montana tom

Yes , I reuse them all the time .

Drivers side cam is under tension. Its always tough to get it to stay. Use an end wrench, keep trying, it will stay if your gentle . Pass side cam is not under tension so its the one you let roll up to the final mark as you bring the new belt into place.

5 speed or auto ? have you checked front diff oil level ? If its an automatic try some additive (sea foam , lucas...) see if it helps . If its a five speed live with it but keep your eyes open for another tranny. Japanese take out trannys are available although pull and save would be cheaper.

I have headers on my 00 & 01 outbacks, can't claim to notice much difference , other than occasional vibrations at certain rpms. I do "feel" better having them but.... Fabricating a kn high flow air filter to fit could help but they don,t seem to offer one other than a stock fit replacement. Delta cams would certainly change things if you wanted to go that deep. Just not a lot of options for a legacy, now an sti ... that has power.

Yes at 124,000 I would do the head gaskets just because you have the motor out. I always use subaru head gaskets, people are having good luck using the felpro ones. The gates timing belt kit with idlers and water pump are good, for the cam seals and crank seal you should use subaru parts there. Fel pro valve cover gaskets will be fine. While you are in there remove your oil pump and check that the rear screws are tight. Remove your flywheel and inspect your rear main seal (don.t change it unless its leaking ) inspect the oil breather cover at the same time (if it is the plastic one then consider replacing it with the metal one.

Always worth fixing a subi with only 129,000 miles on it. From your description, just a radiator isn't going to do it ... your going to need head gaskets, or a takeout motor to drop in.

When you refill , remove upper hose from the radiator and pour anti freeze directly into the block,after filling the block reconnect upper hose and finish filling from the radiator.As you fill the rad gently squeeze upper hose to get the last of the air out. You wont have an air pocket if you do this.

If you never ran the motor or added fluids ,I would reuse it. Heat as well as pressure is what seats a head gasket, no heat ...then carry on.

After its cold remove upper radiator hose at the radiator and pour antifreeze directly into the hose, until you fill the entire block. Then quickly reattach upper hose to radiator and fill the rest from the radiator cap.

Confirm where the coolant is coming from ... could be a bad cap or the coolant lines to the intake.... might not need head gaskets.

Contact a japanese engine takeout place, they sell transmissions also. I seem to recall a big price difference between an outback and a forester. Its been awhile so I could be mistaken, or could be a year group issue.

Just found one on ebay for a reg. 97 impreza . They are out there just keep looking.

2007 OBW auto trans. This car was giving me fits trying to find out what was causing it to lose power badly,to the point of leaving you on the side of the road. In an earlier post I tracked down a clogged second cat as the culprit. Replaced cat and its fixed ... right?... wrong ! As was suggested by several respondents , something caused that cat to fail ! Car seemed to run great for a while until it misfires, only code it throws is misfire. It does stay running now,... just poorly. I have it in the shop ... its running but missing ,clear the code and it comes right back. I finally shut the engine off and open the hood,you know to swear at it ... what do I see ... the brand new second cat is glowing orange !!!!! Seems that when it's misfiring it's dumping raw fuel ,down the exhaust !!! After it cools off and the shop doesn't burn down, I do a little research and I discover that it's the coil heating up and misfiring. One 75.00 coil and both O-2 sensors later and it really is fixed this time ! At least we didn't melt down the new cat , or the car, or the shop... Talk about a hair puller !!! Code reader was telling me what was very obvious it's misfiring !! ahh yea we noticed !! Only after seeing the symptom of the red hot cat was I able to track the misfire back to the coil.

Haven't heard anyone suggest checking the timing belts to make sure all is in time there.

Does it release on its own, or do you crack a bleeder ? I'm thinking possibly a crushed (steel) or crushing(rubber)brake line that allows pressure in but will not freeflow back , after a few pumps of the pedal pressure builds in the caliper and it can't release ?

Thanks guys; I will continue to monitor her car . No damage to old cat, but this a new car to her so we don't know the maintenance history before she got it. So far its running great and have no doubt that I will hear all about it if it doesn't .

Check your exhaust. I just repaired a 2007 with very similar problems and it turned out to be a plugged second cat, $270.00 later and its all fixed ! You could be having the same issues... worth a check.

Problem fixed !! I was about to give up. Borrowed a fuel pressure tester and it had 52 lbs at idle , so no fuel pump problems . No water in the fuel. Was informed that it had a strong fuel smell from the exhaust when it was dying. The problem had progressed to the point that in the shop cold it would only rev up to 4000 rpm then start misfiring badly. Last resort, I dropped the exhaust free from the cylinder heads and attempted to start. Had to hold the throttle open to get it to fire... (very loud) after a few burps as the computer adjusted, suddenly it would rev to red line !!! Reattached exhaust and back to 4000 rpms ... yes ! went to the second catalytic pipe and disconnected it from the resonator and after getting engine to fire I discovered that it would only rev to 5000 rpms. Disconnect 2nd cat pipe from the first cat pipe and its back to revving to redline !!! $270.00 later with new gaskets and a new 2nd cat and pipe, car is fixed ! Revs up to red line & runs down the road strong ! All codes are gone and cruise control lite has quit flashing. After removing the bad pipe & tapping, it produced a pile of silver powder... no doubt the cheaper alternative to platinum. Rear resonator pipe and both rear mufflers are shot but at another $400.00 they can wait a few weeks.For now sister can hop in her subi and go... she is a happy camper!

An 02 with 215K could have a poor flowing radiator. Also only a subaru thermostat is reliable. Rad cap is another cheap thing to try.

When you filled the engine, did you do so from the rad cap or did you fill directly into the disconnected upper radiator hose ? IF... you filled from the cap there is a chance that you haven't gotten all the air out. Disconnect the upper hose and pour the engine full ,then reattach and finish filling via the rad cap, gently squeezing the upper hose to burp out the last of the air. Also you should be using a subaru thermostat only,the cheap parts house ones do not work well at all... If you're lucky, one of those will be your problem ... otherwise it may be your head gaskets again. The longevity of a head gasket job depends on the quality of the parts used. Subaru gaskets are best , felpro makes a gd quality gasket , china makes poor gaskets (they are very cheap though) heads should be checked for flatness and machined if necessary.

When you say that it intermittently falls on its face, do you mean its running fine and then loses all power... limping to the side of the road ? with a strong smell of fuel out the exhaust ? Does it restart quickly ? Run normal , till the next episode ? Checking timing belts on that year , always requires removing the harmonic balancer. If you have done that before its not that big a job, but my opinion... is its not going to be a timing belt... if it runs fine , then quits , then runs fine again its not a timing issue. If your timing belts slipped more than just a little bit your motor would not run at all. The fuel smell out the exhaust should hopefully give somebody with more experience than me a clue towards what your problem may be.

I didn't record those codes , and the only ones that came back were misfire 1&2 ,no # 3 this time. Had to work all weekend so I haven't looked at the car. Still going to try dropping the exhaust while it's acting up to see if it's a plugged exhaust or not .

Its more severe than limp mode. It slowly gains 3ooo rpm only in park or neutral, if you were still in gear it would just power down and stall. It did have its ecu reset , by me. I tried disconnecting several sensors while it was barely running ,in the hope that it would go into a limp mode to get me home... did'nt work, but I sure had plenty of codes to go with the misfire 1-2-3... Clearing codes did not change anything , replacing the plugs , wires and air filter also did nothing. Currently too hot outside to work on it... Going to try disconnecting the exhaust tomorrow to see if that has any effect .

Would hope & expect a crank sensor to throw a code, no oil on boots, and I agree about cly 4 ???? would think a plugged exhaust would misfire 4 also ?? Runs clean and smooth on all 4 when cold.

I thought about plugged cat , could try disconnecting exhaust to see if that had any effect. Would it flow cold and then slowly close up as it heats up ? Yes my code reader does live data , nothing but cly. 1,2,3 misfire.