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it sounds like the insurance folks are being fair with you.

In real life it is a very nice feature. My BMW M Roadster has what BMW calls Vanos variable valve timing. Although it is one more thing to have problems with, only a few folks I know have had trouble with it yet. My 65 GTO idels with a rumpety rumpety rumpety and does not come on the cam untill about 4000 RPM. It is really a bit ugly to drive in traffic and don't ask about gas mileage. The BMW idles like a tractor and spins up like an electric motor, The only time I notice the vanos is when I come into the basement garage at work. I am trying not to lay rubber so I go pretty easy. When you let off the throttle you can feel the vanos shift to tractor mode, and then the car will idle smoothly along. Subie may be able to add this feature to later models, but it does seem to take up a bit of room in the head.

Everybody loves the engine and nobody has had trouble with it, but they are not that old yet. The only complaints I have heard from owners has been. 1 requires premium fuel. 2 It seems that a six should be more powerful. If they offered tham in the Forester I would be very tempted.

but when I was rebuilding engines and honeing them in a shop you could feel small ridges sticking up after honeing. Tearing down an engine for a failure with little mileage (new radiator hose failed) I found the edges of the rings were shiny and the cylinder walls felt more polished. I know factory engines now have excellent honing systems so the wear must be much less on initial run in.

of the car. Once again my memory is fallible. The container says extended service not high mileage. My oil dealer told me it was for high mileage cars and I think that's what screwed me up. My seals are safe.....

which is one of the reasons I got the courage to try a heavy Mobil 1 in the engine. I have not even looked at the oil container for the ingredients since I don't really know enough about oils to tell if any would be a problem. I do suspect that old and hard seals would be much more of an issue. I have broken an edge on an old seal with my fingers to see how hard and brittle it had gotten. Pretty brittle was the answer.

but I have had pretty good luck touching up my clear coat. Since I can't see the damage its kind of hard to give you advice. I wish you luck having your rep look at it.

witch in the Wizard of Oz, but I intend to keep running this stuff as long as my friends carry it. I have never seen it in an auto parts store, so I am not sure if this is just a test market for the 15-50.

there. Lexol has a slight tendency to be sticky on a hot day. On the other hand they use it on saddles and Land Rovers in Africa so it does seem to work. My BMW is a 99 and the seats and interior look brand new. The only thing leather in my Forester is an old jacket on the back seat.

We work on combining our trips to keep the engine warm and polloution as low as possible. When I drive to work with the Subie in the winter it gets those two cold trips a day. The trips are 6.7 miles each way from work so most of the time is warm there. In the winter with oxegenated gas, slightly cold weather, and bad traffic I have seen a tank as low as 18 mpg.

to answer your question I drive in the San Francisco Bay area with the Subie. The car does about half city traffic and short hop, balanced with freeway driving. A few times a week I drive into SF to pick my wife up. It is usually about 7pm and traffic can be stop and go, the trip is 24 miles one way. Once I hit SF I usually get slow stop and go for about three miles. On the weekends this is our Safeway, library,shopping, and Home Depot car. It is a couple of miles between each stop, but after the first stop the car is warm. With the mixed use my car gets about 25mpg every time I fill up. It is a 99 Forester with about 118,000 miles. The best tank ever was going through Big Sur at 27.75 mpg which will lieve in my memory forever. When I am on the highway I have never been able to keep my foot out of it to keep from cruiseing 75-80 which does not help my mileage. I kept close track of the mielage for the fist few weeks after the oil change and it looked like I picked up a couple of tenths with the 15-50. Blitz, Mobil 1 high mileage is available at least here in the Bay Area at my friend's Speedy oil change because I got two extra quarts to keep from diluteing this oil. It says high mileage on it which means they think the same way I do.The reason I went to this is that the slap had gotten worse over the last three years and this did quiet the engine. I though it might cut wear and help mileage, but it seems to be too heavy to make mush difference in mileage. I did not expect to get as much difference in piston slap as I did though.

I finally got the oil changed after 4,600 miles on the 15-50 the other day. The reason I changed it out was extra noise on cold start up. My car burns a bit of oil and I have been topping up with 5-30 Mobil 1 since I have it in stock. I think the mileage and the top ups had lowered the viscosity to the point that the slap was increasing on cold start up. It was still quiet when warmed up, and did not slap on the second start up of the day. I'm not an oil expert but I think I will continue to run the 15-50 high mileage in this car. There seems to be no penalty as gas mileage is about the same.

I have only put one timing belt on a Subie if I recall, and that was so long ago I have forgotten the details. I did it in New Zealand and the only instructions I had were the marks on the belt and good advice given to me by a friendly auto parts guy and a couple of mechanics waiting in line. I sort of wondered why a Subie had the pistons down when everything else I have worked on usually timed to TDC on the compression stroke. To think that if the pistons are down if you rotate the cam your valves should be safe. Good idea, and it would take some planning to get it to work that way!

That would make me feel a lot more confident that the average tear down manual. Looks like the engine I read about (sohc) would not need cam locks.

say to bring the engine to TDC on the compression stroke is tradition. Many engines have set up this way for years. Since many mechanics work on quite a number of engine types during thier career I think folks tend to fall into a pattern in thier thinking. When one really had to worry about TDC on the compression stroke was in installing a distributor when you could easily get it backwards if you got TDC on the wrong stroke. On the new Subies I would go with the factory instructions out of concern for bending a valve. I would also make cam locks so they could not turn during installation. A real pro like Wwalker knows ways to take shortcuts, but if you don't work on a type of vehicle every day I say take no chances.

but you would need experience and good equipment. The newer gas cooled welders don't heat far from the job. As long as it's running and does not move you are good. It is true the JB weld may fail in the future, but let's hope it is a long way away.

That would easily solve the problem as I think we all agree except for the minor semantics anyway.

years ago when mixing parts on a Norton I had blown up I found that the crank I used had the position for the rotor in a different position. I got a time consuming course in basic engine timing punctuated by many kicks on a heavy starter pedal.

one is really doing the old trick of putting water in the combustion chamber to knock out carbon. This used to be pretty common in the old days, but I have no done it myself in years. Any fully ported vacum line will do.

In the wrong position. I usually move them until they are quiet, bit better view backing with them down anyway.

My Mercedes was rear ended at the toll booth on the San Mateo bridge. the insurance company was OK to work with, but they wanted to total the car Since it was an 85 and they don't count condition, new engine, tranny, rear end, etc. I bought it back from them for about $1500 and bought a deck lid in the correct color from a junkyard and pushed the body back into shape so the hit was hard to notice. I drove it about another year after that. The pain was that the car was wrecked on the title and I had to do a DMV inspection and pay for a brake and light inspection. Altogether this cost me about another $300 if I recall, and a lot of time. When I sold the car I got next to nothing because of the rebuilt marking on the title.

and have the crank case vented. I think you could weld it in place with no problem, but I would rather see it in person before I decided myself. I have welded truck rear ends by opening the drain and fill plugs and flushing them out as much as possible first. You should be a fairly safe distance from fuel lines and such. People do weld gas tanks with proper precautions. Then there a few jokes about welding gas tanks too..... Actually I would not be all that worried about drilling through into the crank case or an oil passage. Do be careful and measure if you can, but when I was rebuilding Ford FE series we had to be sure we installed a couple of oil passage plugs correctly, and many engines have plugs and freeze plugs in water jackets. If you drill though you just have to clean out all the bits and plug it carefully with the stud and sealer.

That replaced a Jeep. Fuel mileage averages around 25 with both city and freeway driving. This is the car I use for Home Depot, hauling, chores, trips, and this weekend to pick up a back window for my 65 GTO. I think your daughter will be happy with it as they are easy to drive and park. I had a Durango as a rental for a while and it was more tippy, I had it up on two wheels in a panic stop, and never made better than about 9mpg.

since I moved the Subie to Mobil 1 15-50. I was going to clean it out at 3,000 miles but the oil still looks fine. I'm leaning toward changing it at 7,500. My BMW gets about a year on Mobil 1 and the interval is determined by a computer that measures fuel used. I use a local Speedi Lube that is owned by friends of mine. They do work for the Subie dealer so are pretty familiar with Subies. Next job is I'm going to have them change my front cat and the Oxy sensors since I got PO 420 again after seven months. I feel pretty good about a small shop with folks who work on Subies regularly.

the cap is one of the items that get checked. It sure would be nice if that is all it is and when Gnumans car had problems that was the winner.