idosubaru

did you click on the ebay link and read the information? it's difficult to understand, hence the title of this thread pointing to that ebay auction: "want a good laugh?".

define "life expectancy"? you do realize everyone has a different oppinion and decision making process? is this a real question or mental exercise? i say 200,000 is reasonable to expect without much effort.

an EA82 that doesn't leak would be a true find. by this time something is usually loosing some oil. the turbo's are touchy. remember that it's 20 years old. when you have a turbo you have extra things that can fail after that amount of time...turbo gaskets, turbo bearings, oil lines, and turbo coolant lines. these are additional failure points and each one can cause really bad things to happen in an engine. but if it's running now and all is good, you can address all of that on your own and these are in general good engines. they don't hold up well to lots of playing...if you're going to play with the boost and do power mods then i wouldn't plan on the 20 year old headgaskets lasting much longer. keep it stock and keep the coolant and oil sytems in check and chances are good you won't have many problems with the engine if it's in good shape now.

that's definitely not normal. for now, at the very least turn your A/C off before it gets that hot or while climbing. radiator may be partially clogged, they easily get build up in them, i've seen them only a few years old with not many miles on them have lots of white deposits inside. probably wouldn't take much given the heat, pulling hills and running a/c. pull over when it gets above normal and make sure your fans are kicking on as well.

shhh, don't tell me that, it only encourages me! i agree, i wouldn't recommend this kind of stuff to anyone, kind of silly really. but now i'm interested and want to see what happens. i've got it hooked up and am driving 200+ miles tomorrow. see what happens. my electrical tools, extra ECU, extra TCU, extra RWSS....bunch of goodies, are in the trunk just in case.

wonder if he's reading this? i laugh and heck, i read through this thread. but i feel bad for the guy too. he's probably always getting picked on and who knows, he may have issues. injury, trauma, asbergers... if so, then it's really sad because at least he's functioning to some capacity, which is more than some people can say, but he's getting slammed at every turn. dont' get me wrong his intolerance for listening to anyone else and admitting he's wrong definitely gets old and causes confusion.

if it wasn't significant oil, it was probably running off with the antifreeze. did it ever get to the red? the noise could be heat related - pinging or louder than normal HLA's. if it's a hose then no big deal, replace and see. if it's something worse, like $250 in water pump work then you might want to reconsider. if you didn't run it hot too much and kept it from the red the engine should be fine. they are quite resilient engines if you keep them from the red and running out of oil. i'd replace it myself, but i wouldn't being paying someone else to do it so that's easy.

awesome you found some hotdog! the 2.2 is your best bet. i don't know you, your finances, your situation that well, but i think the 2.2 is a much better fit as far as i can tell. there's no need to call the previous owner, look at the gaskets. look under the car or under/behind the power steering and you can see the headgasket protruding from the block. a quick look will tell you if it's original or the replacement. most people don't know enough about cars anyway to get an accurate report. they confuse terms all the time. asking yes and no questions is the best way to get bad answers. "was that replaced?" "oh yeah, same time i had the wheel belts replaced.". hm mm, okay, right. did they replace all 5 wheel belts then or just one..... if your title said "2.5 or 2.2?" you'd probably get more responses from the 2.5 lovers out there. there are people that say 2.5 all the way and that the risk is minimal. and they are nice motors, i like them a lot too. but i like seeing my friends not get hosed more than i like that motor. i've stopped and asked shops before while i was getting parts...they'll have a couple 2.5's HG jobs going on at a time, it's constant business in areas with a lot of subaru's, they are everywhere in WV. and to the guys out there buying blown headgasket 2.5's...like me, trust me, there are way more than there are 2.2's eventhough the 2.2 has been around much longer, i still see gobs of blown 2.5's and still rarely see a blown headgasket 2.2. and the couple that i've see are like 250,000 mile 1990 models with original radiators and such...probably blown due to poor maintenance or overheating. i've yet to see a low mileage, good condition 2.2 with blown headgaskets that i could say was properly taken care of.

positive. i can see it's rusted and warn down and i know it was the right size, i double checked on the one i removed from a spare engine...12mm i think, either way it was definitely right. i was thinking about trying one mm smaller and seeing if i could pound it on...like an 11mm. i have spare engines and removed a good knock sensor just fine. hopefully the code never comes back, seems to be fine now. i'd need some really long, skinny pliers to fit down there and grab it, i don't have any that would work for that. but i could use a set like that.

that's good news matty. if it's sliding back and forth some, maybe you just don't have enough room for it to come off all the way? dropping the diff may give you the extra slack you need to get it off. but...i have always been a little confused. the Off Road guys always talk about how easy it is to remove a rear axle for those running welded rear diffs. in my experience the axles don't just pull off without dropping the rear diff or gaining some "slack" in the axle, so i've wondered how they do that. maybe there's a trick i don't know? i've always had to drop the diff. maybe they have "lifts" or suspension work that allows them more slack to do that.

my legacy sat for awhile before i got around to fixing it. fixed it and it had a knock sensor and O2 sensor code. cleared the code twice and it kept returning. i filled it up with fresh gas, replaced the O2 sensor and the code went away. a used one isn't a bad option. i pulled one off a 80,000 mile motor that looks great, i'll install that if the code ever returns. i was going to install it anyway, but the freaking bolt was too rusty and the socket wouldn't even grab it. just my luck, how does that bolt head rust?

i tapped into the ECU input, but the ironic thing to this is that it looks like the output of the speed switch splits into many parts right at the speedometer cluster to go to the trip meter, cruise control, power steering, ECU..etc. so, i may have just sent input to the ECU. haven't driven it enough to see if the stalling is now gone since it happened so rarely. still looking into getting the input to all of those other items.

dropping the diff may help. depending how high or low the vehicle sets, you'll probably need something under it to hold it up, otherwise it won't go all the way to the ground and there won't be much slack in the axle to get it to move or come off. are you sure they're stuck and it's just not enough room to get it off? the rear axles on the XT6 won't come off without dropping the diff, there's not enough room for them to come off without removing/unbolting something i don't think. the pins come out and the axle cups might move some, but not enough to slide all the way off the diff i don't think.

i wouldn't even bother. if you have to pass inspections, try to find someone that will pass the thing. the rears never break...well im' sure it's happened but i'd leave it. my last XT6 - broken rear boots for who knows how long at 220,000 miles. it was broke at least 50,000 miles and never made a sound. actually...i've owned like 20 XT6's and every single one i've used as a daily driver for any significant amount of time had broken rears...the one right over the freaking exhaust always breaks. anyway, the axles never make a sound and there's no reason to replace them. i bought my most recent DD XT6 last year, i've put about 25k - 30k on it so far and i got it with broken boots and they're staying. i got a brand new one and one good used one that will go in before winter just because i'll be installing my LSD rear anyway. i've destroyed some things trying to get them off and still have a set fused onto the diff at my house. so take it easy and slow. soak with as much liquid wrench or PB blaster as you can. and yes, hammers will need to be used, just go easy with them. maybe heat might help?

an update - i'm trying to splice the rear wheel speed sensor signal into the speedometer vehicle speed sensor. yes, there's a 30:4 ratio they will be off. but...if it works it should quit the rare stalling, the cruise may work, the power steering should work better and the trip meter might work (but it'll be inaccurate by 15:2 of course). i found the wire for the speed sensor in the instrument cluster and i'm trying to figure out which of the three wires in the rear wheel speed sensor may work. i have it installed but not sure of the results yet.... i guessed sort of on one of the 3 rear wheel speed sensor wires.

good job nip. i like the idea of some more testing, drifting, in neutral and accelerating without the engine (down hill) through the vibration range. that it's mostly speed related would lead me to think that it's driveline related...wheels, tires, bearings, axle in the front. if it were engine or trans related i'd expect more variance than 20-25mph.

are you trying to fix yours? what do you mean by "random feedback"? have a look at the steering rack bushings, though they shouldn't be anywhere near going bad yet.

i agree, disty wires are easy to screw up. some caps have the numbers printed on them, so have a look and that might make it really simple. you didn't actually remove or move the distributor in the housing did you? some people mistakenly loosen those two 10mm hold down bolts or move it. cylinders are, from front to back: passengers side = 1,3 and drivers side = 2,4 when doing the air filter you didn't disconnect the MAF or vaccuum hoses?

i don't recall the details but kingbobdole (phil) didn't like something about his breathers on his XT6. i think he ended up removing them, maybe mike knows more about that?

you can't beat an EJ22 for price and reliability. only you can make financial decisions for yourself, but the EJ22 is what i would recommend to someone who doesn't have loads of disposable income, it just makes sense...as a hobbyist and a financial planner. if you can afford it, without stretching yourself, then go for the turbo set up now. if that's going to stretch you thin, the EJ22 alone will be an enourmous improvement over your EA82T. add a turbo and i think you'll be very happy with the performance. the beauty is that since you're "dumping all your money" on your hobby, the EJ22 is easily replaceable. have any problems or blow an EJ22T or EG20 and the cost to replace is large. EJ22's are cheap. blow it up and who cares?

good choice connie. make sure you have an excellent daily driver before getting rid of a vehicle.

make sure the fans are coming on properly? they're blowing the proper way too right, they're not wired backwards or anything and blowing in opposite directions? the radiator cap has to be the right pressure or something right? make sure that's right? i've heard that, but i drove an XT6 for 10 months with the timing off by 8-10 degrees. it drove fine and i never bothered to check it. finally set it correctly and it made no difference?

did this start happening randomly or after any particular service, maintenance, incident, etc? i've personally had brand new axles from the parts store explode to pieces and know of others that have had them be noisey, vibrating, and leak grease, i don't know what i'd do. but i'd want to rule out those axles for sure before yanking a transmission. if the vibration is identical to before then i guess that basically rules out the axles since it would too coincidental to have the exact same symptoms from different axles. just make sure it's indeed exactly the same. you're sure that axle was changed? i know people that have accidentally reinstalled the old part...thinking it was the new one and realized it after the fact. long shot...but heck, so is a subaru torque converter failing. what you say about the driveshaft makes sense, but i'd want to pull it off and have a look. they are rather easy to remove. it has to come off to drop the trans anyway, so they can remove it and inspect the ujoints then at least. first step is to check all the torque converter bolts. there is an access hole where they can be inspected and retorqued without any real work being done. i know subaru torque converters can fail, but it is very, very rare. there really isn't much to a torque converter, it's a big hunk of metal with vanes inside. i'm not even sure how they fail exactly, i've never heard of or seen a subaru torque converter fail. there is a snap ring that holds the shaft to the torque converter, don't know about your newer model, but typically 4EAT's have a ring seal around one of the shafts as well and there's a torque converter seal too. i would be prepared to inspect and replace those while it's out. i would also have those shafts that slide out of the trans inspected, just to make sure they're not bent or anything. i'd be completely paranoid to get into a job this big and not have the issue resolved once it's done....particularly if i was paying someone else to do it.

i have late model (97) 2.2's that have EGR and don't have EGR, so based on what i have i wasn't sure what yours would be. more than likely it should have the EGR set up, so it should be a straight, no brainer swap. in researching my EGR issue, it seems the solenoid on the passengers side strut tower will also cause EGR issues when it fails...with accompanying trans shifting issues as well, so probably a good idea to grab that solenoid off your parts car just in case you ever have problems. i plan on swapping mine out tonight when i get home.

the lack of a working speedometer and a VSS signal is definitely the cause of the problem. it slowly died over the past couple months. when it works...everything works, no problems at all. when it doesn't, the speedo shows zero and the power steering is quirky (speed sensitive), the engine rarely shuts off, and the cruise doesn't work. all of that works fine if it decides to start working again...which as of the past week or two is really never. thanks for the info on the rear wheel speed sensor, makes sense. i forgot it was a hall effect sensor. i knew it sounded too easy! yes i've been wondering what that does to my AWD. and you are correct, i have Duty C control if needed.