1996 Legacy Coolant Leak

[monosapio]

Hello everybody! I'm a novice at working on cars, but have bought two for under a grand and kept them working so far with minimal trips to a professional garage. 

My 1996 Subaru Legacy L with 2.2 liter stock engine overheated on me the other day after driving on the highway for about two hours. It just hit 200k miles. I have had it for over a month and have done some simple things to tune it up, and also have a stack of old service receipts. 

Steam started coming out of the passenger side of the hood and I immediately pulled over and took a look at the engine. A small amount of steam was coming out of the radiator cap, but most was pouring out from just underneath the upper radiator hose. I got a tow. Today I removed the radiator hose and it looked fine, but I went ahead and replaced it, poured in some coolant. I could see the coolant dripping from the passenger's side bumper from under the hood before I started it up, but I couldn't really see where that might be coming from. There is a bundle of tubing behind the bumper there I let it run for 5 minutes and the drip rate increased during that time.

I'm guessing that it's good news that there is an obvious leak as this might indicate that the head gaskets aren't the problem, but am wondering if the best steps from here are to replace the water pump and timing belt. I grabbed a new radiator from auto zone, but would rather not replace it if that isn't the obvious problem. Any advice would be much appreciated. I have not replaced a water pump before, but think I am up to the task. However, I'm worried that replacing the timing belt and bearings would be beyond my ability. Any advice, questions, or encouragement is much appreciated!

[Rampage]

From your description it sounds like you will need the radiator.

The radiator has a plug you can remove (opposite side from the cap) to let air out while filling it.

After you install it and fill the system with coolant keep an eye on the overflow tank for bubbles. There will be some initially but they should stop after a few warm up and cool down cycles. The warm up pushes air out of the system into the overflow tank. The cool down sucks coolant into the system. After that, if you still see a continuous stream of bubbles then it needs head gaskets.

If this is an automatic transmission check the rubber tranny coolant hoses that connect the lines to the radiator. They usually get very hard and crack when you remove them from the radiator, so you may have to replace both of them.

Changing the water pump and timing belt and components would depend on their age and what brand was installed, it they have been replaced. Your 96 is an interference engine with adjustable tappets on the valves. I would play it safe and do the right thing, new good components.

You can download the Factory Service Manual free from two places.

I use THIS site because you get the whole thing in one zip file. When you click the zip file download button another window will open. It's an add just click the X to close it.

Or you can download individual files HERE.

With this being a 96 and 200k there are 3 small coolant hoses you should check while you are at it. The OE hoses are molded and soft and can swell up and split. That happened on our 95 and 97 EJ22's. They are located under the throttle body and IAC Valve. 2 of them are on the throttle body and 1 goes from the IAC Valve to the coolant pipe where the two temp sensors are. They are not easy to replace. For that last one, I use a hose about a foot long and loop it out around the PVC pipe and IACV.

[1 Lucky Texan]

bad crimp or maybe crack on the upper rad tank?

 

anyway - good post above

[ocei77]

The 96 2.2 is non interference.

If the OP doesn't know how to fill and properly burp the system, it will continue to overheat. Do search  for burping the system.

If you can get it pressure tested, that will determine the source of the leak, but from what you've said it again leads to the radiator.

With this mileage, you might as well replace the hose from the water pump that feeds the water bypass pipe (the pipe that feeds the throttle body). 

O.

[monosapio]

I replaced the radiator and found the plastic had corroded where the upper hose joins. I was happy to see that. Replaced the upper and lower hoses as well. I did look up how to burb the system correctly and I'm 80% sure I did it right. I took it on two 15 minute drives and after the last one it looked like the coolant level was the same under the cap, but might have lost a bit in the reserve. No signs of coolant and oil mixing yet. Thank you for your responses.