T.J.

Indeed. I saved a couple hundred bucks on the installation alone, plus whatever it would have cost to get the problem diagnosed in the first place. $$$$ T.J.

SUCCESS! First off, a big thanks to everyone who read this thread in an attempt to help me out, whether or not you were able to contribute. It was very much appreciated. An the cookie goes to (drum roll)..... Cougar for suggesting on page 2 (in his first post!) that the cam timing may be off on one side of the engine. Nice call! Story: I finally got around to removing the timing belt cover last weekend and the first thing I noticed was a little piece of plastic that fell out as I removed it. It looked like it had been chewed up a bit. The next thing to jump out at me was the large hole in the timing belt that was almost half the width of the belt. Next I checked the timing and sure enough, the passenger side was off by 3 or 4 teeth. Great, problem found! At this point I decided I was going to take it in to richierich to have him fix it right and make sure there were no other associated problems. He is a member of this board, professional mechanic, and an all-around good guy. Two of my friends have had work done at his shop per my recommendation. However, I called him back because it occured to me that if my 1/2 timing belt snapped as I limped the car 20 or so miles to his shop it would probably ruin the engine. He not only confermed that it would be better for me to do it where it sat, but he even gave me some helpful tips on the procedure before letting me off of the phone. Thanks again Richie! Replacing the belt was very straight forward and went smoothly. As I was reassembling the cover I noticed a small piece of threaded aluminum embedded in the side of it! It turned out to be a part of one of the bolt holes for one of the upper timing belt cover bolts. Soooooo I have concluded that... Cliff notes: Previous owners got metal debris inside timing belt cover which eventually got into the teeth of the timing belt causeing it to skip on the passenger side cam gear. Said debris then burst through the timing belt and lodged itself in the timing belt cover. Mystery solved. I now have about 180 psi. of compression on all cylinders and the car is totally reassembled. I had to wait untill today to pick up the timing belt guide that was conspicuously missing the first time I removed the cover. I now have an idea of what to look formard to when I replace the t-belt on my Impreza, I have more tools than I did before and the Forester is once again purring like the lumpy Subaru it is.:burnout::burnout: Thanks again everyone, T.J. Here is a picture of the damaged belt and the debris that did it:

I drive in snow. It's one of the main reasons we drive Subarus. Again, I bought the car used but as far as I know everything has about 50,000 miles on it. Thanks, T.J.

Yeah. By the sound of it, it would be nice if it were the timing. I was just looking up how to tell if the timing is off. Will it be obvious when I can see the belt? Are there marks on the crank sprocket and cam sprockets? Really? Leaving the cover off wouldn't make it suseptable to debris? Thanks, T.J.

Thanks again for the help guys. I will look into checking the timing myself and go from there. T.J.

Edit: Ignore. I just put 2and2 together. Thanks, T.J.

Are those under the timing belt cover? It looks like I would need to remove the radiator to check those in which case I will get to see if the timing belt tensioner is loose. I don't have a garage or means of removing the engine. If it comes to that I will likely take it to a mechanic. T.J.

Big news! I think... Here are the results from the Vacuum guage: 50cmHg (or about 20in.Hg) steady vacuum on drivers side manifold measured from the brake cyl. hose. This is in the green zone on the guage, indicating "normal motor". 35-40cmHg (or about 13-16in.Hg) oscillating vacuum on the passenger side of the intake manifold measured from the fuel pressure regulator hose (smaller diameter). This is in the small red zone on the guage indicating "late ignition timing". Now for the compression guage (in psi) w/ plugs in: Cyl #1= 91 2= 180 3= 89 4= 200 W/ all plugs removed: Cyl #1= 80 2= 179 3= 89 4= 198 Both guages are pretty vague so all numbers are approximate. So the passenger side seems to have less vacuum and the needle oscillates w/ the rpm of the engine instead of being steady. I'm not sure if this is indicative of the problem or merely a result of the lack of compression and or combustion. The passenger side cylinders are indeed significantly down on compression. It is also a little odd that the #1 cylinder dropped about 10psi w/ all of the plugs removed while the other cylinders appeared to lose a couple psi or less. I performed all of the tests multiple times and the numbers were consistant. I can't speak to the accuracy of this guage but the results were repeatable. So maybe the loose timing belt theory has legs? Anything jump out at you guys? Thanks, T.J. OT: wOOt for getting advice from NY and AK. The internet rocks.

So, should I at least disconnect the plug wires so the engine doesn't start?

http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/displayitem.taf?Itemnumber=92697 and http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/displayitem.taf?Itemnumber=93547 Still need to go get them. Thanks, T.J.

Well, I pulled the big vacuum hose off at the brake cylinder. I started the car and could hear the air being drawn into the hose to the intake manifold. I could feel the vacuum w/ my finger over the hole in the end of the hose. I sprayed the end of the hose w/ our garden hose nozzle on the mist setting. I swear, the idle didn't change! :-\

Great. I will swing by Harbor Freight and look for a cheap compression guage as soon as possible. Then what? remove all of the plugs and use the starter to turn the engine a certain # of times w/ the guage pluged in to one of the cylinders at a time? OT, I was born in Fairbanks. Didn't spend enough time there to remember anything. I have heard some stories from my parents though. Later, T.J.

Ooooh. Do you think I could check this w/o removing the engine? Maybe just the radiator?

Thanks for the info ron. nipper, is a vacuum guage different from a compression guage? Same thing? Exactly. I'm sure the timing belt could effect one side of the engine like this, but the car was running great before this started. About a month ago it got 28mpg on a 380 mile road trip up Mt. Hood w/ the car fully loaded and a bike rack on top. I was impressed and took that as a sign that the engine was pretty healthy. No one has been in inside the engine to effect the timing belt location since we purchased it. Can it go out of adjustment? I was under the impression that if it went, it would just snap. T.J.

Yeah, I need to get a compression guage. Probably not untill payday though. The timing belt would be 50,000 miles old unless it has been replaced already. We bought the car at 40,000 miles. I have tomorrow off. I'll try the brake booster idea. Thanks. T.J.

Thanks again for all of the input everyone. Todays update: I tried the water mist trick but the results were inconclusive. I pretty much soaked the engine spraying in different places (surprized I didn't short anything) but couldn't get the engine to react. I wanted to see what it would do, so I created a vacuum leak and hit it w/ the mist and the engine didn't seem to react. So I still don't really know what to expect if I had a vacuum leak. Hmmmfff. Does anyone know what this little valve is? It looks like it is mounted to the end of the fuel rail and has a vacuum hose leading to the intake manifold. It is toward the back of the passenger side. Looks pretty suspicious to me! Thanks, T.J. Pic:

Thanks for the help guys. nipper, I will try the water bottle idea. I couldn't find any loose or deteriorated hoses or bad connections. I do see a little valve of some sort that looks like it is between the fuel system and the intake manifold on the passenger side. I wonder if that could be causing a condition similar to the one you are describing gbrand. Maybe it isn't associated w/ the fuel system. I need to look at it more closely. That will give me something to do after work tomorrow. Thanks again, T.J.

Well, I searched around and saw plenty of mis-fire threads but nothing that was specific to one side of the engine. Maybe one of you can help. I got misfire codes from our '03 Forester X 5mt (50,000miles) a few weeks ago. The car seemed to be running fine so I just checked the plug wire connections and the code went away not long after. During a camping trip this weekend the cel came back on and the car started running really rough. I limped it home low on power. So far I have used a spark checker on the ends of the plug wires and saw a spark on all four cylinders. So as far as I can tell, all of the cylinders are getting spark to the plugs. I pulled the plugs and found that both of the passenger side plugs were fouled and wet looking. They didn't seem oily, so I assume that the wet apperence is unburnt fuel. I replaced all four plugs w/ Bosch platinum plugs. I expected that replacing the bad plugs would get the engine running smoothly again until whatever the real problem was fouled them up again. Wrong. The car is still running rough w/ the new plugs. Is there anything you can think of that would cause both cylinders on one side of the engine to misfire like this? To cover some of the more obvious stuff: Oil looks fine. Coolant looks fine. The engine never over heated or smoked. The gaskets look good from outside. No leaks or other obvious signs that I have noticed. Any thoughts would be appreciated. I am going outside to check for bad vacuum hoses and electrical connections to give you guys a minute.:-p Thanks in advance, T.J.

Many of you seem to be wondering why you have never seen PacMan and me in the same room together, but let me assure you that I am not him and he is not me. Lol. My problem seems to have been fixed by the advice of RichieRich to use valve cleaner in my fuel and Marvels Mystery Oil durning oil changes. Hope this clears things up, T.J.

It does have an o-ring but replacing it didn't help. I went to the junk yard and obtained both sides of the fitting for $6. Replacing them stopped the leak. Later, T.J.

Thanks for the quick reply! I did try tightening it but I haven't taken it apart to look at it yet. Maybe I'll luck out and find out it's just an o-ring. I'll check right now. Thanks, T.J.

So my '92 Legacy L is leaking power steering fluid from the metal pressure fitting on the pump. The fluid comes out between the hard line and the nut that holds it on the pump. I believe it is a flare type fitting on the end of the hard line leaving the pump assembly (output line). Subaru wants $190.00 for both lines (output and return). They wont sell them sperately. Is there any way to fix a fitting like that w/o replacing it? I guess I'm off to the junk yard.:-\ Any other suggestions are appreciated. Later, T.J.

PacMan, my legacy was doing the same thing pretty consistantly. I started putting Chevron injector and valve cleaner in the gas tank about every other fill up and using Marvel's Mystery Oil every oil change. It has been over a year since the last time the problem occured. Try it out! Good luck, T.J.

Update: Well it definitely isn't the endlinks. I changed them out for the stockers the other day. I also tried putting the rsb on the soft setting. Nothing changed other than the handling got a little sloppy. I think I am going to drive down to the suby dealer and try to shake thier axels to see if they are similar to mine. T.J.

I actually drove around w/ the hatch up a few days ago and I could still hear the rattling sound. I also took everything out of the back of the car. I tried retightening my aftermarket rear sway bar and end links (my only suspention mods.) and I tried jacking up the rear wheel and shaking it to see if the wheel bearing was shot. Thanks for the input though. So you say it is normal for the axels to move? I am suprized. What is to keep them from rattling then? I was convinced that I had this sound nailed down. T.J.