Ok so, I have a '97 Legacy L Sedan EJ22 with about 82K on it now. I bought at 60K and have done the oil changes on a regular basis until recently. I have gone 6K since my last change. Recently I have been smelling a burning rubber/plastic from the engine area every time I park my car in the garage after driving for as little as 5-10 minutes. I search of diagnosing the problem myself I was surprised at what I found looks to be going on under my car. It looks as though 1) Oil is leaking from my engine 2) Coolant is leaking from somewhere and 3) The oil is leaking onto my radiator hose... i have not replaced the timing belt, tensioners, drive belts, spark plugs, air filter, fuel filter, trans fluid flush, coolant flush etc. yet but am thinking, I should do it all now as an early 90K service due to the neglect of service. Here are some pics to see what's happening. Please comment and let me know what else may need to be done service wise. Thanks in advance.

 

Bad air filter?

Should I be worried about my drive belt pulley rusting like this?

1) Leaking cam seal $7.

2) Leaking water pump possibly or rad hose. $70.

3) Change air filter ASAP. $12.

4) Not hurtin anything.

 

Neither leak are deadly serious but I would CLOSELY monitor the coolant level to verify leaking water pump. Don't chance an overheat, it could ruin your whole day.

 

I would idle the car until it's up to temp, and see if you can see dripping coolant from the pump housing (greenish stuff). They typically drip or make noise before failing.

 

Both items require t-belt removal so get a new one of those while you are at it.

1 if it is oil it is definetely the cam seal on that side, also check the valve cover gasket.

 

2 green stuff in that area.... hmmmm it would be the Water Pump gasket, white replacing that gasket go ahead replace the crack seal cam seals and timing belt.

 

good luck

 

Neo

the green stuff doesn't look to promising but hard to tell where it's coming from.

 

be sure you're not running low on oil or coolant. leaking isn't that big of a deal usually. the only real issue is running out or low. watch the TEMP gauge and make sure it doesn't creep up and make sure you don't run out of oil.

 

doubtful you're leaking enough oil to run out. but check level.

 

i'd guess your oil pump seals should be replaced for the oil leak.

 

i think i'd try to clean everything up really good, replace the radiator hose, thermostat and check if it leaks after that. are you sure someone didn't spill antifreeze recently on the motor and that's just runoff?

 

the coolant leak is the most concern unless you're really loosing significant amounts of oil. oil leaks typically don't blow up into catastrophic fluid loss, they can but coolant leaks are more likely to do that. keep it simple - replace the Thermostat and radiator hose and clamps first and monitor the leakages.