GeneralDisorder

You might notice something - but more because the damn coolant runs through the manifold, and water injection would cool the incoming charge. Probably get about the same gain from removing the coolant from the manifold and building the manifold from carbon fiber. Some people rig them to spray on the intercooler in a turbo..... GD

Yeah - as long as it's not to the red. Every EA81 I've had runs like that. Even with new thermostats, caps, and perfect radiators (I have a friend at a radiator shop, and had him go through one). My guage usually reads slightly less than halfway between the mark and red. Totally normal. GD

But any impurities that are "needed" by the system ought to have been put in the antifreeze by the manufacturer don't you think? I would conjecture that this is why they recommend distilled water. Everything else has already been added. I have never heard of the water pump bearing and seals needing anything of this sort. Which is quite odd considering the number of automotive classes I've taken over the years. I cannot imagine this to be possible considering the different qualities of tap water all over the world. There would be almost no way for the manufacturer to know what mineral content you will be using unless they put it in themselves. Water here in the US is some of the softest in the world, and I would think that if mineral content were any sort of factor we would be blowing up water pumps on an unbelieveable scale compared to the rest of the world. Freezing temp with 50/50 is more like -30 degrees. I do agree tho that people do not change their coolant often enough. And you are correct that some of the additives (such as zinc) will deplete after a time, leaving the engine unprotected against electro-chemical corrosion. GD

The real problem with making them uber powerful is airflow. The heads just can't handle much, and unlike VW's, we can't just go get some dual port heads for reasonable $$ (not sure theres any at all for the EA71 - EA81's do have a following in the aircraft crowd. $2000 for a set of dual-port heads for an EA81..... Get a 32/36 Weber DGV and you will gain some low end. High end is pretty much a matter of porting the wimpy heads you have, decking them a bit, and getting a custom cam.... probably a custom manifold too at that point. I'm afraid it will never make much over 100 HP tho without new heads. GD

Halfway between the middle line and hot is normal for an EA81. Have you tested your temp sending unit? GD

Absolutely! You just need a big breaker bar, and a socket the right size.... 21mm I think, or a 13/16" will usually work in a pinch. Stick it on the pulley with the breaker bar propped against the body, and hit the starter (coil disconnected). Sometimes takes a couple bumps, but it almost always works. Oh - and stay away from the engine compartment when doing this. Stories of hucking breaker bars into the next county are not unheard of You can also use something to hold the flywheel through the timing hole if you have a manual. Might work on an auto too.... Retightening can be done many ways. My favorite if I have the time is to remove a spark plug and fill one cylinder with nylon rope. Then you can reef down at will on the pulley bolt and not worry about breaking anything. you can use this technique for removal too if you wish, but removal is usually much more difficult than installation. GD

So what exactly is wrong with using distilled water? All the makers of pre-mixed coolant use demineralized (distilled) water in their production process, and all the car manuafacturers sugest distilled water. "Premixed with demineralized water to provide freeze protection down to -34°F": http://www.valvoline.com/pages/products/product_detail.asp?product=14 "Water quality is critical. Vehicle manufacturers recommend mixing distilled water with antifreeze. Don’t use tap water, which may contain minerals that will corrode your cooling system. Do not use water softened with salts.": http://www.eetcorp.com/antifreeze/antifreeze-faq.htm "Yes, tap water is commonly used for mixing with antifreeze, however, deionized water or distilled water is preferred. Do not use water softened with salts to mix with antifreeze." http://www.peakantifreeze.com/faq.html Antifreeze does not react with the minerals in the water to change the boiling point and freezing point - it reacts with the WATER to do this. I have no idea who told you that or why, but it's completely wrong. Actually - adding ANYTHING to pure water will raise the boiling point and lower the freezing point to a certain degree. That's why we use salt on roads. It disolves into the ice, and lowers it's freezing point. The outside temp is no longer enough to keep it solid, and it melts. A 25/75 mixture will protect down to about 10 degrees, and boil at about 200 degrees. The system is designed to operate at a continual 195 degrees on an EA81, and with a 13 psi system pressure you raise the boiling point another 40 odd degrees or so. Now I have a range from 10 degrees to 240 degrees with a system operating temp of 195. GD

First, to do a proper job, and so you have room to work, remove the radiator. It only takes a few minutes. It's just the two bolts at the top, the ground wire on the top, and the upper and lower radiator hose (and the ATF lines if you have an automatic. Really - it's better this way. Once you remove the pulley, you should be able to see the seal. You can just pick it out with a screwdriver or an awl. Clean up the area, and use a little clear silicone on the outer edge of the new seal, and grease on the inner edge that rides on the crank. Done. Also - for future reference, there is no need to remove the pulley to get the oil pump out. You can fit a socket right under the pulley and get to that 4th bolt.... GD

The tach will fluctuate, while the engine seems to run normally. That's what I mean by jumping. On mine, the tach would start to vibrate (you could actually hear it, and feel it if you put your hand on the disty), and the engine would idle along, but the tach read 7,000 RPM's New really isn't an option, as I think even the dealership only sells rebuilt units. I personally had mine rebuilt by these guys: www.philbingroup.com They are local for me, and will do a rebush (this will correct the jumping), for about $35 if you dissasemble the disty for them. It's more like $50 if they have to do it. They can also rebuild the vac advance canistor if your rubber is shot. I had a rebush and the vac can rebuilt. It cost a total of $55, and I've driven it 15k miles since then and no problems. You can also get rebuilt units from CCR for like $150 or so I think. Email them and ask about your options. They are by far the cheapest for rebuilt units that I could find. GD

See your last post on this for the return line thing. I answered it there. As for a pressure regulator, no you don't need one. The reccomended pressure for the weber is 4 psi. The stock pump only puts out 1.35 - 2.06 psi. Thus a pressure regulator is a waste of time. GD

I think you are noticing the different brands of distributors rather than a difference between the auto vs. manual. In fact the 2WD's had a different distibutor than the 4WD's..... I can't tell you why. But it is a very good question. The advance curves are the same according to the FSM's I've read, so I really don't know why they would have done that. The NipponDenso unit is found on the 2WD, and the Hitachi unit is found on the 4WD's. The Hitachi unit seems to be better able to handle wear. The shafts in both units tend to wear over time, and eventually will result in a "jumpy" tach. But the Hitachi design can handle a lot more play in the shaft before the "jumping" starts. The ND will start to jump with just a little play in the shaft. My ND from my wagon (formely a 2WD) became astonishingly jumpy within only a couple hundred miles after reaching 150k on the odo. I've seen Hitachi's with over 200k that were just barely startin to jump, and they had a LOT more play in the shaft than my ND had when I had it rebushed. The ND went from working perfect, to almost undriveable in the space of 200 miles, but I have seen Hitachi's that were "jumpy" for years. GD

You need a 1/4" drive E10 torx socket. I bought mine from Matco for $8.25. Snap-On sells them for $13.50. The matco one is impact rated, and cheaper. Plus their shipping was cheaper too. Matco part#A10XRA Snap-On part #STLE100 GD

Check out my post on the thermostat subject: http://www.ultimatesubaru.org/forum/showthread.php?t=16277 If they rodded it, I would hope they would have told you if the fins were too rotten to mess with. I'm sure they would have liked to sell you a new radiator if that was the case. Funny how a different area of the country can make such a huge difference. I have never seen a rotten radiator like those pics - hell, I've never even seen a bad EA81 radiator here. All the cars I've bought were fine - even ones with 300k miles or more. GD

Strangely enough, Brats were only rated at 24-28 MPG. I have been on the high end of that lately after some carb rebuilding. I suspect that close to 30 might be possible with a light foot, and some more tweaking. My whole ign. system is 140k miles old, and my idle is a bit rough from that. And I have some strange "goo" in the drivers side valve cover that looks like water+oil, but hasn't effected the engine much other than a really, really slow loss of coolant. GD

Yeah - might want to remove the disty, and dissasemble it for inspection. Could have some corrosion on the mechanical advance too. Also - when using the timing light, disconnect the disty vac advance, and plug the port for it. GD

The axle shafts are different, and the hub's are different depth. You can do it if you swap out the front suspension to an EA82 style. But you have to use the knuckles, lower control arms, and axles from an EA82 (maybe some other stuff??), and weld the correct mounting points to the cross member for the control arms. Miles Fox has done it - I would ask him about it. GD

There's only 2 fuel lines going to the carb itself. A supply and a return. Both eminate from the little forked hose barb at the float bowl inlet on the Hitachi. Many people remove that barb and install it to the weber. I personally just capped off the return line. Either way seems to work fine as far as I can tell. The rest of the lines on the carb are vacuum lines of one sort or another. EGR, disty, and various emmissions related stuff like evap and purge lines. GD

I'm in no way implying that you are uneducated. Education is a broad term that encompases many types of knowledge on many different subjects. I was simply saying that a review of some applicable physics material would be helpful in explaining some of this. I don't wish to offend, just to debunk this myth which is so prevelent.... it's just like recycling - costs more and bad for the environment - but it does make the pleebs FEEL GOOD. And certainly if adding the coil improves the quality of your idle, and the throttle response from a dead stop at idle, I could see where someone might consider that a performance boost. But I also know that a properly functioning stock system can do the same thing. The EA81 is an 8.7:1 compression N/A engine in stock form - it does not have the ability to pull in enough mixture to need a huge hot spark for ignition. The spark is just what starts the controlled burn of the fuel-air mixture. The flame front travels downward from the point of ignition until it contacts the head of the piston, forcing it downward. It matters very little how big this spark is, or how far it jumps. Just so long as it's enough to light off the burn. The problems come when the spark is too weak to light the mixture at all - causing a misfire, and loss of power, rought running ect. It is VERY difficult to notice a misfire that occurs only 2% of the time, so if adding the accel coil reduces that to .1%, then a "magical" performance boost will be seen. However, this is not because the coil is "hotter" but simply because you have reduced the frequency of misfire's in the system. A properly functioning stock system should not have any misfires to speak of anyway, and thus a hot coil should not have any real effect. As for multi-spark situations, I can see how multiple flame fronts traveling from different angles would cause some interesting interactions.... I would have to see some data to know more about how that interaction affects performance. I can conjecture that two flame fronts (if properly aligned in both time and space) could cause the burn to occur faster, and thus you could change the timing of the engine over the entire RPM range.... an interesting concept indeed. GD

Lots of people belive in lots of stuff that isn't true. Take some physics classes, such as I have done, and I'm sure shadow has too. Really there is almost nothing to be had from installing a high power coil. Other than you may avoid the occasional misfire, and it may help to band-aid an already failing ignition system. It's mostly bunk guys. Everyone wants a free lunch, and I'm sorry to say that there isn't one here to be had. GD

You did not say you had a modified engine. If you are going to modify things, then a different thermostat *could* be a part of that modification. My personal take on these issues is that the engine was not properly designed, and thus is not a good candidate for "mods" anyway. But do as you like. As for coolant mix - I sugest a good book on the subject, but suffice to say that more water will cool your engine better. Try it. It's a balancing act tho - as the "anti-freeze" is also technically an "anti-boil" too. Lowering the amount of anti-freeze will lower the boiling point, and raise the freezing point. But WATER tranfers heat more efficiently, so more water will make your cooling system more effiecient.... to a point. That point is where the boiling point is too low, and you get steam (which BTW - doesn't tranfer heat AT ALL for our purposes. NOT good).... which blows the radiator cap. I sugest a 25/75 mix. That's what I run in oregon. 50/50 is good to like -30 degrees or some silly thing. A temp that I have never seen here on the coldest winter day. I'm sure in CA you would probably be in a world of hurt if it ever got that cold.... GD

Set your choke. Sounds like your idle up isn't functioning well. GD

RTV is your friend for sealing a lot of those oil leaks. I've used it with much success on intake manifolds, valve covers, and oil pans. It will make even the cheapest gasket take notice. GD

Yeah - we had campers here - at least 3 or 4 different styles too. Probably very similar to what you had, but you're correct that they were made in the states, and not by Subaru.... although I'm pretty sure you could buy them at the dealerships. GD

YES! Just like that. Interesting that you also got the weird bumperlets..... I wouldn't mind aquireing a set of those as they were not produced for the US market. Probably some silly law that they had to come with a bumper to pass inspection here. We have strange laws - for example you can drive with no windsheild, but you must have wipers.... What do you mean by "closed in the back"..... I'm not getting a mental image of what you're describing - do you mean it has a camper top on the back? Commonly refered to as a "topper" or "camper shell" or just "truck cap" here in the US. Confusing isn't it? If you would like to host some bigger images of your Brat, and other interesting subaru's from Isreal, you should get an account with the USMB photo gallery. That would allow you to do what I did above, and post bigger pictures etc. Besides that, you will soon run out of attachments as the board only allows a certain quantity for non-donor's. The gallery logins are free - you just have to contact SubaruJunkie for a login, and then you can post pics there, and also link them to your posts here.... GD

There's no plate that designates it - it's just stamped (in ink more or less) on the float bowl in the back. That would be the idle mixture adjustment screw. 4 turns out is where it should be set initially before finer adjustement while running. GD