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I think they had most of the bugs out by 2003. The only thing I have heard is that the brakes wear fairly fast on the heavy automatic models.

He had changed the seats in his older Legacy wagon to adjustable seats from an uprated model. You might try pming him, I think it was all bolt on.

First remove any clamp, insert a screwdriver in the rubber and spray the gap with silicone. It will help it break loose for you. If I can get to it I like to twist the hose with water pump pliars to break it all the way around. This also works well with radiator hoses.

The only failure I have ever had was with the nylon tube. It does make a mess. I have used copper tubeing with no problem many times, and I think the best is steel tubeing with a brake line type flexible section on the end toward the engine. That said the last Jeep I had I just used the nylon with no problem, and I will probably do it again with the Subaru.

I have used oil pressure guages for years and that is pretty normal. I am planning to put one on my Forester but that is one of the many things I have not gotten around to yet. Engine don't have oil pressure until they run fast enough for the pump to work so don't worry about that. This is one of the reasons for wear they say, there are devices to pre lube your engine, but residual oil lubes it too. For years engines did not have oil pumps and engines were lubed by splash or cups. In old steam engines like those on a Liberty Ship one of the crew's jobs was to lube the connecting rods. This job was called oiler. Fairly low oil pressure at idle with a modern engine is pretty normal too. The less oil pressure the less resistance, hence better mileage and emissions. The engine is being lubed just fine when the perssure regulator valve opens to prevent too much oil pressure, so don't worry about that either.

In CA we sell cars because we are tired of them or we wreck them. When I lived back east it was always because they rusted out. It is amazing how much easier a CA car is to work on. When I read about you guys struggling to get a bolt or something off it makes me remember how often I had a cutting torch out to do a simple job.

you might hold out for a CA car. If you are in the San Mateo area I can show you my Forester so you can see what is normal for here. Usually east coast suspension parts and brakes are harder to work on. I pulled my brake drums last week by hand with no puller or bolts. When I grew up in Maine I used to use a sledge hammer.

Piston slap is the piston rocking on the wrist pin and having the lower part of the piston skirt hit the cylinder wall. I am sure somebody else can explain this better than I can, but this is caused by a short piston skirt and excessive clearance between the psiton and bore. On Subaru's later engines if it goes away when the engine is fully warm Subaru figures it is fine. If the engine keeps ticking when warm it may be valve gear. If the engine makes a pinging sound on throttle application when pulling it may be a condition known as ping, or detonation. This is also slapping the piston skirt against the bore, but the piston is rocking because of preignition.

90,000 mile mark the piston slap issue became a bit worse. I have cut it down to when the car is just started by using Mobil 1 15-50. This oil might be too heavy to use in a lot of climates. The car used to slap any time it was below full operating temperature, and now it only slaps for about 30 seconds when completly cold. I thought about changing the pistons to cure it, or changing the entire block. Folks here tell me the car will slap on merrily for many thousands of miles. This has pretty much convinced me it is just a characteristic of these engines, and I have lived with piston slapping diesels for many thousands of miles. I guess I can live with this one too. A number of car manufacturers are having slapping issues these days and it seems like the best remedy will be to turn up the stereo on start up. I am going to have my oil analized next time to find out if I should be concerned about this issue. If the oil is full of aluminum...

they should have found a leaking manifold if they did the old spray ether trick, but who knows.

But I think they had it pretty well in hand about 2003. I am running the 2003 revision head gaskets in my phase 2 2.5. These are the last revision I personally know of. Any of the phase 2s are pretty solid as all they are prone to is small external leaks. Subau claims its sealer clears this up.

to the coolant. I got 25mpg before and 25mpg ever since. I have not checked mpg lately but would not be surprised to see a couple mpg drop with the crummy fuel available. I'll check back in a couple of weeks to let you guys know what I'm getting here in CA for mpg now.

it's not much help but my BMW has two cam sensors (DOHC). It would seem to make sense that Subaru might use two.

but would a MAF problem only affect one bank? I have not had this situation, but I would expect it to hit both banks.

Three cylinders aren't likely to just carbon up all at once one day are they? One would get a bit bad and then the others would get worse.... If this all came on at once and affected three cylinders I would be concerned about a common component to all three cylinders. Injectors fail one at a time so I would not have changed those. Valves fail one at a time. This would lead me to the coil pack if they are all on one bank like my car. I have never even looked under the hood of an H6 so I don't know the layout. After the coil pack I would check the wires and connectors that control it and entirely replace the computer with another to test.

I have a 99 Forester and I do have the sensors sitting in the garage. I was thinking of replacing one of the two cats but I am not sure which one. I suppose eventually I'll have to do something about it. It's hard to get very motivated about it when it takes five minutes to clear and stays clear for six months.

but it only works if the lifters are not stuck very badly or worn. I would not add it to a good running engine as I don't believe diluting the oil is a good idea. Each to his own and whatever floats your boat.

I do recall the chain now. I have seen a chain screw up but it is extremely rare. It would seem that a complete engine compression test would also find carbon. One set of cylinders would have more compression that the other side. A compression test should also find valves out of time as results would be different from one side to the other. Makes it look electrical to me.

If it was me I would probably switch the coil pack first as that is pretty easy, and then look at the belt.

Cleaning carbon is easy enough to try with a number of methods. Folks here swear by Seafoam. Does not really sound major, just irritating. Perhaps there is someone else around there who is better at diagnosis. I have not heard of many H6 problems at all, maybe because they are stil fairly new.

for heavy duty use that release additives slowly over the life of the filter, they are supposed to also have more filtering area for long life. I've never used them myself.

but I have a phase 2 and did the necessary stuff to keep it covered. In my recollection Chevy, Ford, Mazda, Honda, Datsun, and Toyota have all had head gasket problems as well as other things from time to time. When my friend Ernie had a head gasket problem on his Toyota they changed the entire engine. this is one reson he swears by Toyota. Every company has problems, it is just how they handle it.

and I find the confidence on holiday trips and the rain to be worth the extra the car costs in mileage. If you don't need the extra ground clearance the Legacy is a better cruiser and handles better on curves. I have a Forester because of the size and shape myself, but every year when I drive my brother in law's Legacys in New Zealand I get reminded of how nice they drive.

needing head gaskets for an oil leak. If it was an external water leak OK. There sure are a lot of other places for this engine to leak oil that are much cheaper to fix. I would want another opinion.

with mechanical linkage it was only a few different things. The easy one is wear on components that keeps the cable from moving far enough to disengage. The best happens when you remove a bit of clearance from the clutch and it is just enough to get you by for a while. The worst is a clutch disc coming apart, or a disc so worn that the pressure plate over centers. Most likely you will need a new clutch to fix it.