idosubaru

pop the hatch, you'll see on the passengers side upper corner a rubber hose connecting hatch to body. inside of there you'll find cut wires. they need repaired. not much room to work with and it's annoying how many wires there are, so if you don't feel comfortable doing it get someone to fix it for you. you'll likely have quite a few cut or with bare metal showing.

I've done a zillion EA/ER head gaskets. How would you folks that have done a lot of EJ head gaskets compare? EJ easier or harder? quicker or longer? Why? Answer in #2 pencil only.

Good call - PCV valve. Yes, 240,000 miles. Replacing the engine or gaskets is not going to happen so we'll see how it goes. He said he adds "a little once a month". That doesn't sound bad considering how much he drives, a one hour commute every day. Definitely head gaskets, it's obvious. I'm doing the timing belt for him free of charge, so all that stuff will get taken care of.

There's rarely much you can do. There are companies that repair them. Repairs run $150-$400 or so. Simpler, and cheaper usually, to buy a used one, but that sounds like a bad option on something prone to fail anyway.

they are actually interchangeable physically speaking. but you got it right, the double bearing idler goes up top, the single on the bottom.

good point, if you find some good old boys willing to do the metal bending and welding they'll set you up quick. i needed a muffler installed once and took one i had (not for the car) to a shop and they welded it in place with new pipe for $40. that was even in down town atlanta georgia, the last place i would have expected that. that's an anomaly though to find a place with folks willing to do that for so cheap, must have been bored.

rear diffs can be hard to come by for some reason (read subeman's recent debacle trying to get one). you are correct - rear differential assembly. type in your model year and all the info and it'll cross reference everything for you. whatever it lists will work (assuming the yard categorized it properly).

this is the first i've seen leaking only oil. he says it's never leaked antifreeze.

Exhaust is annoying. You're from baltimore...you're name even sounds familiar (i'm from westminster). Anyway, you probably have rust to deal with so you're likely going to have bolts/nuts that need cut, torched, or ground off. One of my least favorite things to do. But - if you care to mess with the rust and bolts then just buy all direct fit parts and install them, the installation part is actually easy, very easy actually. You could even pay a place to remove the bolts/exhaust and do the rest yourself. I bought a cat off ebay earlier this summer for $89 or something like that. But yeah, make sure that's your problem.

I think it's related to the hydraulic clutch system, other threads i was posting about. The bucking and near stalling probably caused it. Didn't ask him about gas mileage, i'll say something. I'm replacing the timing belt and will probably reseal the oil pump though and check those rear backing plate screws.

yes - replace the oring or seal at the top. or just get another one from another car, junk yard, etc.

odd, i'm kind of worried he's never mentioned the "sticking pedal" though, which i've seen in numerous other posts.

oh man, this guy commutes 1 hour to work every day! i think you're on to it, maybe that's why it drove fine for me. i found that TSB you talked about. thanks Mike! *** I have no idea about this, any chance I can do this in a couple hours? I'd like to get the car back to him tomorrow if possible. How many parts was it - I see mention of a slave cylinder, two gaskets, and a hose (still searching for part numbers)?

Great, thanks a bunch mike! Do you recall the symptoms the car had? I'm trying to help this guy, he's already replaced the trans, clutch twice (all at shop prices), and I'm trying to get him through this ordeal at the cost of only the parts necessary. I think he'll be pretty excited about this "easy" fix compared to all the run around he's gotten prior.

What symptoms did you guys have with these hydraulic clutch components? A friends 03 Legacy seems to be doing some strange clutch antics, but I haven't personally seen it yet. I'm not familiar with how these systems work. He said it engages really high (seemed low to me) and he'd have to rev a LOT to get up a hill from a stop. I didn't have that problem at all.

Friends 2003 Legacy Wagon that I'm looking at after being jacked around by a couple different shops. 240,000 miles He said the clutch engaged really high, he'd have to rev the engine and hold the brake to get it to engage and get up hills every time he drove it. I drove it 20 miles last night, seemed fine, stopping numerous times at the base of a mountain, etc. It engaged really low for me and seemed fine. (he definitely knows how to drive a clutch) Is there something that could fail intermittently? It has the hydraulic clutch set up - he said one of the previous shops replaced the fluid in it. (he's been jacked around a bunch on this car, replaced trans, clutch twice, etc - so that's why i'm trying to help him out). These things have slave cylinders and such, what happens when they fail?

Sweet, if you want one, get it from Dave, i'd rather not mess with it anyway.

i can ship you a 1997 Legacy GT front sway bar. PM/email for price/shipping info if you're interested.

Any 1996-1999 EJ25 (except 99 forester) Any 1995-1998 EJ22 with EGR (96-98 will require exhaust manifold which bolts right in place). Follow those directions and you have a very simple, bolt in, plug and play swap.

NGK plugs and Subaru wires and no more code for you.

the initial loosening is crazy on these, usually is. impact is the way to go. my buddy had one last week that bent the subaru "special" tool, breaker bar, chain wrench, rubber straps broke..nothing would touch this one bad bolt on a DOHC, all the others came out. he eventually got it with an electric impact wrench. i told him it wouldn't work, glad i was wrong! it was only rated at 150 ft/lbs i think (the wrench), but it buzzed it off.

funny you say that, it seems to do it when it "bucks" from a start so to speak. doesn't seem to run 100% so it might be a low idle thing only. probably nothing. good call.

+1 to what GD said. You didn't need new heads, those are superficial "cracks". Every EA82 on the road right now has those cracks, every single one i've ever pulled anyway. I'd bet 10,000 dollars my XT6 has them because every other one I've ever pulled did (and i've owned like 2 dozen of them). They're benign. The heads should have been milled, they just saw the cracks and I guarantee they never actually measured/checked for warpage. Why would they ever go through all of that if they junked them because of cracks? That's like buying new tires for a car that doesn't even have an engine...or some another more creative analogy. Your best bet is to get acquainted with the car, ask questions here and/or find a mechanic that knows Subarus, particularly old ones.

This is a new one for me. IDoing a free t-belt job for a friend on his 240,000 mile 2003 Legacy EJ25 manual trans. Driving the car home the oil light flickers when starting from a dead stop when you gas it good. Drive normal, nothing. Give it some stank from a stop and it flickers every time just for a second or two then goes out. Legit or bogus?

Experience anyone? Friends 240k EJ25 (03 Legacy) has an oil leak at the drivers side headgasket. Do these get worse quickly? I don't think replacing the head gasket is anywhere near an option right now. I offered to do the T-belt for free. He asked me to look into the oil leaks and I assumed it would be a cam seal or oil pump I could do with the t-belt. Can he get another 50k out of this? I feel bad being the bearer of bad news about the head gasket.