idosubaru

find out what CEL code was thrown and go from there. yes it could be HG, it could be something else. if it gave you a code, no point in ignoring good information and trying to guess what the problem is. keep your eye out for loss of coolant, leaking anywhere on or under the engine, coolant out the tail pipe on start up, bubbling in the overflow tank...etc. and keep your eye out on a good motor (also known as an EJ22). unless you want to pay the $ or do them yourself.

mr. radon at xt6.net has an excellent thread about this with pictures and details. he converted from FWD automatic to AWD Manual. he didn't have too many troubles, but he is very proficient. he did have to create some mounting holes that others with FWD already had in place. so it sort of depends on your vehicle. if the mounting holes are already there (and often they are) that's certainly much easier. if they arent' then it gets trickier. for the XT6 it seems some have them, some don't. center driveshaft support, rear crossmember mounting location, and rear diff mount are the ones that you would hope are present. in yours, i would bet they would be. a peak under the car would tell you if the center driveshaft mounting holes are in place. that's 2 bolts on either side of the center indent that houses the driveshaft so to speak. swap over the rear end - hub assemblies, axles, driveshaft and diff and you should be golden.

in the drivers side fender well (at least i think that's where it is on your car, that's where it is on my XT6 and XT Turbo), is the air suspension compressor, air tank and drier. the other item of interest that would be dedicated to a particular strut is on the air compressor outlet (the receiver i believe). there are 5 air lines connected here. one to each strut and one to the air tank. i'd carefully inspect the line and fitting to the strut giving you problems. there are the same o-rings here as on the other fittings. replace all of these o-rings as you on the strut solenoids. another common issue is the plastic fitting itself. the female side that's connected to the air compressor assembly can leak. the base of them are only plastic and they crack very easily. i believe they are only pressed or lightly glued in place, they crack easy enough. the soapy water trick should work here as well. if your strut and solenoid look good, and you don't find a leak at the compressor fittings like i just mentioned i'd start thinking the suspension computer or the strut height sensor (internal to the strut) are bad. when you're under the fender well area with all the suspension goodies, that's a good time to also remove the valve attached to the air tank. it's obvious since it's the only thing threaded into the large air tank with wire coming out of it. takes a wrench to get it off...something big like 14 or 17mm. remove this valve and scrub all the flaky corrossion off the inside of it. i've seen some completely corroded shut. get all of that out of there and reinstall, only takes a couple minutes. good luck and have fun.

are you talking about the y-pipe at the front of the car, under the motor/trans? that's a catalytic converter, specifically it's a pre-converter. in my experience there isn't much performance gain messing with the cats. a better flowing muffler at the back of the car in place of the stock muffler offers some performance gains and better gas mileage at highway speeds on an XT6. messing with the catalytic converter has offered little to no measureable improvements in my experience. i've had hollowed out catalytic converters and high flow converters, no noticeable difference. open up the exhaust too much, larger pipe, no converter...you'll end up loosing significant low end power which is really annoying for daily driving. been there, done that too. again on the XT6, but very similar engine and i'd expect similar results on a non-turbo EA82.

pay close attention to how the old one is connected. i actually attached mine incorrectly and it popped off so i had to reinstall it again. unfortunatley i can't recall exactly what i did wrong, only to say it's not exactly obvious how it attaches down at the pedal. take a good look at the old one before you remove it.

always a good idea to install an aftermarket trans cooler anyway, so i'd do it and get the stand alone trans cooler going.

the non-interference is a nice safety if you can come up with a 96 in great shape and the mileage/condition you want. they definitely made the 2.5's in 1996 (at least in the US they were installed in some 1996 vehicles). the 96 has fewer km's on it as well, sounds like a great car. you would be fine to run those tires. use this tool: http://www.miata.net/garage/tirecalc.html to help you see how far off your speedometer will be while driving and the differences in specifications. your speedometer will read 60mph when you're really doing 62.7mph. all the 97's i have (3 of them) came with 15" wheels. 205/60/15 tires. the torque bind is very very rare in the manual transmissions, so i'm not surprised you didn't notice anything. you said you did "doughnuts" in the parking lot, that's not a good test for torque bind. you want to go very slow in a tight circle, steering wheel turned all the way. if yo'ure going fast and doing doughnuts you'll give the wheels opportunity to slip and you won't notice the binding. go slow and the binding would be obvious, it's like driving a vehicle (think truck) locked in 4wd on pavement, it starts binding, hoppping and feels VERY slow going around turns because the wheels need to spin at different rates but they can not. it'll feel as if the car just want to come to a stop, has the brakes on etc. if you don't like the interior, it is not hard at all to swap front and rear seats. very very easy to do, you could look for a nicer set and get the color/design you want and newer as well. the door panels are easy to swap as well if you needed a complete matching set of those for the new seats as well.

looks like he's looking for Subaru OEM parts, which is often highly recommended here over aftermarket. dealer prices can vary all over the place. even still OEM subaru head gaskets can be had for $26 for the XT6 and less for the EA82. the dealer may be able to come down in price or come close to matching another dealers price if you get a quote from a State-side dealer. worth a shot, that price seems very high. if you have time, have someone send you a set from the states. maybe one of the online Subaru retailers would ship it to you? might not be much of a savings, but if you ordered a load of stuff it may be worth it.

have you already resealed the oil pump? that would be the first step. there's a seal (behind the oil pump sprocket), a gasket (between pump and engine) and an o-ring (behind the oil pump body). resealing the oil pump solves it most of the time. if you are sure you need to address the HLA's, this is a much bigger job than replacing the oil pump, but it is fairly straight forward and isn't that hard. it can be done in a couple hours depending how you plan on addressing the HLA's. (disassembling and cleaning them takes a long time). you have to remove the timing belts and the entire cam carrier assembly. with the valve covers off you'll see a number of 12 mm bolts inside the valve cover and a few outside (top and bottom) as well. all of these hold the cam carrier (the entire assembly that holds the cam in place) to the head. it's just a matter of unbolting all those bolts, removign the entire cam housing with the cam still in it. once those 12mm bolts are off, the entire cam housing pulls off the head (with the cam still in it) and there is your valve trains, HLA's, valves and rocker arms. once you pull the cam housing - run a straight edge (a ruler) along the tops of the HLA's, any that are at "different" heights from the rest means that one is seized and liking causing your issues. it'll be obvious..it's nicer with the XT6 because being a 6 cylinder there are more HLA's so it's easier to have a base line of good ones. two bad ones will stick out against 4 good ones. with the 4 cylinder if you have two bad ones...it might be hard to tell which are bad and which are good just by looking. if it's just one it'll be obvious it's at a different height than the other 3, so that's the bad one. you'll need to decide ahead of time whether you want to disassemble them and clean them or have new ones ready to install. i'd suggest having new ones ready to install as the disassembly is time consuming. if you do disassmble them, plan on some down time for soaking and replacing a bad one or one that won't come apart. best to have a couple spares in case. mitzpah engineering sells completely rebuilt HLA's for like 5 bucks each, well worth it in my oppinion. drop them in and you're done. once you have them out i'd have some good parts cleaner to soak them in over night or take them to a shop that might be able to heat and soak them for you. here are the tricks youll need to do this easily: partially unbolt the cam carrier at first (all those 12mm bolts i mentioned), just loosen the bolts enough that the cam carrier will only come 1/4" from the head. then tap it loose with a mallet. this will allow you to use a mallet to break the seal without knocking the entire cam assembly on the floor (seen that happen). and....it will also prevent the rocker arms from falling out. once the cam carrier is loose, loosen the bolts far enough that the cam carrier has enough clearance for you to reach in there and pull the rocker arms out one at a time. i generally loosen one side more than the other that way i can get the rocker arms from one end, then the other and don't risk them falling out on me while i'm pulling them out. you want to install the rocker arms in the same place they were, if they fall out on you there's no way to keep track. pull them one at a time and mark the location of each so you can install each one where it way. the second trick is during reinstalling the rocker arms. they'll want to fall off the HLA, they won't stay in place to install the cam carrier. use high quality grease (like wheel bearing grease, thick stuff) smeared all over the head of the HLA and the rocker arm. this will hold it in place as you install the cam. on the cam carrier housing get a new o-ring at the base (bottom corner) of the o-ring. this is a subaru only part, although it can also be bought at http://www.thepartsbin.com, that's the only aftermarket parts place i've seen that carries this o-ring. definitely replace this oring. you'll need anaerobic sealant for the cam case seal, it's a squeeze on gasket maker. some people use ultra-grey and other RTV sealants. anaerobic is better in my oppinion as it's what subaru says to use and it is made to not coagulate and clog oil passages. (there's a picture on the Yahoo! XT6 groups of a piece of clotted RTV that clogged a guys oil passage from this). this job is WAY to easy to even think about pulling the engine. you can have the passengers side cam off in an hour easily. i could have both sides off in an hour no problem. all of this being said...the one, and really only, very tricky part to this job is if any of the HLA's are stuck in their bore and you want to remove them. i've had a heck of a time removing them many times. i'd probably suggest running some sort of detergent in your oil for awhile before openign up the motor in the hopes it'll help free any that don't want to come out. i'd use ATF or seafoam would do well too.

on the XT6 it is very common for the check engine light to come on when you're holding a steady speed (think cruise control). as soon as you hit the gas or breaks it will go out, this is a sure sign of the "vehicle speed sensor", which is located in the instrument cluster. there is no need for alarm and it doesn't cause any driveability issues. maybe if the sensor went completely bad there would be issues but i've never seen that happen. more than half of the dozen or so XT6's i've owned long enough to tell have had this issue. not sure if EA82's have that same sensor or not, but the symptoms are obvious like i just mentioned.

excellent, glad it worked.

is there more information on the rear disc brake swap? i'd like to do the same on my impreza.

you see "pre-1997" because 1997 2.2's are interference engines. all 1997 and up 2.2's are intferences. subaru says i think the tires should be within 1/4" in total circumference of each other. i'd look for other signs of "neglect".

you are good to ask, the wrong depth is a bad thing and the rear main is not something you want to install wrong. seen a few threads where recently installed rear mains gave out. i believe you install until the outer edge of the lip is finally within the sealing surface of the block. at that point there is no need to drive it any further. having it set out past the sealing portion (but it appears it's "inside" the tappered portion, if there is one on the EJ22) is not far enough. someone who knows this motor better can give specifics.

on occassion you really have to man handle the steering wheel. turn it HARD while trying to turn the key. if it doesn't work, try it again, keep trying and the wheel will finally "give" and the key will turn. usually gets easier after a couple minutes....you get real PO'ed and that brute force mentality starts kicking in!!!

when you're reading this....scroll to the bottom left of the page and look at the "related articles". it grabs your title and looks for related topics already posted. you'll see exactly what you're looking for in one of the listed threads...the third one down: "92 Legacy Timing Belt", click on that link. links to FSM and other dead on material. there's a "search" button on the gray bar above that allows you to find these posts as well. this site makes this job CAKE! did for me the first time anyway, it was a breeze. i've done dozens of older generation subaru's but it's still easy. no special tools required.

all the information you need to do this are on this board. awesome write-ups, links to subaru endwrench guides with more pictures and info and details. very informative, i found everything i needed here and didn't have any problems at all. very straight forward doing the timing belts, find the subaru "endwrench" articles and print them out. the cam seals and oil pump have some little tricks, if you're goign to do those, you'll see that pointed out in the many timing belt threads here.

it does sound right and seems like it, but doesn't work out that way. i will say i've only done it on the XT6, guess others may differ, but i'd expect that for the same reasons the XT6 doesn't make any difference it would hold true for newer models as well. the internals of the trans are all still there even though the output is removed. if he does remove his he can do a before and after gas mileage check.

manual transmission should be golden, i didn't see that in your post, they rarely have issues. the auto's have more torque bind issues (completely different trans and failure modes, but similar results in driveability). you can still test it if you wish, i'd be very surprised if you have issues with a manual trans.

no savings. i've removed driveshafts, rear diff, rear axles....been there done that (years ago, not trying to save gas) but i watch my mileage like a hawk on highway driving. remove drive train = no difference.

if a loose connector was the suspected cause might be worth the trouble to have a look inside the connector and make sure there's no corrossion or dirt in it from not being seated tightly.

good call wayne, they always say here that installing the FWD fuse is the "test" to see if you have torque bind or not. if you install the fuse and it goes away, you just found your torque bind.

S, i've done it before on a 4EAT and manual XT6 without issue, i think you'd be fine. not saying it's ideal, but i don't think there's a high probability of having any issues.

awesome, a 97 legacy wagon with a 2.2? i thought they were always 2.5. pardon the confusion on my part. i wonder if CA got different motors than US in legacy of that year? the head gaskets can last nearly indefinitely on the 2.2 liter motors. seen plenty over 200,000 miles with the original head gaskets. overheating is what will kill them, otherwise they shouldn't fail. thermostat, radiator, water pump failing will cause overheat and a 10 or 20 year old head gasket won't stand up to overheating to well. that's why i say replace the water pump with the timing belt. no matter what the replacement interval is of the 2.2 (it's either 60k or 100k, not sure), either way if you don't know when the belt was done it should be checked/changed. i replaced mine last year at 60k. i'll replace it again at 120k with a new belt and water pump. i'm not going to hope for the old water pump to make 10 years and 150,000 miles. cheap insurance to install a new pump and belt. allows checking the timing bearings as well if you remove the belt. bad pulley/bearings will break a belt. checking is really hard to say, really old belts can still have markings on them. but they can be checked very easily by anyone willing to give up 10 minutes of their time. all you need is a 10mm socket wrench (or wrench)..i think thats' what it is, they all run together. anyway, there are left and right side timing covers that come right off and allow you to see the belt.

your question is loaded. Yes. And no. you already answered the question yourself by including the disclaimer "non-interference". If a timing belt breaks on a non-inteference engine then there will not be any internal engine damage regardless of year, make or model. but you said "pre-1997", not all pre-1997 subaru's were non interference. i think the 1996 2.5 liter motors were interference as well as the subaru SVX EG33. the 2.2 liter pre 1997 engines are all non-interference engines. a generic statement might be, "all non-SVX (EG33) 1995 and earlier subaru's are non-interference".