Hi everyone, new to the forum.... have had many Subaru's.

Quick background, bought 2.5 from Craigslist to replace blown 2.5 in my 00 OBW.

 

Was told the engine came out of 00 Forester. Swapped intake and engine wiring harness. The engine cranks but doesn't start. The car sat for about a year before I started working on it again with about a half of tank of gas in it the entire time. Unfortunately I didn't add anything to it to prevent it from going bad... so it has a half tank of bad gas in it right now.

 

It has spark and there is fuel in the injector rails. So my questions are:

 

1) Do you think the bad/old gas is enough to make it not start? I have cranked the engine over for a long time and pulled the spark plugs and they are dry, well one did look a little wet, but after cranking the engine as long as I have it should be flooded so I'm wondering if the injectors are plugged? Is there a way to check them?

 

2) I have read a couple other posts about the cam sprockets, I know the right sprocket was different (its black and looks to be plastic) but that sprocket has no pickup sensor coming off it. The left sprocket looks the same but I'm not positive. Could that be a problem?

 

Any thoughts on how to get the old gas out of the tank, tried siphon but can't seem to get tube far enough into the tank.

 

Any help is appreciated.

Year old gas shouldn't be too bad. I've started a car with 3 year old gas. Then discovered that a tranny cooler line had sprung a leak...

check to see if the cams sprockets are different, if so swap them.

What you need to do is count the teeth on the back of both the cam and crank sprockets where they trigger the sensors. If you have the wrong one it won't run.

Yes cam sprockets. Outbacks are made in the US, Foresters in Japan. Same with the engines. As bad as this sounds it should be a simple fix to change the sprockets.

 

 

nipper

man, how many CAM issues are we going to see in one week!?!?!? wowsers, good thing that other one worked out, now this is becoming common knowledge.

 

and yes, year old gas can cause problems with starting. it's called a CARBURETOR. im' sorry, i like to make fun of antiquated equipment that sucks :lol:! actually, pretty sure year old gas can cause problems in FI too. not usually, but probably depends on brand, quality, exposed to elements, etc.

Thanks for the help.

I'm going to go check out the cam sprockets this morning.

Let you all know how it comes out.

I'm pretty sure there was a note on endwrench somewhere about this, the cam sprockets being different and the ECU doesn't like it if it doesn't see the expected pattern from the cam position sensor.

Not just cam, crank also. There are two different crank sprockets as well. Don't overlook this.

Ok yes here it was Crankshaft and Camshaft Reluctors http://endwrench.com/images/pdfs/Crankshaft.pdf

If you haven't tied to start the car by using some starter fluid I recommend you try that. I suspect that the injectors aren't opening for some reason. Be sure to check all the fuses also if you haven't done that already.

Switched the timing belt pulleys, crank and cam, and it started right up.... Old gas seems to not be an issue.....

Thanks for the help everyone, very much appreciated.