srs_49

Heck, I can go you one better. My son decided to jack up the front of his (my) '87 BMW up to look at some damage he thought had happened when he went into a snowbank. Anyway, somehow he was under the impression that the oil pan was the right place to jack. Yep, the jack punched right through the oilpan. He sure knows where not to put the jack now!

We have a 2002 OBW (LL Bean edition), H6 with 94,000 miles on it. The owners manual called for 91 octane, but that's not available around here. What I do find is 89 ictane (mid grade) and 93 octane (premium). We have pretty much used 89 octane from day one. I have sometimes filled up with 93 octane for a trip or just to see if there was any difference in performace or gas mileage, and have never noticed any that I could attribute to the difference in octane.

If the empty light is working properly, maybe 60 miles, tops. This in a 2002 OBW, H6.

In general, I always thought you wanted a little more air in the tires that are carrying the greater proportion of the car's weight. Something about trying to get front and rear tires to run at the same slip angle when cornering. Most front engine cars, especially those that are FWD exclusively, may have over 60% of their weight on the front tires. Subarus, with their AWD system , may not be quite that bad. But still, the recommendation to put a couple of more psi in the front jives with my experience.

$315 doesn't seem that outrageous for the entire axle assy. While I've never had one replaced on the 2002 OBW, I have had them replaced on my '92 Sentra, and they were running around $275 a pop. That was 2-3 years ago. I would not go with the boot replacement. I tried it once. It was a real mess and I could not get the joint to seal tight enough to keep the grease in (which also meant water could get into the CV joint). Plus, if you don't know how long the boot has been torn, it's hard to assess how much dirt, etc may have gotten into the joint and is starting to wear parts.

Our 2002 LL Bean OBW had the orginal rotors turned once by the dealer (under warranty). Then , I replaced the rotors (warped again) around 75,000 miles when I did the front pads in April 2006. They may be developing a warp again as I'm starting to feel a shimmy when braking. Will get the tires balance first then see if that improves anything.

We've got 93K miles on our 2002 LL Bean Edition OBW (no VDC - that was another upgrade in 2002). There have been no what I would call unexpected problems (except for a cold temp problem with the brakes - see below). Did brake pads and rotors once, and am on the 1st replacement tires after getting 65,000 from the OEM Bridgestones. Will be doing strut replacements some time over the summer, and also a coolant change out. The cold temperature brake problem I'm referring to was detailed in another thread in this forum. Basically, the brakes' power boost would not work when the pedal was first depressed when outside temp was below freezing. I finally fixed it removing and cleaning out the check valve in the vacuum hose between the booster unit and the intake manifold. Otherwise, has been a very reliable car with little or no maintainence or repair costs. Gas mileage has been around 23 mpg on mid grade (89 octane).

I've had no problems at all with our '02 OBW, 3.0L H6 engine. It's got 91K miles on it. Only non-expected item I had to replace was the brake master cylinder when I accidently grabbed a can of motor oil instead of brake fluid for topping it off. Oh yeah, there was the brake-problem-when-cold issue that has been discussed elsewhere on this forum, that I finally fixed for no cost. So far, no complaints other than I think the gas mileage could be better than the 23-24 mpg we've been getting.

Our '02 OBW came with the RE92's that there's been so much bad press about. However, they lasted 65K miles on the OBW. I changed them out at the start of snow season, wanting good tread for going up to the mountains. I put Goodyear Assurance Triple Treads on, and have 27,000 miles on them with little sign of wear. I expect to get at least 60K miles out of them, if not the 80K they are warranted for.

I spent a lot of time on the Cadillac forums before doing the coolant change. The consensus seemed to be that the "green" was fine so long as it was changed out evry 2 years and the sealant was used. Plus, the engine had "green" coolant in it, and I heard bad things about mixing green and DexCool.

I'm getting ready to change out the coolant in our 2002 OBW, 3.0L. I have the replacement coolant (Prestone, green). I was just planning on draining the existing coolant, running some water through the system while the engine is on to further flush things out, then add the new coolant, 50-50 mix. I have 2 questions: 1. Are there any additives I should use? I just replaced the coolant on my son's '94 Caddy Deville, and the Caddy forums called out using a Bar's Leak sealant, made from walnut shells, I think? Anything like that called for here? 2. Should I use distilled water? Thanks,

Yes, but that's not the 2X difference mtbe was reporting.

I usually check my oil level when the engine's cold. But, that's because at that time most of the oil has drained out from the top of the head and some of the internal passages, giving a truer reading, IMHO. It's OK to check when the engine is warm, (shortly after being run), but leave enough time for the oil to drain back to the pan. Oil does not expand very much (if at all) when hot, so the temperature difference should not be the cause of the differences in oil level you are seeing. Something strange is definitely going on, but I don't know what.

I did the exhaust pipe wrap routine on my '92 Sentra. After cutting/prying off the old heat shield, just started wrapping the pipe from the rear forward. Fastened with some stainless hardware I bought with the wrap, then finished it off with some special high-temp paint. I used the Cool It-Thermo Tech wrap. Bought it online from autopartswarehouse.com, I believe.

We looked at both before we bought our '02 OBW. Since my wife was going to be the main driver, her opinion counted more than mine . We both thought the Outback was more car-like, and would better suit her day-to-day drive needs. We still had our '94 Caravan at the time, so continued to use that to haul more people and junk, when needed. I think either would suit your needs. More a matter of personal preference than anything else.

A 2000 with 90K miles, and you want to move up? Why? Most cars, not just Subarus, can go well past 150K if serviced and given the minimum of care. Here's the miles on some of my vehicles: '92 Sentra SE-R, 135,000 '94 Dodge Caravan (before we traded it in), 178,000 miles '87 BMW, 185,000 miles (odo broke, so hard to say for sure) '02 Outback, 88,000 miles '94 Caddy, 108,000 miles At, 90,000 miles, your Forester is just getting broke in. Put the money into the 90,000 mile service, and you'll have a car ready to provide you years more of driving.

I have a '92 Nissan Sentra SE-R that I lost the rod/main bearings on at 85K miles and had to do a engine swap to get it back running again. This happened shortly after I too had a oil change that left the oil overfilled by approx 2 quarts or more. I think the bearing failure and the oil overfill were definitely related, but could not prove it. If the oil level is too high, the lower journals on the crank will hit the oil in the pan as tyhe crank rotates, causing the oil to foam up and froth. This may allow air to get into the oil passages and thus cause loss of lubrication to some parts of the engine. I think this happened to my main bearings.

Is that right? An '02 OBW with ~45K miles for $12.9K? That sounds like a bargain to me. What model Outback is it? We have an '02 LL Bean edition (with the seat warmers) with the H6 engine. It has almost 90K miles on it, with no issues except for an annoying problem with the brakes at times when the temperature is below freezing (see the related thread in this forum). Only outlays have been for routine maintainence and wear items such as wiper blades, tires and brakes. Oh yeah, I did have to replace the rotors because of a recurring warpage problem, but that was just part of the brake job which I did myself. They've been fine since then. Only thing I would like is a little more power. Going up the mountains in Western Maryland, the car constantly "hunts" between 4th and 3rd gear, which I think a little more power would alleviate. My '92 Sentra SE-R pulls right up those same hills in 5th like they weren't even there. Go for it.

I agree that breaking loose the axle nut is probably the hardest part of the job. I've never done this on my Outback, but did do it on my '92 Sentra. After the nut was removed and the caliper & rotor taken off, I had to remove the lower suspension pieces from the strut so that it could swing out enough at the bottom to clear the splines on the drive shaft. There was one more bracket/support on the frame that the drive shaft was bolted to that had to be freed, but that was only 3 ~14mm bolts. Then the drive shaft just slid out of the trannny. No fluid lost, or maybe just a bit. I think it took me a weekend (actually, 2 aftrernoons would be more like it), but I was taking my time and feeling my way. If you've done the kinds of jobs you mentioned, you shouldn't have any problem (except for the nut,as mentioned).

I didn't mean to slight our friends up north ! Yes, I'm sure dedicated snow tires have it all over all-seasons. But, in my area, most of our snowfalls are of the 2-5" nature, and the roads are usually cleared down to pavement within 24 hours, even the court I live on. Some years we go without anything more than a dusting. So, snow tires seem like overkill for our type of weather. I'd rather run all-seasons (on my OBW) or performance all-seasons (on my BMW) around here, with enough snow capability to get me to the mountains once a month.

I first experienced this problem when the car was less than 2 years old and only had ~40K miles on it, so it's not strictly a high-mileage problem. I took it back to the dealer, but, they were unable to repair. Given the specific conditions under which the problem occured, that's not surprising, even given my dealer's service dept incompentencies. I'm sure had I taken it back out of warranty, they would have been more then willing to replace the master cylinder, power boost assy, and who know what else, until they finally "shotgunned" enough parts that they eventually got around to the hose/check valve. Yes, I did report the problem to the NHTSA, 2 or 3 years ago. Have never heard anything.:-\

I used an air compressor. While there's no air drier, the air coming out is probably less moist than what comes out of someone's mouth. I also ran some carb cleaner through the hose/valve before drying it, so if there was any "gunk" there, the cleaner should have taken care of it.

Last weekend we went up to our mountain house in the 2002 Outback. We got ~8" new snow over the weekend on top of a base of ice left over from freezing rain the week before. One particularly treacherous hill had not been cindered, and we sort of slide down it part way until traction was regained near the bottom. AWD doesn't mean much when you're trying to stop! That was the only place we ever had any difficulty. Later on, my brother-in-law comes up in his Acura, tries coming down that same hill, and ends up in the snowbank. He calls fo a tow (has AAA), and the tow truck ends up in the same snowbank, just missing by brother-in-law's car. I meanwhile am ferrying people from the house to the cars, going up and down that same hill (the lower part where there was some traction) a half dozen times or more. Eventually, I got my borther-in-laws car freed up with a chain (the tow truck was still stuck) and we left it at the bottom of the hill. The tow truck eventually dug itself out. I feel strongly that a lot of the good performance of Subies in snow is related to the tires. I have Goodyear Assurance Triple Treads on the Outback, and they have been great. Not as good as a true snow tire, but a real nice all-season tire. I would be interested in hearing what kind of tires others run on their cars, particularly those that drive in the heavy snow belt areas (Buffalo, upper state New York, Vermont, etc).

Heck, use the opportunity as an excuse to buy a new tool! Usually works for me (though I got my air compressor as a gift - sure beat getting a tie!).

Just an update. It's been 2 weeks since I cleaned out the vacuum line with the check valve. Nightime temperatures have been consistently in the teens, and this past weekend we were up in the mountains where the nightime lows were in the single digits. The brakes have been working fine - no problems at all when the car is first turned on (or at any other time). I highly recommend trying this fix.