TomRhere

Still planning on being there, but not sure if I'll be down Saturday or Sunday. I'll narrow that down here shortly. I'll be driving the XT-6 down, as it's the only running 'Ru I have at the moment.

Really getting hard to find good help these days. Guess it's a good thing this Board is here!

Yeah, Ball-joints are very easy to do on these 'Ru's. Don't really need to do anything special to replace them. Have parts on hand, to begin with. D'oh, hates when that happens. Remove tire from whatever/both sides of vehicle, placing said vehicle on jack-stands afterwards. Gotta be safe here. You need to remove cotter-key that locks the nut onto the ball-joint stud, then loosen the nut. Difficulty here depends on where you live, as road-salt makes things more aggravating. There's a 14mm wrench size pinch-bolt that locks the ball-joint to the knuckle, you need to remove that. It's right above the ball-joint/control-arm connection, below where the axle goes thru. Now, insert a fairsized screwdreiver into the slot there in the knuckle, (talking area of where pinch-bolt is here), and tap it in a few times, but not to far, you ain't trying to chisel thru anything here. You are now ready to apply some down-force to the lower control arm, old shovel handle works real good here, but something around 5 foot long is proper length. Put one end of pry-bar over lower control-arm, coming in from the rearward side, and hook it under the engine crosssmember around where the E-brake cable mount is. Once you have good purchase of pry area, put your weight into it. Lower A-arm should come free of knuckle, may need to apply some well-aimed (light) hammer blows, but usually not. Should easily come free most times. Now, you are ready to seperate ball-joint and lower control-arm. You can rent a picklefork from your local parts place to do this, usually. Insert prongs of forks between B-joint and L-arm with it spanning the stud of the B-joint. Wail on it with hammer, should pop out in a couple hits. Put new B-joint stud in L-arm and install nut, do not tighten yet. Re-apply downforce to L-arm to place B-joint in knuckle. Can be a bit tricky to align everything, but it is fairly easy to do this really. Once pinch-bolt is back where it should be in the knuckle, re-install tire, and lower vehicle back onto Terra Firma. Tighten pinch-bolt to specs along with B-joint stud nut and insert cotter-pin, bending it properly. Really do want to tighten lug nuts here also. Make sure everything is tightened back-up as the book says it should be, after re-installing every removed bolt/nut, and you're good to go. Have read on here that some Members like to lift the boot on the new joint and smear somemore grease in there. Maybe/maybe-not, your call there... Can't hurt, but I haven't as of yet.

I would try to adjust the cable 1st before I tackled a clutch job, just to be sure.

Pretty much sums it up there. But the '82's are somewhat of an exception here. The antenna is on the opposite side, the GL's have single headlights along with the Center Passing Lamp, turnsignals are up by the headlights instead of in the bumper, bumpers are chromed instead of covered. Hatch doors will fit the BRATs, but you need to swap the window glass. Other than those items, parts is parts. Turbo models have 25 count axle splines, ( or is that just for the EA-82 models). '84 and later have vented rotors on the front. Most all of the drivetrain components will fit any other model, with noted exceptions and/or over-all vehicle length for the rear driveshaft. Gas tanks are different between 2WD and 4WD models. Love my BRATs!!!!!!

My '82 BRAT has a hitch on it also, and I always wondered why they didn't do the lighting plug on it. Well, I found the plug while tracing-out wiring issues for 86subaru's '84 BRAT. The plug for the trailer lights was stuffed in behind the PS Tail-light assembly. Pull your light units out and take a look, you might find yours.

Any more info on those little tubes you mentioned? Sounds like a good idea to me. And yes, excellant write-up.

Lots of the Members here have used the Heli-coil kits to repair stripped threads, they do work. Myself, I don't like them unless absolutely nessecary. What I have done for those exhaust stud threads, is use a 7/16"-14 tap, fits right in the bore of the hole with no drilling needed. Actually, I use two taps. 1st the starter tap, (it's the one with the pointed end), then follow with the bottoming tap, that'll get you a couple more threads in there. I'm a firm believer in coarse threads in soft metals, such as aluminum. You can get Stainless Steel studs to use after you do the tapping, or just use a bolt with lock and flat washers. Be sure to use Anti-sieze on what ever you do finally use, helps with future removal.

Way to go Steve!!! Glad you finally got them. Ifin it were me. I'd do the needed repairs to the one with bad engine, and keep 'em both. On a nother note; any luck on finding those rocker panels for me?

Downright gorgeous it is!!!

Got that Tick-Tick-Tick in my XT-6 too. More so when engine is cold, less so after it warms up. Poured some MMO in the oil and ran it a few days, seemed to help some. Did an oil/filter change and put some more MMO in. Did a 230 mile road trip, the Tick has lessened quite a bit now. Still have it on start-up, but goes away rather quickly for the most part. Sometimes one will Tick for a while, sometimes all 12 (thousand) of them will Tick. Sometimes, it be a light Tick, sometimes it be way LOUD. Going to either order a new pump, or just get a re-seal kit for this one. Oil pressure is right up there where it should be, but as said previously, maybe it's just cause of where gauge sensor is located. When pump seals go bad, they tend to suck air instead of oil. Pressure is pressure, be it oil or be it air, but air doesn't do so well in the HLA's, so they Tick.

Yep, still planning on making it. Will probally have the XT-6, as it's the only one running at the moment.

Not saying it is cause, just could be, 'specially if you used original hose. Possibility of inner liner of hose has seperated and is blocking the return of fluid back to the resevior. This would basically have the pump dumping the fluid thru the pressure relief valve in the pump, hence no power assist. Would try another line if you have one. Remember to bleed air out of system, by turning steering wheel lock-to-lock with engine running, and checking fluid level after couple of those.

Few things in this thread may help you out. http://www.ultimatesubaru.org/forum/showthread.php?t=26269

If you do go the Weber swap, I would swap an EA-82 carbed intake on your engine. You don't really need to do it, but the EA-82 intake, has a larger opening beneath the carb, and I do believe the runners are larger too.

A new "factory stock" replacement Y-pipe is spendy to say the least, upwards of $260.00. www.discountconverter.com They have a listing for the stock converter, you'll have to have the header pipes bent though. They also have a multitude of other converters 'specially in the universal listings. Like a Dual 2" in/outlet one, both with and without O2 sensor fitting. Thinking of that one myself for use on all of the 'Roos I have here.

Would suspect the wiring harness connector also. Have had wonky gauge and fuel light on 2 of the BRATs. One was just corroded connector, other is bad sending unit. Also, the units "ground" thru the tank itself, if you lose the ground, they'll get weird on you. Bad ground can be fixed by running a screw thru the lip of the tank into the mounting area of the body, works most of the time anyways.

Thoughts at large; Driveshaft to long, causing bind on output shaft of tranny. Driveshaft to short, allowing the splines to wobble on the output shaft of the tranny. With driveshaft bottomed out into the tranny, you should have about an inch, but no more, of free-space between rear U-joint and rear diff flange. Driveshaft out of balance, bent. If this was a custom built driveshaft, maybe they didn't get the yokes for the U-joints in-line with each other, that definetly will cause a vibration. Had a rookie do that to me once, the shop made it right though. Try pulling driveshaft and driving around with out it in, see if it's still there. Would even try shifting into 4WD just to check. Check engine to bellhousing mating surface area, make sure it is flush all the way around. Any foreign debri between tranny and bell housing would put bind on input shaft of tranny. Lastly; Are you sure you guys put the pilot bearing in? :-\ Been known to happen.

I'm in the market for some good rust-free rockers, maybe some other parts if you were to get it

Got an '86 Sedan here I'm parting out. Have to see if it has crank-up windows in it. (don't recall at the moment). I'll post back here later with results of look-see. Have had low-lifes do that to me in the past, really burns my @$$!!!!

I ported the (EA-82) manifold on mine when I installed the Weber, using a blunt tip rotary file mounted in an electric drill. I C-clamped the manifold to the work bench, mounted all of the spacers, adapters and what-nots using extra bolts. Then I just blended everything together to get rid of that stairstep look of the port opening. Got alittle close to the water port, but I filled it with some Liquid Aluminum, (kinda like JB Weld), after cleaning the area good, and smoothed it off level with the top of the manifold.

I like it.. Did you block-off the air tubes, the 1" diameter pipes going into the head at the exhaust ports? If not, would be source of back-fire.

The spline count is on the tranny end of the axle. You can use 2WD axles on 4WD and viceversa, the 4WD axle has a larger diameter axle shaft, but that's about it. Other than spline count, you need to make sure the axle is for the right vehicle, EA-81 or EA-82 family, as there is length differences. The EA-82 axle is longer. When installing axle on tranny stub, you need to make sure you line-up the pin hole correctly. There is a dimple on both the tranny stub and the axle, that is your alignment mark. Will fit 180* out, but pin won't fit thru hole.

http://www.ultimatesubaru.org/forum/article.php?a=53

Haven't tried this myself, so not real sure on it. Maybe you could get a small mirrior and a light source down by the rocker area and take a look in towards the lifters themselves. If, you can actually see them, hydraulic lifters will have a spring clip holding the inner section into the lifter casing. If you have the push-rod out, you should see the oil port in the center. (atleast I think they have one there, thinking on how Chevies do theirs here. haven't done any internal stuff on one of these engines, yet) Solid lifters will be just that, solid. They will have a dimple where the push-rod seats, but that's it. Took me something like 3 or 4 tries to get them adjusted right. 2nd to last attempt, I backed the adjusters out as far as they would go, then started engine and ran it for a few minutes. Really rattled something fierce!!! Shut it off and let it cool a bit, then adjusted per manual. Fired it up, still had one ticking a bit, re-adjusted it. No more noise.....