idosubaru

open ended questions don't cut it here, it's not that black and white. every swap requires some tweaking - some 2 tweaks - some 10 - some more difficult than others. 96 and 02 are different EJ25's - 96 is Phase I 02 is Phase II. They don't swap without some serious tweaks. The transmissions will bolt up but not sure about swapping, there were some changes and there are some differences.

yep, it's very easy, there's nothing to it. remove piston (keep pressing brake pedal until it comes out). replace seal, boot, and spring clip - there's nothing to it really. no special tools, very straight forward and there's really only one seal. the clip holds the boot in place - though i've seen some newer single piston subaru calipers that dont' even have a clip to hold the boot.

Yes you can run RWD fine. If someone had problems I would guess the diff had issues to begin with, it's a 20 year old car with people tinkering with it over the decades. It's not safe if you drive it in the snow like it was an AWD! There are all sorts of folks with various opinions, looking for one answer from multiple people is silly.

are you sure? i've seen them with 14", 15", and 16" depending on model?

i'm not WA state specific but it's not nearly as hard as all the linguistical CYA's make it sound. most of that is just fluff. i did my first one this year and it was really straight forward and simple. my friends have done a bunch (in another state) and said it wasn't a big deal. i gave it a whirl and it was a cinch. the state had a packet, just follow the rules and get it done. they weren't sticklers either - document with pictures all repairs - i couldn't do that since the major stuff was already repaired, i had no damage pic's. they said that's fine. the "safety" check included a quick walk around and turning the car on then off to make sure the SRS lights properly lit up and went out. yours doesn't have air bags so no worries there. it was really simple. just annoying getting an extra inspection and technically it's not road legal first so you have to tow it there - i just drove it because i don't care! yours looks really simple I tend to think they're looking for really shady and questionable work. this being so minor and an older car isn't subject to that.

Noise, no problem, i've driven them 50,000 miles like that. Vibration is bad - it can break the plastic speedo gear inside the transmission case, it's very close to the axle but inside the trans. Guess how I know this Pack some grease in there by hand and the vibrations should go away? Or the boots are intact? In that case the axle is junk, common aftermarket problem. I recommend Subaru or MWE only. Get a used Subaru axle and reboot it.

That's bad but if really only 2.3 miles I wouldn't worry about it too much. Change the fluid?

actually the good news for you is that AT's are easier, very straight forward. there's an access hole (hard to access but it's there) at the rear of the engine under the throttle body, usually covered with a small rectangular rubber plug. through that hole you can stick a socket extension or beefy screwdriver in one of the holes in the flexplate to lock the engine in place.

I looked into this awhile ago - front auto and manual diffs are available since they're the same EA to EJ. But like a few folks mentioned above I could not find any good info on reliability so i've avoided it for years based on that.

Hard to say - at this point the timing belts need inspected. So it ran fine one day then didn't the next? Did it "break down" like quit running or just wouldn't start one day? Need to view this as "how much damage did this pulley cause" rather than a straight up no start condition. There's a few things that will cause a no start and the crank sensor is a common one.

get the ebay timing belt kits - they include all the pulleys at a reasonable price. not positive but i think you can even buy the complete $80 for the earlier 1996 EJ22 and use the two smooth idlers from that - they're the same part I believe. you'll want to confirm that here, someone will know. let us know what the aftermarket store costs were if you go that route.

If you don't know the timing belt is under those covers, you can't see it. So that's why I say be very careful and don't drive it like this. Good luck, if you fix it now you've got a relatively straight forward and simple repair. But it can get ugly quick from here.

Looks like a simple repair actually - do not drive it 10 feet like this. You have an interference engine - if the pulley breaks the timing belt then you'll sustain internal engine damage - bent valves and need a very expensive head job. Fix it now. Replace the crank shaft pulley, it's failed. If the timing belt has been touched at all, my guess is that it has based on the displacement I see in the picture - then the timing belt needs replaced as well. Dealer charges an insane amount for the belt - $700 in the states but it's only a 2 hour job so you can easily get it down elsewhere for cheap. Again though - I can't tell for sure it needs a new timing belt, but it does look like it. I wouldn't bother replacing the timing belt cover, the part that's been chewed into, it won't make any difference over the life of this vehicle. At most you can repair the covers with epoxy or RTV sealant easily if yo'ure worried about it, but i would (and have) left them.

Driveshafts are notorious for vibrations too i'd want some more info before declaring anything definitive. Are the axles original, how do they look? If they're after market axles that have been replaced or the boots look new, then there's a good chance those are the issue.

Unless someone else pipes up, I'd get one from 1988-1991. PM or email me, I probably have one. I tried a conversion/swap of a mid year 1987 model and found that the 1987 year can be a complicated one with a few wiring differences. It's the car in my signature, I'm still working out bugs with it and if memory serves me correctly (been awhile since i've tinkered with that annoying project) the 87 and 88 years have slight wiring differences. I was trying 88+ ECU's and ended up looking for an 87....but my issues were slightly different than what you're asking too.

Yes repair it. It can be done. Do not drive it like this and replace the timing belt if it got warn by all that carnage. If the pulley came loose then it wasn't properly installed the last time it came off. Or the pulley may have separated - it's actually a two piece part separated by a thin ring of rubber. They can separate at that rubber ring. Either way you should be able to get another pulley and fix this. Doesn't even have to be "perfect" if the end of the crank got chewed up. This has been covered several times. Can you do the work yourself? Posting a picture of the end of the crank with the pulley removed would be very helpful. I, and a few others on here, have repaired these before. I've repaired a couple.

what GD said. i wouldn't worry too much about the brand name here.

yep - you're on it get the metal one. not sure if they're all like that, but sound slike you're getting the one i always get that requires different screws. slightly annoying considering the cost of Subaru screws, but it's not really expensive, just principle.

everyone on here is going to say you can't do that and don't do it. i doubt anyone will say what i'm about to but since i have experience (in the last two months) i'll say this. i can't wait to hear all the responses to this! i've actually done it. that set i ran for 4,000 miles to colorado and back - up to 10,000 feet off road mountain passes - vibrating like crazy - towing a thousand+ pounds of trailer, 4 wheeler, and gear. so bad i had to pull over a few times to stuff with grease and slow down immediately....gas pedal placement made all the difference in vibration severity.....that same set i rebooted and they're smooth as a whistle right now in my daily driver lifted XT6 - drove it this morning. perfect ride. they were originally an MWE set i bought years ago that have been on a couple XT6's since then. i sort of did it as a test to see what would happen because every time i stuffed a bunch of grease up in there the vibration would go away. so i thought maybe they'd be fine with new grease/boots. i think it's okay to give it a whirl personally, the metal expands due to heat and all the tolerances and balance is off - but install new grease and it won't do that, surely that's what happened in my case. it might be that they don't last but something tells me they'll be okay. mine is even lifted and they're at a stout angle and being stressed - the new axles that came on the car couldn't take that angle. yours not being lifted, should be even more forgiving. So - all that to say, I think there's a high chance of that axle being fine if you reboot it.

they can get a vented radiator cap for a few dollars to at least be able to drive the car around in while they decide what to do. this will allow the pressurized gas to escape and the coolant to flow.

nope - not in these engines. these engines push pressurized exhaust gases into the coolant - so there's little if any coolant loss. and the gases stifle the flow of water causing coolant not to flow and the overheating - without coolant loss. the very strong indication of head gasket issues is bubbling out of the overflow tank after it's been running or overheating. that's the heated gas coming out. latter Phase II EJ25's (1999 or 2000 and up depending on model) leak externally and only overheat when they get low - different failure mode of the gasket.

There aren't any 3.7 final driver in EJ stuff. it's 3.9, 4.11, and 4.44. (ignoring the goofy SVX 3.54 set up).

Sort of stinks to not know for sure. There's other possibilities, axles are the highest probability. I've had the vibration cause a speedo driven gear to destruct...but it was vibrating VERY bad thanks to the awesome coal dust or whatever that extremely abrasive stuff is they throw on the snow here in the mountains. that stuff is terrible. If one has ever been replaced before, that's the one that's causing problems. One time I was faced with the same scenario. My plan was to replace both at some point (since the previous owner had put new aftermarkets in and of course they vibrated so i didn't want either one in there). But only one was necessary at that time. I replaced the one I thought was causing the vibrations and I got it right. Had I gotten it wrong I would have just replaced the other one too, but I didn't have to do that for awhile later. But doing one at a time will at least rule out which is good and which is bad and you might end up only needing to replace one. You can save the good one for later or sell it to someone who needs it. Or you can buy one axle - replace the passengers side. If that isn't right install the previous axle that you removed into the drivers side, so you still only need to buy one axle. I recommend replacing the inner boot...or both boots if they look dry at all while you have it out.

my first thoughts are head gasket, sounds classic. but of course want to rule out similar things first. there's TONS of head gasket information on here, a searching would have pulled up all sorts of hits. that being said - you have to make absolutely sure there are no leaks in system, these engines (not all subaru engines, but this one) are notorious for overheating when they get an air pocket in them. they have to be properly bled...which means every single time they run low on coolant. sounds like you added a good bit of coolant but was it bled properly? also called burping often on here. that being said, head gaskets are common problems on this engine, if it was a bad head gasket though it would hvae been overheating well before it lost ta 1/2 gallon of coolant, unless that was just previously underfilled.

sounds like a synchro issue, the good thing is these can essentially stay the same forever and never really cause problems or get worse. change your gear oil, it's probably never been done? how many miles? i would just go with the proper weight quality synthetic oil. avoid additives and concoctions in this case. don't down shift and skip 2nd:lol:? just kidding, well you could skip down shifting into 2nd. i'm not sold on the value of downshifting myself. brakes = $40 and easy. downshifting means more stress on clutch, engine, trans, driveline, etc and that stuff is time and $. but i realize that's not the industry standard so i'm way off what everyone else thinks. i guess i'm wrong but i'll continue to use my brakes and not downshift unless necessary. you can probably start by replacing one O2 sensor, the front.