Gnuman

No need. . . My fingers cannot spell. Hadn't you noticed?

Didn't you know? That is the nickname for FHIs new convertable. . .

My rear mainseal is leaking, just a little. . . It may have something to do with the small nick in it. . . I thought they went to the plastic seperators in 95? My 92 has a metal one. I think that after a while they discovered that the plastic seperators were crap, and now they use the metal ones again.

You know. . . That sounds a lot like Torque Bind, particularly a failing Duty C/valve body. If you jack the car up (all 4 off the ground) put the tranny in N, and release the handbrake, can you turn the propeller shaft by hand (it should turn both rear wheels then). If there is no noise, and you can turn the propellor shaft by hand when there is no external hold on the shaft, then I'd say that the rear diff is fine. Can you get the matching rear diff to go with that tranny? I would not buy a tranny for a Subaru unless I knew that teh final drive ratio was identical to mine, or they sent a rear diff with it.

If someone is doing my brakes, I want them to be willing to stand in front of thier work!!

It is not that the equipment is inferior that gets me worried (that is a matter of fine tuning the software to perform better), but that this opens up a hole where you car can be hacked into, and control of the vehicle is taken away from you. Converting the major systems to "by wire" type mecanisms is the first step in having the computer control everything (and I mean everything) on the car. The electronic power assisted steering can lock the steering so that you cannot drive the car away, the brake by wire would lock up the brakes, the throttle by wire would simply no longer accept input from your foot, the engine would not go above idle, and the security system would lock the doors, and not allow them to be unlocked. . . There you are. Captured. This is done with a push of a button. I'm not talking about tomorrow, or even next week. But that is the place where this could be headed if certain powers remain in power. Am I paranoid? God, I hope so.

Heh, I'll add to the list. Mine is a 92 Legacy wagon that you cannot write a manual for. Every time you try and say what it cannot do, she goes and does it. In pure unstoppable (except when you use the brakes. Then she stops fine ) capability, I have never seen her equal. Well versed in all areas, she will eb next to imposable to replace. Good thing I can justifiably expect annother 200K miles out of her.

Yeah, "the life of the car" is set by the computer, and you have to get a new computer (or a new car) when the computer says time is up.

Actually, the 2.2 is interference in 97 and later. so what you are looking for is a 90-96 Legacy wagon. These are available in both a very well mannered 5 speed and a 4 speed Electronic Controlled Automatic. The 5 speed is much more robust than the 4EAT, but both are fairly sturdy. at 70MPH, I'm spinning about 3KRPM in 5th. I pull 27MPG highway with cruise set at 85. Around town is a few MPG more. The 4EAT would eat a couple of MPG as well.

Pull the knock sensor and visually check it. If there is deformation or cracking then replace it with OEM. The ECU know how to deal with the signals from that one, and I don't know if others will fit. The OEM one is about $60 from 1stsubaruparts.com . After the Knock sensor is changed, reset the ECU and drive it for a while to see if the cat code comes back. If it does, I would check your O2 sensors before replacing the cat (they are cheaper, actually, and often cause a cat code)

I'm at about 1 year and 1 month right now. I got Emily with 136K on the ticker. . . so Ummm, that is about 50K in one year. I guess I like my Subaru a lot. . . I got the car as a "derilict" in that it would have been too expemsive for my stepdaughter to repair (Balljoints and a clutch) but I could get the work done for the cost of parts (which is much less than the labor for those things). Since then I have done several oil changes, replaced the plugs (the old ones were still good, but getting marginal), and air filter. I put in a new O2 sensor, replaced the clutch twice (my fault, the clutch was not Excedy, and it sucks ), put in new ball joints, a thermostat, and a radiator cap. I have also upgraded the wheels to alloys, upgraded the radio, added a roof rack, upgraded the seats, and added a towing hitch. Not all of Emilys miles with me have been easy ones. She works for a living. I have bounced off the speed limiter (nice that a 15 year old 4 cyl wagon can still go 115MPH, and coast up to 120. . .), and have hit the rev limiter several times. Heh, perhaps the above is part of why I keep having to replace clutches Oh, and I get 27MPG in this old car, on the highway, with the cruise set to 85MPH. I imagine I could get more if I drove it easier. . . My most recent escapade is carrying a DOHC 2.5L engne and tranny back to the shop so they could be refurbished and put into other cars. . . In the back of Emily. Don't laugh. I have pics to back that up. I could actually fit two engines back there if I needed to, and perhaps a tranny as well. . . Of course, I should probably get better struts if I'm gonna do that. . . Yeah, you see a lot of posts about this problem or that problem, and few of the "I love my Legacy" variety, mainly because people come here to get help getting thier beloved car back on the road. If the cars were not worth the trouble, there would not be such an interest in fixing them.

Drain and inspect. Also note if there is any smoke in the exaust and what color it is. Also please describe "a coating of oil" a bit more please. is this a light coating, or a heavy one, and what does the oil look like?

I go with the thermostat. Much easier, and the tools are a 10mm wrench, and a screwdriver. Oh, and you are very welcome. I do this a fair bit as I pull engines for some of the work I do on them, and I have never had occasion to pull one of those plugs out yet. I will soon though, as I just scored a block heater on an engine that I just yanked out of a totaled OBW for my boss. Gonna put that in Emily just in case I get work up in the frozen north. . .

Axel nut is 32mm. Pinch bolt is 12mm (IIRC). You can use the punch (3/16 Drift) from beneath on the right side of the car as well, but it is real tight. I recomend getting a length of pipe and hitting down on the lower conrtol arm to knock the balljoint loose from the hub, but be careful of the ABS sensors. Takes about an hour a shaft, unless you run into siezed components (parts corroded together). Not hard at all, really.

Because they know nothing about Subarus. Before I got my 92 wagon, I knew nothing about Subarus. I have spent the last year and a half learning about them inside and out. I fell in love with my '92 before I even drove, it actually. All it took was opening the hood. Then I looked underneath and fell in love all over again. (by the time I drove it I was done for. . .) These cars are built to be very easy to maintain (I have looked at the new ones and they are similar), which will tend to make them last longer. In automotive terms, 200K miles is a very long time for a car to last. These average half again that. Unreliable? well the first ed of the 2.5L engine was one of the worst that Subaru has ever produced (meaning that it was only 3X better than anyone elses engines, instead of the usual 10X), so the very first Foresters may have had some problems there. Overall, however, I think you will be hard pressed to find any other car line that even comes close to the reliability over long distances that Subaru provides. You have heard several people that say that they do thier own work on thier cars. There are two reasons for this: 1) Subarus are really easy to work on, so people that would not even consider working on other cars find the Subaru in the driveway an easy fix. 2) people that fix cars a lot, and really know cars tend to be drawn to Subarus because they are well designed that they do not need a lot of repair.

This is an under car job that really should be followed up by an alignment. I would also have the inner tie rod ends cleaned and repacked at this time to reduce the chances of crud from the roadway entering the steering rack and causing premature wear.

The tool you need to get those plugs out is a 14mm hex head socket (looks like an "Allen Wrench"). They are available in a set from Autozone in 12mm, 14mm, and 17mm (I think). Completely draining all the old coolant out is not strictly required, as long as you get most of it out. The procedure to get all the air out after replacing the coolant is "burping" If you do a search you will find some very good descriptions on how to do this, so I will not waste the space here.

*calls the nurse to give Nipper his medication* Nipper, we actually can do s**t without the info. We simply cannot do much more. There are far better reasons to beat people with nerf bats than this. Do not waste them on small stuff. kitsubaru, First off, welcome to the board. To best help you we actually do need the info that Nipper asked for (I will ask more nicely, however ), so we can use that to narrow down the possabilities of what the actual problem may be. For example, if the car has very few miles (less than say 80K), or very high miles (300K plus. .OK, 200K plus ), that info would point in different directions as to what the actual failing component is. Many mechanics make the mistake of just replacing whatever component the computer tells them is bad. That mistake will cost you unneeded money. Nipper (and the rest of us) are trying to prevent that. If you would be so kind to give at least the year, model, and mileage that would help a lot. In general, giving us year, model, what engine you have, what tranny you have (if it is a drive system problem like shifting or somesuch), and the actual mileage on the car, we can be of far greater assistance to you. EDIT: Aha! I see what the problem is. Nipper look at both of our locations. That explains a lot . .

I'll add my vote that the sender is bad, or the wire attached to it is unplugged (look just above the oil pump, to the left as you are facing the engine from in front of the car. There is a sender with a single wire attached to it, that is the Oil pressure sender that we are talking about.) If the wire is not attached, or the ground is not good to that part of the engine, you will get a false oil light. Also the sender may have picked that particular time to fail just to mess with you. . .

It means more than that (I'm with blitz on this),but I'd bet that my 92 Legacy will be around for a bit more than 10 years more. And I can "upgrade" to a newer model, just stopping before the "fly by wire" years.

Any EJ tranny will fit any EJ engine. Also true with the flywheel, torque converter, flexplate, etc. The wiring harness on the other hand. . . in 95 they changed the ECU to be OBDII compliant, also they moved the engine wiring harness to the rear, from the front left. Putting a pre-95 engine in a 95 or later car is just asking for a "hobby". . .

Well, I was gonna say sew two thick buttons in that place. . . That better? Considering that the industry has provided a cheap and good looking repair, the "chewing gum and paperclips" solution is no longer needed. . .

IIRC, they go into the casing forward of the extension housing, so this would require a teardown. At that point, you might as well do a rebuild (and I'll bet many shops will not do it without a rebuild). The dealer will not do a rebuild on your tranny. they will swap in a rebuilt and send you on your way. the dealer does not repair parts, they replace them. This gets very expensive very fast, which is part of why many people call them stealerships. . . I would start hunting a good tranny shop, if I were you. . . Nipper, good luck on the surgury. I hope you feel better real soon. I would offer to proofread, but I have a different problem: I cannot spell or type. . .

You should stop doing that

Well, that could be the lugnuts being loose. . .