idosubaru

"hole in fender", that sounds odd. rust is bad, but i can't tell if it's just surface or what without seeing it. might be rather benign. hard to say what stuff will cost. need to know what exactly is being done and if you're doing the work or not. the 109,000 mile one sounds better in my opinion. better taken care of an crucial maintenance done. it would be nice to know who did the timing belt job, if the water pump was also replaced, and if any idlers were replaced too. Two significant issues in these cars are headgaskets and torque bind. The headgaskets leak externally, so they should be easy to spot. Just look at the rear side of the engine. Also ask the owners, they may have already had them replaced. Subaru had an extended 100,000 mile head gasket warranty campaign for 2000-2002 EJ25's. Torque bind can be felt by driving in tight circles, steering wheel turned to full lock, on a paved parking lot. Any sense of binding or slowing down, hoping, etc is indicative of torque bind. Both of these are prominent issues with more information here and on your favorite search engine, do some reading if you're interested in learning more.

Guess that will make more sense when I dig into mine, but you had to splice/cut wires into place?

awesome, glad it worked out for you.

if you're getting rid of it, i wouldn't "throw parts at it". but an O2 sensor *could* cause bad mpg. so could all sorts of other things. dragging brakes, fuel filter, air filter, plugs, wires, cap, rotor, coil, injectors, intake...etc. personally i'd start with a tune up or at least check the plug gaps and inspect the cap and rotor, both of which don't take very long at all.

i'd want to repair that leak as soon as possible. you have no idea how long you have been dripping and blowing out - overheating. overheating any car is bad and 15 year old seals/gaskets don't make it any better. any chance it's just a hose? if you can find a good used on, that's fine, but you can probably get a new radiator for $100 or so. start pricing them out and see if you can swing it. replace the thermostat with a new Subaru thermostat, the aftermarkets are really cheezeball, the Subaru one is extremely beefy and will last the rest of the time you own the car. good luck finding/repairing that leak.

i never replace in pairs and experience tells me it's fine. pads don't really count as they come in pairs and mine always wear evenly - i never have one wear before the other because i properly maintain my brakes - greasing the slides, etc. i've replaced one caliper, rebuilt one caliper, replaced one rotor...etc. if one part wasn't "bad", i wouldn't be replacing anything in a perfectly working system anyway, so replacing a perfectly good one, that i would normally keep isn't how i want to do it. i haven't had one pad wear faster than the other so i have no reason to change that. if pads start wearing unevenly or the braking is affected (pulling, etc), then i'll do it differently. but until then my intuition...and my experience, shows this is fine. everyone operates differently, but there are a lot of general rules that are good to follow but aren't necessary in all situations. i can see how replacing both might be a better "one size fits all" line of reasoning for some folks, but there's no reason to discount folks with significant experience that may do things differently. the caliper seal can be shot, but the fluid will leak behind the rubber dust cover boot that you can visually see. so you may not see the leak, but it's there behind that boot. you'll find the boot wet on the back side if you take it apart. on EJ calipers all i've had to do is replace seal around piston (it's just a big fat o-ring really), then install the rubber dust boot and then press the piston into the caliper bore until it's all the way in. you're done. i've done it on the vehicle plenty of times.

thanks dave. and if you decide to rebuild, we can help, it's really simple. the only problem you run into is if the caliper bore or piston are too rusted. i've never had that happen. you'd either have to get a used piston or clean the rust out first. speaking of which - used calipers are really cheap. installing used, or buying a set to rebuild on your own clock is a nice option as well, particularly your first time.

right on dave, that stuff can cause all sorts of levels of damage, just letting you know in case you ever see a minor one. there's also a company that makes a keyway repair kit, though i dont' think i'd ever buy it, it's a good fit for some folks.

great, thanks for the feedback 94C. i'll definitely pull the steering coupler off my 1997 Legacy parts car before I send it to the scrap heap then.

I'm skeptical fo the diagnosis. it is EXTREMELY rare for more than one caliper to fail at the same time (read = nearly impossible/improbable). they might as well say "You have a bad caliper, so we're replacing your power steering rack too". you should not need more than one caliper replaced, just replace the one that's bad. second - calipers are easily rebuilt, don't even have to remove them off the car. rebuild kits from Advanced auto parts are $2.99. that's right, $3 and it's super easy. A matter of minutes, there's only one seal to the whole deal - the piston seal. Then the boot which is just a dust cover. Two parts and you're done. Or 4 if it's a dual piston caliper (2 seals and 2 boots). Remove piston (just push it out), replace seal with dust boot in place, and bleed. That's it. It is a bit daunting if you're a timid person doing something like this the first time, but it's quite simple in all reality. good chance this could be fixed for $3 (depending which model you have and which brakes - some are single piston, some dual). but there are more options if that scares you. that being said - calipers are SUPER EASY to replace if you can do a brake job, you can replace a caliper. Once the wheel is off it only requires removing two or three bolts to replace the caliper! it's cake. even if you just wanted to replace the calipers yourself and then have a shop bleed them for you, you'd save hundreds of dollars. or - get the self bleeding systems available to do it yourself. it's not hard at all. Dave and I use the...crack i'm loosing my head, yo'ull have to search for it, it's a really nice set up that is easy to use.

sounds like you know this, but 1 quart per 1,000 miles isn't the end of the world...except for maybe your convertes it appears. it doesn't surprise me that it doesn't "show up" in your compression tests, whether or not anything related to that is the cause. that's just not enough oil loss to point towards significant internal issues. oil consumption (not leaking) is likely to be rings or valve stem seals. not sure if headgaskets can leak oil into an exhaust port, but they can leak oil. that's some low mileage to be having oil consumption. subaru's don't typically do that. mark territory with oil seaping out of valve covers, totally :lol:!, but consuming oil is odd. first thing i'd do is replace the PCV valve and make absolutely certain a Subaru PCV valve is used. if you're still concerned a leak down test may be in order. what's the history of the engine? one owner? previous issues? Head gaskets replaced?

If the end of the crank isn't too hosed you can use a new (used) pulley that isn't messed up. I've bolted a number of crank pulleys on to crank shafts without any keys or pins in place. It's an enormous iron/steel crank and bolt, it can take lots of torque. I have a 2 or 3 foot pipe, put that over my socket and get it nice and tight. The pulley is not coming off, even without a key. I know it's not ideal but i've done it a bunch of times in situations where it's just not worth messing with.

that's why i use anaerobic sealant, it is the best to use for that reason. but RTV is fine, pretty much ever sealed surface i've ever seen has some "squished out" so i'm sure you're fine. i know someone that disassembled an engine that had just that happen - a "blob" of sealant got sucked into the valve train passages and restricted flow. fortunately for them it didn't damage anything, it only resulted in VERY loud valve train. they actually took a picture of the blob and where it was, i've posted it before.

There's no need to oil the pump body, it doesn't move. The only parts that need oil are the shaft and "rotor"...the round thing, whatever it's called, parts that move. Moving parts don't need RTV and still parts don't need oil, so it's rather simple. Light oil and fire it up. I never "prime" or "pump" or anything. Install the pump and go for it. I've turned over engines before by "hand" with oil ports exposed, you'd be surprised how quickly it self primes and moves oil. There's really nothing special to do here, at most it's a mental exercise to do anything more.

no priming needed. just install it and go. the only thing you wouldn't want to do is clean the pump and install it all dry. be nice to coat the rotating parts of the pump with oil. you can disconnect the igniter or plugs and crank the engine a few times if you want to be sure about it.

no need to prime oil pump.

woah - awesome! man, did you create a thread, notes, or share more about that somewhere? i'd love to see that.

being how large those wheels/tires are i want to make sure the air suspension is nice and tight. i actually have to bend the air strut dust shield on the front air struts for them to fit on my old XT6. i doubt the car would move with those wheels if the air struts leak down. although the 2" lift may help, i should try it just to know. no rubbing at all right now, i'm not really seeing anywhere they're going to rub though on the XT6. even with the height switch i don't think they'll rub.

the EJ axle (2001-ish, new style) butted right up against the XT6 seal on the front hub. according to your research, what isn't quite right about it? i'd like to go back and have a look, but i'm not sure what i'm looking for.

screws are often loose - that's more common than not. tighten them with lock-tite. yes the orings can get deformed over time.

since that's the funniest thing i've heard all week, i'll post pic's. here: http://www.ultimatesubaru.org/forum/showthread.php?p=836164#post836164

I slid a newer EJ axle into an XT6 hub. I'm not sure what to look for though, I'm not really familiar with this stuff. The EJ axle snugged right up to the wheel seal. What's the difference between inner and outer seal? The outer seal is the one that rides against the axle? And I did grab some pic's of the lifted XT6. I also have a height switch, will install that shortly, and it'll look much better with the 06 Forester XT Turbo wheels.

Quarter of a million miles, that's too many unknown miles to put that much work into. If it had the last 100,000 on your clock and you knew it had been treated well previously, used no oil during that time, and wasn't overheated too many times - then there may be other options. This is a Phase II motors - they always start out as external leaks and progress from there. Sounds like there has been progression -how much? CCR is a good option, by the time you put all the parts and goodies into what you're planning you might not really be saving much. Check them out, 36,000 mile and 3 year warranty, and members of this forum.

not all vehicles are the same. the XT6 (and maybe XT's) are easier than other EA's, more room. and i think different fan set ups are easier than others. and a huge difference is whether you're doing anything else. if you're only replacing belts, then the radiator isn't a big deal. if you're doing anything else - water pump, oil pump, and more importantly any crank or cam seals then leaving the radiator in is annoying and it's easily bumped/dinged. rarely do i go in there just to do timing belts.

the newer and older axles are interchangeable if you knock off the ABS tone ring, so they should be the same. i have axles and hubs at home to try first, thanks for the heads up.