idosubaru

it'll match FWD coil converted XT6's nicely....at 200,000 the fronts are original OEM so i'll be doing struts/springs there and bring it back up.

wow that's nuts - where would that happen? not much rust to speak of but i'll definitely check tonight. ordered stiff 2005 Baja Turbo rear springs that are supposed to stiffen the ride and lift the rear 0.5" - 1". part number: 20380AE50A luckily i have another H6 Outback to install them on if this one has something more ominous going on!!

okay, great, thanks guys. i'll order new springs. looks like 04-05 baja springs are stiffer and give some lift and increased stiffness for carrying loads.

i like the nice clean looking engine bay and all. $2,400 is really steep. and for that price the timing belt hasn't been done? that's a $500 job on the cheap end at a dealer, higher if it's done right. in my opinion that's not a good daily driver until it has a new timing belt kit - they're $60 - $100 on ebay. the timing pulleys are old and so is the belt. i was looking for about the same thing you're looking for earlier this year and there are not many of them...but if you give yourself time you'll see them consistently popping up here and there on craigslist.

2002 H6 Outback auto Rear drivers side was *really* low, tire was rubbing lightly until we shifted some weight more to the other side. It did come back up a little as we took weight out of the car. 2 adults and some gear in the back - 500 pounds maybe. And now is up a bit (not sure if it's normal or not) now that it's unloaded. The rear struts are new KYB GR-2's. I didn't replace the springs as it seemed many folks don't. Rear spring seems fine on visual inspection. Guess it looks like I should have replaced the rear springs too?

You're using Mozilla - use another browser and you won't have that issue. i mean mozilla is my default browser, but something with the settings is preventing it...

the fan(s) aren't coming on or there's is/was a leak. If this is what happened: 1. car ran perfectly, never overheated 2. hit deer at 65 mph 3. car immediately started overheating/loosing coolant then it is most definitely the deer that caused the issue and not headgaskets (unless of course you overheated it so bad that you blew the headgaskets, that doesn't sound like the case thougH)..or you are so acutely in tune with odds that are anomalies that you should go buy a lottery ticket right now. if a hose or something is tweaked - the hot, pressurized coolant can spray, coagulate as it runs/drips down, and cause areas to be wet that aren't necessarily near where the leak is. interesting that you said this - i hit a deer at 75 mph and smashed mine in pretty good. i immediately pulled over and there was coolant everywhere so i thought i would be stuck. oddly enough i cleaned everything up, saw no signs of leakage and drove the other 100 miles or so home. i am still running that car 2 years and many miles later (including a couple thousand mile trips)....where that coolant came from i have no idea. but...mine was nowhere near the amount that you're talking.

nice hit. replace the others that way and you'll have a sweet looking swiss cheese timing belt cover. many of us run 'naked' without timing belt covers to make belt changes a snap. our belt/pulley changes probably take as long as it took you to do that. but that's only if you've done a bunch of these things, first time would certainly take longer.

usually just drives a little rough...sometimes in rare cases it can be very unpleasant to drive. it's really easy to replace, cheap (ebay, even a member here sells them i think) and the plastic housing is cracked (that's how they always fail), best plan is to just replace it.

the H6's around that year have weak throttle position sensors. i've never heard of one not allowing it to start like you suggest and that certainly wouldn't be fuel level dependent....but if we assume the fuel level was coincidental and i have seen TPS's cause no starts in other Subaru's (just not EZ30's) then maybe it's possible. one of mine also has a funny characteristic, and oddly enough it only does it on long extended drives - it will "run out of gas" right around the time the low fuel light comes on. done it multiple times, i just don't let it get down to empty and all is good that's what i keep wondering. what is *causing* it to fail? maybe replacing the fuel filter is a good idea...if it gets clogged could that increase pressure on the pump components? doesn't seem likely to me but something must be causing this?

+1 don't hammer it. if it's really bad like it can get here in the northeast then the amount of hammering required can mushroom the end of the axle and once you get it loose it will be mushroomed too far to pass through the threads. LOL then you'll have to file the pounded lip down. then you'll see the threads damaged so badly that the axle is no longer usable and few people have a die that big to rechase those threads. don't use a regular gear puller either. there's nothing to grab onto and again if it's anything like the rust here your disc rotors will crack right off or the hub will break if you try to grab anything on those. i'd be interested to see a hub puller in action against some of these rusted demons, i need to get one.

i would install them and live with it. ceramic pads are quite nice, i prefer them myself. not much dust and perform nicely. not sure what they do to rotors on subarus, i seem to replace those due to vibration up front anyway over time and the rears never really need replacing so i haven't worried about it.

there is no ring that needs to come off, so i'm not sure what you mean by ring? being rust-welded in place may be a possibility. soak it in some rust penetrant? folks have been talking about an excellent product available in auto parts stores, you soak a rag in it and stuff it where you need it and it soaks overnight/over time into the rusty joint. forget the name and haven't tried it myself yet.

i've installed used caps, swapped some caps and they are always that tight. very, very tight fit. feels wrong but that's how they are. the depth of the cap is meaningless as you said, just a reservoir. i will be ordering some caps and orings. he is implying how many people take this in to a dealer to have it repaired...which is going to include labor, tow, tax, labor, shop fees, diagnosis...$700 might be high side but i bet it's not too far off.

that is some bad transmission mojo you got going on mr. radon. high miles, fluid never changed??..dunno, doesn't sound normal to me, EJ transmissions hold up well if the fluid is changed.

you have tried turning the engine both ways with no luck? engine is trashed - can you get it close enough to just smash the bellhousing enough with a chisel to get at the last bolt? can you get it from underneath - sometimes there's a plate you can bend or manuever around to see into the bellhousing area underneath, never tried that before though. yes you can pull the engine with the converter attached - the pipe usually stays connected so it's looooong but it'll come out. or just pull the engine/torque converter out enough to have a 1 or 2 inch gap and then dremel, hacksaw, sawzall, chisel the flexplate tab off and get another flexplate. you can use any converter in my opinion, i've never noticed a difference. probably not a bad idea to have the converter that was designed for the engine so the 2.2 might be a good idea anyway.

by "seal" i take it you just mean the oring. a picture would help to make sure we're talking about the same thing. the cam cap has 2 10mm bolts holding it to the back of the passengers side of the engine. remove that cap and underneath is an oring. behind the *front* drivers side cam sprocket (and maybe passengers side too?) is the same style cam cap and same exact oring, remove caps and replace. don't look on the back of the drivers side, it's behind the timing belt up front. if you weren't too put off by removing the motor you could just try to run the clutch as-is and replace it later if needed. makes sense to do it now but sometimes someone doesn't have the money and pulling the motor a second time is a better option...up to you. if the clutch has plenty of material it's likely to last. disc looks warn but usable, probably has life to it. up to you to determine how much life, how much you don't want to pull the engine again, cost, etc.

would this tool hold up to east coast nastiness? wonder if 5 years of use there means 2 months here. LOL

i'm not confident we know where the leak is coming from yet....i'd drop that exhaust manifold and then get us a picture before we assume anything. s.

i really don't know what's happening physically but this brake issue is a very common 00-04 Legacy/OBW problem so it seems simple enough to check. but if you're reliant on a mechanic i can see where it would be nice to actually know. i've also had it happen immediately after brake jobs (i assume making that bushing swell or something). and you said it goes away when braking...strongly implicating brakes...though not ruling out other things of course! i think it goes something like this...but this is speculation, i usually just think of this as a common issue more than try to analyze what happens, but i can probably make something up!!...the rubber bushing is only in one pin per side and that pin is impeded or seized (probably a gradual process, not immediate - a bit reminiscent of your description of it going away). the other pin is able to move, but only has very limited range due to the other one sticking. so the pad has more range of motion on one end than the other. i can sort of picture a scenario where the pad is unevenly warn and slightly canted such that the pad is pushed, pulled, pushed, pulled..making a clunking noise. why it would be timed with tire rotation i'm not sure about. if memory serves me right i believe it is the inner pad that gets affected, i know it's just one that gets affected by this for some reason due to the geometry of the configuration. the ones that i have seen make more of a rubbing noise than clunk...so i'm equally unsure. applying brakes seizes the pads in place...acceleration may push a pad far enough off the rotor surface to mitigate the cause? who knows, i'm still calling my suggestions very rough guesses at best. hate to see you take it to a mechanic for a shot in the dark.

i use a cheap Lowe's wire feed welder and it works fine for simple stuff, i've removed quite a few rusty stuff with it. there are of course cases where it won't work or you want want too. like i had a stuck pinch bolt but didn't want to weld around the wheel bearing due to heat, or you won't have access to it with a welder, or it shears off flush with or deep into a hole....etc, so welding doesn't always work, but sometimes it's a quick and easy solution. i'm not sure if it's true but i suspect the process of welding/heating it up also helps as i've had them come out surprisingly easy before after welding. some very tight turning of the wrench sheared it off but the welded on nut easily came out...i just assume that's heat cycle related but no idea.

why don't you weld a nut on them and then back them out? i haven't been able to find drill bits that easily and quickly drill through all the bolts on Subaru's, kind of annoying. i got expensive online cobalt bits recommended by a machinist friend and they would not touch the torque converter to crankshaft bolts - brand new bits, oiled up, would not even make a dent in them. (not the flexplate bolts, those drill easily). i had a thread about it here, had to grind them off http://www.ultimatesubaru.org/forum/showthread.php?t=130519&highlight=drill&page=3 i wish i could find a drill bit set that can drill through this stuff...

best way is to place a nut over top the existing stud and weld it onto the stud. then use a socket wrench to remove it. takes a few seconds. propane helps sometimes, though i usually use it on nuts. get the flame right next to the surrounding area and the idea is to try to back the bolt out while it is still cool and the metal in the block is hot.

Yeah the manual trans stuff is everywhere, hard to find final drive stuff for autos isn't it? The impreza RS should be 4.44 I would think the same of the forester. Subaru generally fitted all EJ25 auto's with 4.44 gears but i do recall some exceptions to that. Subaru did some odd things with final drives....

it made an immediate jump to decent gas mileage to this? wow - 9mpg !!! that is terrible. i have you pulled the intake back out from when you replaced the air filter? i wonder if something got left in there or installed crooked or something is wrong with the air filter, stuck in the throttle plate, i'd go back in there and see if you can find something. i'm not sure how fuel pressure is regulated on these but i wonder if you accidentally affected the fuel pressure regulator hoses/lines when working on it?