 miles and damaged the heads. they may be repairable but at a cost.

someone moved my post? i was trying to get an answer on a question before cluttering up this thread. if there are 10 questions with 2 responses each you just ended up with 20+ replies....

the covers come off very easily, the right and left timing belt covers. only need a 10mm socket to remove them. you can inspect the belt this way. a visual is the only thing you can do....or find the original owner. in the US you can find the previous owners information and call them up if you really wanted to. if there is any doubt or you don't know, this is an interference motor and must be replaced. or you take the risk.