montana tom Posted November 11, 2018 Share Posted November 11, 2018 Hi all; Picked up an 01 limited 5 speed to flip this week. The seller claimed new head gaskets, new oe timing set , new factory thermostat. heads sent off to machine shop. All done in Jan 18. I was shown the bill. Car ran good until may then started overheating. Would run apx 25 miles before heating up. Putting pressure into the radiator just like a 25 D engine... having never come across a cyl. leaking head gasket on a 2.5 1 I went under the assumption that I would find a cracked head. Inspection of the spark plugs after bringing it home showed #1 plug water stained. While pulling the motor I saw that indeed a new timing set was on the car, not OE but not junk. The "new" thermostat had 1/4" holes drilled into it ,no doubt by the seller hoping to fix his heating up problem. My thought at that point was a low rent machine shop swapping out heads instead of rebuilding what was brought to them. Seller claimed he had the head gaskets done because they were oil dripping & he wanted to get another 100,00 out of his car... When removing the first head I could see that factory gaskets were not used ... after head was off, the problem was glaringly apparent, total crap quality head gasket !!! I have never seen a gasket deteriorate like this one had! In only 5 months ! No name left on the gasket if it ever had one. I pulled the other head and it would have been leaking any day! No proof but I have no doubt they were china gaskets.... The seller paid almost $1800 for this work, $200 alone for head gaskets and bolts! Moral of the story... Factory original parts ! If you can not do the work yourself... find a real Subaru shop. You usually get what you pay for... sometimes you get even less. He sold me the car for $800... costly little fix by a non subaru shop for him... nice clean car for me. 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lmdew Posted November 12, 2018 Share Posted November 12, 2018 Thanks for the info. Yep it pays to have a quality shop you know and a relationship with them. If not, do the work yourself. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
el_freddo Posted November 12, 2018 Share Posted November 12, 2018 Also, no need to replace the head bolts unless there’s something wrong with the thread. Cheers Bennie Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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