GeneralDisorder

The disc and the calipers will work, but the rest will not. The hub, and the backing plate (which is also the caliper bracket) are totally different. GD

The cone washer is worn out and needs to be replaced. No amount of torque will get it properly seated now as there is a ridge worn into it from the nut being loose and allowing the whole thing to wear against the mating surface of the hub. You could torque it to 500 lbs and it would still not stop the noise. It will keep coming back till you replace the cone washer and potentially the hub (I certainly would), or until you strip the splines out of the hub and and are forced to replace the hub, axle, cone washer, and maybe other things. GD

That is 100% correct. I just had one done about 3 months ago. $25 to code cut a brand new key for my hatch (my only copy was too worn). And $3 for each copy of same. I had 4 made and hid one under the car in a mag box. The code is on the tumbler and takes all of 5 minutes to remove. It's just a spring clip that holds them on. GD

You need more than a push-button. You need some switches as well to turn on the accessory circuits or nothing will be powered after you release the momentary starter button. At least a three position switch - off, acc, and run. It's not hard to wire it - take the column apart and remove the switch from the back of the lock tumbler. Get out your DMM and it shouldn't take long before you understand. Or find the wiring diagram in any of the commonly available manuals. GD

Engine x-member only - 1" isn't enough to need to drop the leading rod plates (where the trans bolts to) but you can if you like. The PK-Davis lifts have the leading rod lift blocks 1" shorter than the engine x-member blocks - the difference is not an issue in practice. You will need longer bolts to bolt the x-member to the frame rails if you only do 1" though. If you go larger than 1" and use channel you can slip the nuts through the sides and reuse the stock bolts. GD

Change your fuel filters (front and rear, but mostly the rear will be the clogged one). GD

It screws up the camber quite a bit and isn't recommended for tire life if you are running on pavement most of the time. It's also only good for about 1" to 1.5" of additional height. The wheels look funny at the camber it puts them at. Better to make some small 1" lift blocks for the x-member to avoid the camber problems. Then you can crank them up and have them straight. GD

You didn't have the belt on right. With the belt incorrect, the valves don't actuate in sequence with the piston reciprocation and you will get intake valves that don't open at TDC, and don't close and BDC (and exhaust valves that do similar). This doesn't allow the cylinder to reach full pressure so you can't get an accurate compression reading. I would say you pulled the heads for no reason. GD

Way too much work - pull the inner control arm bolt, and the sway bar link. Two bolts and no stepping on anything. GD

The VSS is inside the speedo head. So yes - making it work again will fix the code. Whether it's the cable or inside the tranny.... you'll have to check. GD

1. Yes your alt is bad. 2. The easiest swap is an early (around 85) 90 amp Nissan Maxima alt. Next easiest is probably the XT6 alt but they are quite expensive, and the GM requires the most mods. 3. All '82 and newer Subaru's are internally regulated, and that includes all gen 2 Brat's. GD

Yes - you have a bad inner Double Offset Joint (DOJ) on one of your front axles. GD

Correct - the switch is just a simple plunger. The plunger is plastic and it rides on a notched shaft inside the transmission. The plastic plunger wears down then will not actuate the contacts in the switch body. I've done that when I needed a neutral switch for fuel injection. It's not hard to fab something up. GD

There's a lot of small differences, but only one major one. Think of the EA82 as an overhead-cam EA81. The EA82 was developed for the 1985 body style change as an interim solution while the EJ engines were being developed (EJ development began in '85 also). It has a primitive timing belt system vs. the well-developed push-rods of the EA81. They reversed the valves in the heads as well. For all that extra complexity it really isn't much benefit. The highest power EA82's were around 175 HP used for racing. The heads and head gaskets can't hold much beyond that. In contrast there's a company here in the US that sells a modified EA81 rated at 200 HP and it's reliable enough for use in aircraft. GD

There are two switches - one is in the tranny and one is on the linkage. I can't recall which is which. The tranny switches cannot be adjusted - they simply get replaced if they are bad. The linkage switch is a micro-switch with an inch-long metal arm that can be bent to adjust the switch. The EA81's are different, but similar in operation. Although I beleive the function of the two switches is opposite. GD

You should get it anyway. My SS was delivered to me on a flat-bed. Covered in dust and leaves, two flat tires, ill-fitting exhaust, and the hood popped up because the engine wasn't in the cross-member. Dead battery and wouldn't run even when I charged it. It sat mocking me from the side of the garage for the last 6 months. I hadn't the time or the resources to tinker just then. It cost more than the car was worth to put it on the road again - the kid I got it from spent over $4,000 on the car, replacement engine, etc. It hundred-dollar billed him into a hole from which I had to rescue him by trading him my (nice) 94 GT wagon for his "project" that he never got to drive. In the end.... TODAY it was all worth it . For the first time in 4 years the car ran like it was meant to when Subaru designed it. It moves with purpose I'm tellin ya! Once I clean some loose ends up and install some safety gauges and meters I'll be ready to put on some of my go-fast parts that my tax return bought GD

It probably should be in the USRM if it isn't. It's a good trick. And if you like that - next time you need to take off a crank pulley or stop the engine from rotating for any reason - thread about 10 feet of nylon rope into cylinder #1 with the engine at TDC on the comp. stroke. GD

Yep - got the copper anti-seize out for this job. Turbo with no intercooler = HOT. The copper has higher heat resistance than the nickle. The two rear plugs were harder to get out but luckily nothing stripped and the new ones went in fine. Also gooped up the boots with a generous amount of silicone electrical grease. Keeps out water and corrosion. GD

Yeah - the kid I got the car from "resealed" the engine before he (half) installed it. I know he did the head gaskets and it just didn't occur to me that he didn't remove the plugs at that time. He was also having a serious no-start issue for about a month before I got it (valve timing), and in the process of trying to fix that he put in a new fuel pump, ect..... I can't beleive that he didn't try to shotgun plugs at the thing to get it started. I'm stuck in that horrible middle ground of an extremely major mechanical overhaul that was done by an amature and I'm trying to figure out what he did right, what he did wrong, and what he didn't do at all. Had I bought the car from anyone else either damaged or in running condition I would have just replaced the plugs and wires on general principle. But I don't want to redo things he already did. Although I'm finding that most of the stuff he did was done so poorly that I'm probably going to be doing it again anyway. At least the head gaskets seem ok - not using coolant and my temp is dead center GD

Ok - I feel like a total noob wasting everyone's time like this. It's fixed. I'm not going to make any excuses because I should have checked these things. It was the plugs and wires after all. Brain - you called it and I shot you down. I will say that I'm learning about forced induction as I go here and I'm surprised at the way it would run fine without boost and then with the higher cylinder pressures the spark would just basically STOP. Amazing. No N/A application that I've ever played with acts anything like that. Bad plugs are pretty apparent in N/A land where they aren't obvious at all in Turbo land. It really felt like a fuel delivery problem - the transition was so sudden and predictable that I didn't think plugs could be the issue. The engine purportedly has just under 105k on it. And I'm almost positive these plugs are orginal or close to it. They are OEM plugs as I just replaced them with a set. (new plug in the middle for comparison). Notice that the groove in the electrode is completely burned away! Thanks for all the sugestions guys. It runs like the beast it is now. Love that power! GD

Dealership is going to be your best bet for the cone washer, and a junk yard would be most adequate for a hub as they aren't typically wear items. www.subarupartsforyou.com is one that I know of. GD

I'm assuming you are trying to install an internally regulated unit? A stock '80 Brat would be externally regulated and I can't remember off the top of my head how those connect through the external regulator.... For the later internal regulated alts ('82 and up): Standard GM remote sensing system. Big wire goes to the battery positive. Next smallest wire goes to the main power junction point - this wire senses the voltage at the junction and allows the alt to regulate power at that point to account for any voltage loss between the alt and the junction. Smallest wire is the field excitation/warning lamp wire. It connects to battery positive and has a dash warning lamp and a diode inline with the wire. Anytime the voltage is higher at the battery than it is at the alt the lamp will glow. When the alt is making power this is not the case so the lamp is dark. This wire is also the field excitation wire that gives the windings their initial magnetic field so the alt can begin producing power. This wire isn't totally necessary as the alt will self-excite once it hits about 2500 RPM or so. Bu it's a pain to wrap the engine up to 3500 every time you start it. GD

So wait - the one the shop put in is loose enough you can move the nut with channel-locks?!?! Take it back to them and make a huge scene. Seriously - you will need to replace the cone washer and possibly the hub at this point as the taper lock will be worn and unusable. They really need to fix it right. The nut HAS to be torqued. The taper lock HAS to be smooth. And the Spring washer HAS to be installed correctly. If they aren't you WILL fight this till the axle tears the hub splines out and you lose front wheel drive. Never go to that shop again. GD

That's classic wheel bearings - did you remove the axle on the other side and check those as well? Because of the double ball bearing arrangement used in the front of the EA's, bearing noises can change with turning and breaking loads as you describe. They generally don't have much slop that you can feel, and remember when checking for slop you have to release the parking brake as it's on the front calipers and will effectively lock the rotor to the knuckle making it impossible to see any play that might be there. GD

Cooler is better for compressors. Many are located outside and they should be. The ones we have problems with the most are indoors in poorly ventilated rooms. Does it? That's a twin cylinder single stage - other than pumping slower you likely wouldn't notice a discharge reed valve failure in a single cylinder. Those valves are rated at about 1000 hours before they need to be replaced. After that it's borrowed time till they snap off and cause all kinds of irreparable cylinder and head damage. I can't even count the number of broken reed valves I've seen. There's plenty of products that are better and just about the same price as that craftsman. Craftsman has the advantage that they are widely available and the only place a lot of people know of to buy stuff like that. But an IR, Champion, or Quincy are all going to be better quality and about the same price. A 2 HP Quincy QT3S on a 12 gallon tank would perform just as well as that Craftsman you have and cost about the same new. One thing that helps is to install a filter and a vapor seperator with an auto-drain. The more water and contaminates you get out of the air BEFORE it gets to the tools, the less oil you need, and the longer your tools will last. Frankly with clean, dry air you don't even need an oiler. Just 5 drops of oil in your tool's air inlet once a week is sufficient. Plus it doesn't contaminate your hoses so you don't need to keep both oil free and oil flooded hoses around GD