idosubaru

right, what he said. i'll add that the 99+ forester also has the Phase II EJ25 and all 00+ legacy's. Those are different beasts and slapping the earlier Ej22's in them isn't for the faint of heart. Although the newer gen EJ22's can be slapped in, but the rules for that game are all different and newer EJ22's are hard to find.

I'd bet it has ABS (my 97 does). But subaru did do strange brake changes. 80,000 miles is nothing, that's low mileage. i prefer one owner vehicles with a known maintenance history - meaning i'll pay more for those than something unknown (like from a dealer or multiple owners). At that mileage you're really close to a timing belt change interval. Considering most newer subaru's are 100k timing belt change interval you really need to replace all the pulleys, tensioner, and water pump. Otherwise you're expecting all of that stuff to make it to 200,000 miles, that's not a good gamble, particularly on an interference engine. You can find threads on this forum of people who have damaged engines do to this. At a dealer or shop you're looking at $500-$1,000 for a proper timing belt job on this motor (all the items referenced above). Do not let some mechanic talk you into just replacing the belt, bad idea...unless you plan on going in to inspect in 30k-60k, but few people do that and it's expensive. Ebay sells complete kits for reasonable amounts. The older EJ22's are only $80 for the entire kit - belt, all pulleys, and brand new tensioner. can't beat that. Not sure what your 01 EJ22 kit would run though.

the EJ22 will plug right into and run perfectly fine. remove EJ25 - install EJ22, it's that simple. The only thing extra you will need is an EJ22 single port (1996-1998) exhaust manifold. good news is that it bolts right up to your existing EJ25 exhaust, so it's simple enough to do. The EJ25 is dual port exhaust and won't bolt to the EJ22. But the Ej22 manifold will bolt right into your legacy just fine. you'll want to make sure the EJ22 has an EGR set up on it (which your EJ25 will have). almost %100 of 1998 EJ22's have an EGR set up so it sholud'nt be an issue. but i've seen rare late 90's EJ22's without EGR (and one was an automatic??). so just double check. even still, i use the non-EGR EJ22's if i can find them, because i hate EGR stuff. it just causes the check engine light to come on because it's not there but runs fine. most people find it annoying, i don't care and neither does the state i live in!

an XT6 of mine caught fire years ago under the hood. fun story but i won't recount it here. i would have had no problem reusing that engine. they would be very simple to reuse - just swap out the entire intake manifold. i'd replace all seals, gaskets, and water pump, unless for some reason you're very confident certain things didn't get heat damaged. my guess is usually something simple stalls the engine before major damage occurs. wiring or fuel starvation. there are probably rare cases of owners jumping out with the car running and it runs until something shuts it down. as long as the timing belts don't melt/slip and coolant hoses don't burn up and cause it to overheat before that you're probably fine. the odds might be better or the same as your "average unknown" condition motor in reality. at least you know what happened and can inspect it, see how bad it was. i'd check the timing belts on interference engines, not sure what to say about the timing chain equipped H6's. they don't do so well with cooked oil, but have a metal protector plate and probably shut off quickly with an under hood fire.

no kidding, i'm 99 percent sure the XT6 (1988-1991 old school Subaru, the original subaru H6!), has some 6203 bearings as well. Maybe even the serpentine idler i think??!! i tried *pressing* some bearings out of an old XT6 pulley and it was darn near impossible without a press. i mean i'm sure it's possible for someone who knows what they're doing, but i ended up destroying the pulley entirely, cracking huge chucks off it and the pulley still never budged. maybe that's why the newer H6 bearings fail, the bearing is too loose/sloppy and not tight enough fit?

i think they're all premium.

Plugs - are they NGK? Wires - are they Subaru? they should be, though that wouldn't be causing your problems now, not without a CEL anyway. Definitely replace the PCV valve. Next step might be a valve job, they're usually due for one around 100,000 miles. Not sure if they'll make noise though, maybe someone can confirm. Mileage? Has the timing belt ever been changed? Next timing belt job should include all oil pump seals, retighten and lock-tite the rear backing plates and the cam seals and inspect and replace the necessary timing pulleys (should be a couple of them at this age/mileage). Water pump for good measure.

i don't think that's right, maybe someone else can chime in or you can fill me in? only in 1995 were all manuals non-EGR. after that there are *some* EJ22's without EGR but they're more random than anything else from what i've seen (i had an automatic EJ22 without EGR 3 years ago, still have the motor). i just bought a 1997 Legacy EJ22 a couple months ago and it had EGR.

eek, sounding worse by the minute/post. EJ swap it is always an option. timing tensioner or oil pump are two other options. can't say i've ever heard those but can the oil pump make noise if the backing plate screws come out too far?

+1any one find something, post here. i'd like to order them too. did someone mention earlier they ordered these from Summit or was that something else i'm thinking of?

i don't know if it's in the FSM or not, good call. i'd imagine it is since it's almost %100 true. intake manifolds are easy enough to swap, how often do you have to do this? could you just swap intake manifolds and make it "look" right? how closely do they check. that stuff is so bizarre, they flakes. good luck pulling it off. hopefully you don't have to go through this every year!?

i realize it's a done deal will, but $250 isn't a horrible price for a transmission if it's what you want. and normally those jokers would come down a bit...weirdo! it is on the high side and you can get cheaper. and heck it's not even hard to find a completely car for that (blown motor, trans, etc). but if it's what you want, when you need it, and it's close, then it's worth more than "what's the cheapest I can get a trans for". the time spent searching can also be used to make money. the idea of opportunity costs is extremely valuable to those who's time is worth a considerable amount. those of us with addictive personalities need to buy quick so we're not spending all day on craigslist!!!!! lol.

i wouldn't rule out piston slap either. sounds like it might have a bad case of it. but piston slap won't cause any problems. now - if it really wasn't making the noise before the head gasket work, that scares me a bit. makes me think it was driven too long overheating. but, it could just be valves or piston slapped that they forgot about (i mean it has been a year). there are other possibilities, you might be able to narrow them down if you listen closely.

it's a real nice ride, so far I like our 2002 H6 with VDC. it's big car with beefy safety in mind. the motor is nice but it's pulling a lot of weight. my first highway trip was on the lower end of that spectrum of gas mileage. seems like i only got 22mpg or something. your 2001 will have the LATCH system too if you plan on using that for child seats. although they're on the outside seats and the safest position is the middle, so they're more ideal with more than one child in the rear. they have an excellent reliability record but are young relatively speaking. can't say how they'll do over the 10-15 year haul but it's looking good so far. like nipper said there's frequent accessory belt pulley failures. i plan on just replacing mine based on the few incidents of failure and how simple they are to replace. there's a great thread on here about that.

like mentioned, the gauges aren't very accurate. how did you diagnose it "ran low on oil" or whatever? if it actually ran low on oil the engine is probably toast. but unlikely that happened. have you drained the oil? i'd do that and try to sift it or look at it closely to see if there's metal shavings in there. if it was run low on oil, the ones i've seen incurred significant damage to the oil pump and cams. so you could pull the oil pump and valve covers to inspect, that's at least easy. once i see that, i scrap the engine. not worth rebuilding cost wise.

expensive to repair is not true. learning and asking what to buy will be your biggest help here. you can end up with a great, cheap, and reliable subaru if you know what you're doing. but not ever 10 year old 150k subaru (or any make) is going to be cheap and reliable. you're going to need helping picking out the right one and being wary of issues, and important maintenance. there are a few parts that are going to be Subaru only, you won't find them at the auto parts store. but that's rare. there will be some parts that are more expensive, but the difference is minimal. and compared to american cars, you'll be fixing a lot less stuff. Ford stuff is cheap...and readily avaiable - because there's a GREAT MARKET for those parts. meaning - they break all the time! if you're looking at 150,000 mile 10 year old vehicles, nearly anything you buy will be incurring a certain amount or risk. mostly just because of not knowing the vehicle history or how well maintained it was. nearly any 150k vehicle is going to have concerns: american cars - they're a crap shoot at that mileage foreign cars - are going to need timing belts and seals done ($500 at a dealer) knowledge is your friend here. knowing the details, which motor to look for, and getting all the important maintenance stuff up to par is key to having a cheap and reliable vehicle.

are you still trying to remove these bolts? if so, there's no need to worry about water passages, just drill to the depth of the bolt and no more. no need to drill more than the bolt out, right? maybe i'm missing something? as for removing the heads, you should be able to just remove the head, clean it up and reinstall with new head gaskets. it is ideal to mill the head and have a valve job done, but everyone is different and depends how long you plan on keeping this thing. you could attempt a leak down test before pulling the heads to see how the valves are holding.

yep - for an EA82 the bottom end stuff will all be the same.

thanks nipper! from that link: "belt tensioner and idler pulleys for the H6 (at least 2001-2003) is bearing# " 6203-2rsj"

awesome info folks. so how hard were the bearings to get out of the tensioner and idler? don't you need a press for that? i wonder what fails on the tensioner - the bearings or the spring loaded mechanism? do you just remove that huge air dam over the top of the engine and that gives enough access to those pulleys?

reuse both the head bolts and case bolts. if you're going for a crank grind then sounds like you're doing a complete rebuild? so as long as the block doesn't have some massive problem you're fine to use it. the statistics are going to be highly in your favor on that. the $65 is nice, the work and labor involved is the hard part!

welcome fleming, i'm from MD (Westminster). which 02 OBW do you have? there's the EJ25 and the H6 VDC. i have an 02 OBW H6 VDC in Red.

MGG - In 1995 only automatics have EGR, the manual transmissions do not. It's only post-1995 EJ22's that you can't tell. Almost all post 1995 EJ22's have EGR. There are some up to 1997 and i think 1998 that don't have EGR but there's no rhyme or reason to it, it's completely random. I have one from a 97 on an engine stand in my garage and the intake manifold is in my Legacy. No EGR at all. Sounds like you want to "tell them" you have a 1995 manual trans EJ22. So how do they actually check, will they pull the VIN off the block? I don't think the VIN would be truthful to the EGR system though, considering some later engines (like the one i have) don't have EGR, but the rest do.

timing belt is a fairly big job, but it's simple to those of us that have done a bunch. timing belts are not the belts you see, they're under covers inside the engine. on newer vehicles if the belt breaks or is installed improperly it can ruin the engine (pistons and valves collide). so it's crucial to be done right. that's why all the pulleys should also be replaced. lots of info on here for learning and doing the job right to keep your subaru reliable, but timing belt job probably isn't a great first job unless you have lots of time to ask us for help. i'd try to find one that already has this done or plan on an extra $500 to have the timing components replaced. this applies to any vehicle, and most importantly to any interference engine vehicle (engine damage is belt breaks), which is most newer vehicles.

i probably should buy one, but don't have time now. i'm in the middle of some XT6 dealings and work and selling some of my cars, which all needs to be done first. the SUS swap is simple enough for me - trunk, hood, and bumper is easy enough. and like you, i get them cheap, the 2002 H6 VDC legacy i just picked up was less than that.