nipper Posted August 12, 2007 Share Posted August 12, 2007 ok, now I am worried. Got the motor out yesterday, wasn't to bad, pretty much as explained on here. Pulled heads off today and I CANNOT find any sign of a BLOWN HG! Gaskets appear to be 3 layers, thin metal on each side over some other material. One thing I did find was one spark plug on the passenger side was loose! The cavity that the plug sits down in was black compared to the other 3 being clean. Plugs are champions, which I have heard good and bad about that, and appear to be ~ 42 - 44 on the gap. Obviously I have to push on (heads rebuilt/tested) does anyone have any ideas? other suggestions I have heard: replace plastic seperator plate with metal retighten oil pump backing bolts seal in the front of the transmission front & rear main seal new oem thermostat new NGK spark plugs oil/filter comments? Dont be worried. It sounds like yours just started. YOu can have the machine shop pressure test your heads just to be on the safe side if you want. TRanny seals dont usually leak. everything else sounds good. nipper Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Olnick Posted August 12, 2007 Share Posted August 12, 2007 other suggestions I have heard:replace plastic seperator plate with metal retighten oil pump backing bolts seal in the front of the transmission front & rear main seal new oem thermostat new NGK spark plugs oil/filter comments? Don't want to add to your work but since you're that far into the engine it'd be a good time to replace the timing belt (if it's anywhere near due). Also inspect the idlers, especially the cogged one, and the tensioner. Check the cam seals too. Add a new o-ring for the oil pump. Along with the NGK plugs throw in a new set of Subaru OEM wires. Sorry about your surprises but wow, you're gonna' have a virtually new engine when you're done! Good luck. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
idosubaru Posted August 13, 2007 Share Posted August 13, 2007 wow, that is bizarre. we should have asked if the headgasket had already been replaced, that would have been good to know when discussing all of this and you can check it very easily, just by glancing at the motor. if yours is the MLI variety, it sounds like it's been done before. let's start from the begining - how long have you owned this car, total miles, miles when you bought it. i'll be interested to hear the answers to those questions. it's possible they just didn't do a good install or check the heads. checking the heads is the first step i believe. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nipper Posted August 13, 2007 Share Posted August 13, 2007 wow, that is bizarre. we should have asked if the headgasket had already been replaced, that would have been good to know when discussing all of this and you can check it very easily, just by glancing at the motor. if yours is the MLI variety, it sounds like it's been done before. let's start from the begining - how long have you owned this car, total miles, miles when you bought it. i'll be interested to hear the answers to those questions. it's possible they just didn't do a good install or check the heads. checking the heads is the first step i believe. not only checking the heads, but re-surfacing them to the proper finish is critical. nipper Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scotte6 Posted August 13, 2007 Author Share Posted August 13, 2007 I bought the car in the end of March, it had ~ 124,000 miles on it at that point, now I am up to ~ 133,000. The water pump went aroud the end of May, replaced that and the timing belt at that point. Sending the heads out today to be pressure tested and resurfaced. I guess then put it all back together and see what happens. Unless they find something when they are testing the heads I'm gonna be a little nervous until I run it down the road. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
idosubaru Posted August 13, 2007 Share Posted August 13, 2007 my guess is they weren't replaced properly before, probably meaning the heads weren't touched. some people will ignore the heads and slap on new gaskets. that's a bad idea. my concern is that since the headgaskets were replaced you know it overheated before, but not how much or how far it was driven like that. when your water pump went out, how bad did the car over heat? one of nippers common recommendations is to flush out your radiator, i think that's a good idea here not knowing what happened in the past. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OB99W Posted August 13, 2007 Share Posted August 13, 2007 [...]one of nippers common recommendations is to flush out your radiator, i think that's a good idea here not knowing what happened in the past. If there's any question about possible "gunk" in the cooling system from previous problems, having the radiator flow-tested might be prudent. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scotte6 Posted August 13, 2007 Author Share Posted August 13, 2007 OK....heads are at the shop, they con provide "Felpro" gaskets there, are they ok or should I go straight to Subaru? The shop is also doing a "valve job" so they need the valve seals in order to complete. Car did not overheat much went water pump went. Yes it did get hot, but it was hotter last week than when pump failed. Is there a way to identify the original factory gaskets? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nipper Posted August 13, 2007 Share Posted August 13, 2007 Get the HG from subaru. Felpro is a trusted name, but sometimes you just need to get OE parts. nipper Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scotte6 Posted August 16, 2007 Author Share Posted August 16, 2007 Just thought I would post a quick update. I got the heads back tonight, the shop said one of them was warped (.006), from what I heard the acceptable limit is .002. So this could explain why the hg's did not look bad but it was overheating. Now I wonder what caused the head to warp, heat no doubt, but what caused it to oveheat to start? My plan is to spend Saturday trying to get it back together, will update this when I get done. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nipper Posted August 16, 2007 Share Posted August 16, 2007 Just thought I would post a quick update. I got the heads back tonight, the shop said one of them was warped (.006), from what I heard the acceptable limit is .002. So this could explain why the hg's did not look bad but it was overheating. Now I wonder what caused the head to warp, heat no doubt, but what caused it to oveheat to start? My plan is to spend Saturday trying to get it back together, will update this when I get done. Age, the bad water pump, previous owners care. head gaskets and aluminum cylinder heads are quite unforgiving, and have a long memory. They are also highly stressed engine parts. nipper Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scotte6 Posted August 21, 2007 Author Share Posted August 21, 2007 well the good news is it is up and running. Took it for a test drive today for ~15 miles. Heat gauge never went above 1/2. The bad news, I think it is a "little" bit out of time. Going to pull the front cover off tomorrow night. I want to thank everyone for all of their help! Thanks Scott Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scotte6 Posted August 26, 2007 Author Share Posted August 26, 2007 Reinstalled timing belt, this time used the marks on the belts, not really sure why I did not the first time. Anyway, running "so-so", thought it was good, but ended up getting a CEL. Have not had a chance to pull the codes. Adjusted TPS about the same. Checked tps voltage, get 5 volts all the time. Checked resistance of TPS and it changes with the movement of the throttle. At this point it will not idle, just stumbles and stalls. Any suggestions? Should have codes Sunday afternoon. Thanks! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nipper Posted August 26, 2007 Share Posted August 26, 2007 Reinstalled timing belt, this time used the marks on the belts, not really sure why I did not the first time. Anyway, running "so-so", thought it was good, but ended up getting a CEL. Have not had a chance to pull the codes. Adjusted TPS about the same. Checked tps voltage, get 5 volts all the time. Checked resistance of TPS and it changes with the movement of the throttle. At this point it will not idle, just stumbles and stalls. Any suggestions? Should have codes Sunday afternoon. Thanks! BAD! BAD! back away from the tools. Your timing is way off. Never Ever use marks on any belt. You always use the marks on the gears as per the mfg. Go to www.endwrench.com and look at the procedure. nipper Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
frag Posted August 26, 2007 Share Posted August 26, 2007 Here's what I do when i replace a belt and it has worked perfectly for the amateur I am the two times i replaced mine the last time having been this wenesday. I use an OEM belt : you can trust the marks on it. In my opinion, if you just align the marks on the camshafts and crankshaft sprockets and slap a belt on them without counting the teeth between the marks (the marks on the belt just do that work for you), the minute you unpin the tensionner the sprokets marks might just not align anymore with the cover or engine marks. Happened to me the first time i did the belt and I had to remove and recompress the tensionner two or three times. I first make the sprockets marks alignments with the marks on the cover (camshaft) and front of the engine (crankshaft) and then I slap on the belt taking care to put the cam marks (continuous) and the crank mark (dotted) on the belt in synch with the other marks. At each point, I clip the belt on the cams and crank sproket with big spring clips you can buy in every harware store. So there's no jumping of the belt while you're installing it. Then if the sprokets have moved a little, I realigned them with the marks on the engine and covers to be sure everything is alright and I release the tensionner. If all three marks align at each point before you release the tensionner, there will be no bad surprise. Worked perfectly both times I did it. It might seem a little complicated to someone doing this all the time but sometimes what works for an amateur is differnet than what works for a pro. In case it could help. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scotte6 Posted August 26, 2007 Author Share Posted August 26, 2007 I checked the tooth count on the belt before using the marks, also did a count after pulling the pin on the tensioner. Car was running ~90%, seemed like it had a slight miss. I still can't figure out why I always have 5 volts on the tps. I really don't think it is a timing issue at this point. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
frag Posted August 26, 2007 Share Posted August 26, 2007 I still can't figure out why I always have 5 volts on the tps. I really don't think it is a timing issue at this point. According to Haynes, for a 97, that's what you should have if your probing the disconnected connector on the ECU side : ground terminal and «reference terminal» You should have variable voltage 0,5-1.0 to 4.5-5.0 volts only if you backprobe the ground terminal and the «signal» terminal while mooving the throttle. With the connector in a vertical position, snap connection to the right, ground is on top, ref is just below and signal is at the bottom, according to the drawing shown. Hope that helps. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
scotte6 Posted August 27, 2007 Author Share Posted August 27, 2007 I was testing it with it plugged in. No matter what I did I always had 5 volts. I did get the codes read and it said "TPS low input". So does that mean the throttle position sensor is bad? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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