GeneralDisorder

It's gear oil - 75w90 will do. Although many of us prefer Redline, or one of the various other cocktails that are common. Do a search on nasioc for Scotty's Cocktail - I run it in all of mine. GD

I cleaned the seals of all mold and such (glass to), and adjusted the latches so they put a bit more pressure on the glass when closed. That seems to have worked for mine. Both the latches were broken when I got it, and the windows were ajar for several years. Even so - the seals seemed alright. GD

It's not just the bearings - it's the front differential gear backlash that is set by those adjustment rings. If one side seems loose, you cannot just adjust the one side. You have to adjust both sides - they move the gears, and they set the bearing load. If you move one side, you'll cause the gears to mesh poorly - the contact patch will be reduced and this causes excessive heat, wear, and eventual failure. You NEVER touch the backlash adjusters. If the bearings fail behind the adjusters then you need a new transmission or it needs to be rebuilt. At the very least the bearings must be replaced, and the backlash reset. The procedure requires splitting the transmission though. GD

Hhhmmm - yeah that's a good point. I'll see what I can do. GD

For all of you wondering how to tell apart the different EA81 heads without pulling them off and measureing the valves - I've taken pictures of a few from my collection to illustrate the differences. For all these pictures, the large valve is on the left, and the small valve is on the right. First - a shot of the valves. The intake valves on the small valve head (the outer valves on both heads) are 2mm smaller in diameter: At the bottom of the heads you can see that the large valve head has no holes for the two extra 10mm bolts that the small valve head has. In the picture below you can see that these are very obvious when you are looking at the head from the bottom: Now - another popular misconception surrounds the shape of the valve covers. Here is a shot of the valve side of the heads, along with an EA71 head to show that the valve covers for ALL EA81 heads are the same. The EA71 valve covers are rounded on both bottom corners, and the EA81 valve covers are less rounded on the left corner, and angled on the other: In the above picture you will notice that the size/shape of the cross peice in front of the plugs (between the top stud locations) is different. This is NOT an indicator of head type or valve size. I have seen many different sizes of this portion of the casting regardless of valve size or year. I beleive this is related to the actual casting process as it seems to differ on every set of heads. The ends of the heads are also slightly different in their castings, but this is difficult to rely on as these things changed based on what accesories were availible for that engine: Hope this clears up some of the confusion on the subject. GD

All turbo's were 25 spline axle. Regardless of tranmission type. Even the push-button and 3AT's. And being it's a "turbo-traction", not an RX - it's probably NOT a 1.2:1 transmission. But it's impossible to tell without testing the tranny. GD

There was, about two weeks ago, an EA81 digi-dash at my local yard (likely still there). I have a 12v jump-box. If you can figure out where I need to power it up at, I could give it a shot. I really haven't much use for the thing myself, but I'll pull it, and it's harness and test it for the cause if you like. Do you want it if it's good? Bad? Just a thought. GD

Poop's decals are exclent - I have some myself, and I've seen some of their other work. Cool stuff. GD

Well - if you want, you could rotate the cam gear by hand till each cylinder's set of valves is closed. That would allow you to check compression on that cylinder using the normal method of cranking with a pressure gauge in the plug hole. Do it with all the other plugs removed, and with BOTH timing belts removed so that all cylinders are tested the same. Readings will be high as the exhaust valves won't be opening. But it should still indicate a head gasket or valve faiure by comparing each cylinder to all the others. Ideally you don't want more tha 10 to 15% difference in any of them. That would at least give you an idea of the condition of the head gaskets. No guarantees, but if you show substantially less in one cylinder or on one whole bank then you can rest a lot easier with a decision to give up on the thing. Also - since you are leaving the covers off - water pump replacement is much easier. You could forgo that job if you are confident in the pump once you get in there to look at it. They aren't expensive though. GD

It was used for the EA81T's as well, but this discussion wasn't really about that so I didn't mention it. Also the EA81T didn't come in a sedan - Brat's, Coupe's, and Wagon's only. No hatch's and no sedan's. GD

BTW - all of these have horrible engines - the EA82T is a terrible choice for a rally vehicle - especially a heavy wagon. You'll want to yard that out and install a newer EJ or EJ turbo for rally needs. Do some searches for EA82T and you'll find out all you need to know about them. GD

Depends on the year. Turbo Traction was a trim level from MY '85 only. It was part-time 4WD. GL-10's are a trim level. They came in wagons, sedans, and 3 door coupes - both turbo and non. It's just a higher level trim package than GL. Extra options abound, but changed from year to year. RX's are a different animal. 85/86 RX's are sedans. They came in Part-Time 4WD, with a higher low range than the rest of the vehicles (1.2:1 instead of 1.59:1). They have a special interior package with bolstered seats, etc. Turbo, rear disc brakes, rear sway bar.... all that stuff. No LSD's. 87 to 89 RX's are the 3 Door Coupe variety. They came with Full-Time 4WD, and a center diff locker (still with 1.2:1 low range), or in 4EAT Full-Time 4WD Automatic. The manual version came standard with a rear LSD. They only came in white - except for a few black one's made in 89.5. In 90 there was a Loyale "RS". It was not a D/R car, but it was turbo. It looked basically like the RX but with grey trim, and a different decal set. No LSD, etc. GD

He can't because it never existed. If it had, then there would be an FSM that covered it - there is not. Also I and many others would have seen one - I've seen my share of EA81's, and GL-10's have always been carbed. EA82's started out with an MPFI non-turbo in 85, and quickly adopted SPFI in 86 - that part is true. GD

The rarest? Hardly. The rarest are probably the coupe's, and of those, the ultra-rare convertible coupe's that were dealer conversions done by a place in California. If you want to talk across all bounderies, then the long-bed 2WD Brat's from Isreal are likely pretty rare (in terms of world-wide numbers). Then there's the dual-carb EA81's from JDM land..... If sedans are rarely seen it is because they are unwanted. Brat's are the most sought after, follwed by Hatchbacks, and then probably the Wagon's. Coupe's and Sedan's have a relatively small following. GD

That's common with worn out keys. If you have a new key ground from the passenger door lock code it probably won't come out like that on it's own. My hatch does it too, and the worn out key is annoying and barely works. GD

If you get the right charger on that battery, it should be able to blast the sulfate off the plates and bring it back. 6 amp isn't going to do it though - most of the decent high amp chargers are around 100 amps or so. Quick fix is to buy a new battery of course. There won't be any damage beyond that. GD

Yes! Call Jerry - his kit is excelent. HIGHLY reccomended. GD

There is no need to swap consoles or shifters on ANY EA81 if you do it right. Driveshaft has to be made longer, or the two-peice from the EA82 used. The two peice has the advantage of being cheaper, and having better ground clearance, and vibration characteristics. GD

Never jump to a conclusion like that. Subaru water pumps are fairly robust. Squealing PROBABLY was a timing belt tensioner and/or idler pulley. That may have caused the belt to fail. It is much more reasonable to assume your recent timing belt failure was the source of the noise. It could be the water pump as well, but you won't know till you pull it apart and inspect them. The good news is that it should be obvious, upon inspection, what the cause of the noise was. Not really. There is a weep hole on the bottom of the pump. If it's been leaking it should be pretty obvious. Beyond that - play in the pump shaft is easy to check - grab and shake. You have a real problem on your hands with that one. Coolant loss could be anything from a leaky radiator or heater core, to a blown head gasket, or anything inbetween. HG's generally don't show coolant in the oil - you can blow them in several ways - coolant can leak into the cylinders and be burned, it can leak out onto the ground, or it can leak into the oil - if a head crack's it can leak directly into the valve exhaust port. Checking the oil will tell you nothing. You need to do a compression check, but you can't do that with the timing belt broken. Coolant can leak from hoses, from the intake manifold gaskets, throttle body base, radiator, heater core, water pump, head gaskets, ect. Without being able to run the engine, you have no good way to find the leak short of taking it all to peices and inspecting/replacing as you go. Even then if it's a leaky heater core you have to remove the whole dash to replace it. Best bet is to make it run (replace the timing belts) and then do a UV dye test. GD

1. There's no rail cutting required. 2. Turbo exhaust will require modifications to the cross-member. 3. The D/R won't hold 240 HP. You'll destroy it. In addition you'll eat axles, diffs and stubs. 4. Turbo's aren't generally great off-road. They don't make torque low enough due to low compression. And they are difficult to keep spooled when crawling. If you don't use the turbo at all, the engine will be a gutless, low compression boat anchor - with crappy mileage. Nothing in the mods you have listed sugests you have the automotive sophistication required for a swap of this magnitude. If you do, then I appoligize for judging - but that's my assesment thus far. Your posts don't strike me as showing adequate knowledge of either your Subaru, or the various newer models you would like to swap from. If you get as far as actually aquireing the WRX motor, then I would be surprised - but should you get that far, start sizing things up and mocking up your install - THEN ask questions. In the mean time do a lot of reading and searching. GD

It's pretty clear from your post that you really have no idea what you are doing. You need to do a lot less asking of questions, and a lot more reading, searching, and listening around here. GD

Some Ford's don't use forks - they use a hydraulic actuator that's INSIDE the bell housing. All that is accesible from the outside of the transmission is a hydraulic line. It would difficult to say the least. GD

Depends on the year/model. EA81 solid lifter engines for example, require a valve adjustment every 15,000 miles.... GD

How would you actuate it? Ford hydro clutches are inside the bell-housing if I'm not mistaken.... where would you attach the cable? I suppose something could be made to work on the pedal end, but that's a lot of work - just buy her a newer Subaru that has it. GD

Probably not.... the ABS systems and the hydraulic clutch on an explorer wouldn't be compatible with the way the HH works. The HH's are cable actuated on the older Subaru's.... I have no idea how they work on the newer stuff by I suspect it's electronic using the ABS/traction control nanny.... GD