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Always happy to help and visit with USMB Members. Parts are mostly 95-99 range Legacy and Impreza. Of course you know Subaru's are like Lego's many parts interchange. Thanks for stopping in!

2" lift shouldn't be too hard on your CVs and shouldn't affect power delivery or transmission life. If you're going to drive the car 99% on the highway and occasionally take it on trails like this, just go 1.5". If 99% trail riding I would go 2.5". 215/75/15 is the biggest tire you'll be able to fit without some crazy spacers or wheels, they shouldn't rub too much with 1.5"+ lift. Supposedly the 08ish Forester struts have a little more clearance, pretty sure the 2000-2004 Outback front struts have more clearance, but still 215/75/15 is about as big as you can go. As you mentioned your approach and departure angles will be much worse than a Jeep. At a minimum remove the plastic bumper covers or the trails will eventually remove them for you. AGX struts are a little better than standard replacement struts and aren't too expensive. Beyond that they get expensive but ride and hold up better. Lift springs would be worth looking into, that would be a better way to lift it than spacers as it will get you higher off the bump stops at ride height. Having done it, I would say it's not worth swapping to an H6 for mild trail riding. If you really want an H6 and obviously don't mind having an auto, I'd just buy an H6 Outback. With the five speed auto would be even better. The biggest advantage that Jeep will have over your Subaru is gearing. I haven't seen this trail you're talking about so I don't know how steep it gets, but any long steep grade will probably be impossible in your Subaru (this is all relative, we've certainly climbed some things without low range a lot of people would consider long and steep). I haven't driven many of the automatic cars off pavement but mine is terrible, certainly no better than a five speed manual, you still need momentum to get up short steep hills. It does work better in 1 or 2 than D. I wouldn't worry so much about ground clearance numbers. Worst case you scrape the bottom a few times, or a lot of times, it's steel and it's a 22 year old car, just make sure the oil pan and gas tank have good protection.

not sure if it will work or not, but you do need to be concerned about final drive ratios.. they MUST match between tranny and rear end.

hey Larry... you are gonna need to add Forester to your inventory... at least to 2004, LOL Glad you got things sorted out Texan, and that Larry was able to help. Always nice to hear of members helping each other out.

1996 is OBD II. Plug in a scan tool and see what's wrong. Then test the circuit and repair.

Check to see if the large 1" dia hose going from the Air Box to the Idle Air Control Valve is connected. It usually comes off when the air filter is changed or top of the air box is removed. Use a Subaru MAF! NGK copper core plugs are best. How did the plugs look that were removed?

Trust me, this is a case in which "expensive tools" don't always provide the answer. On the plus side is that it's probably a relatively large bolt (and head), so if one of those "extractor sockets" won't grab it, you/he might be able to drill into it and use one style of easy-out or another. Those things are notoriously easy to break, though, leaving you worse off than before. As discussed above, persistent and repetitive use of both heat/cold and serious, no-messing-around penetrants may very well make the difference between success and a piece of extremely hard tool steel snapped off in the work.

You guys have no clue what an awesome resource lmdew is for parts!. The volume of his home dedicated to them is huge. he helped me with a hood latch problem (I swear, I lubed 20 points on the car before I left, the one that failed was the one I missed....) Nice meeting him today, he is a true fan of the brand.

the problem is getting long in the tooth now. If there ever was a CALS, I don't remember it. I bet you can pick almost any car maker though, and search google with its name plus the phrase 'class action law suit' and find several. My Brother-in-law's Hybrid Camry suffered a seized engine DURING an excess oil use test! Personally, I think it's sad that there are basic issues like head gaskets, wheel bearings, piston ring lands and other areas that should have decades of good engineering experience behind them - that still suffer early failures. Other makes have stuff like this come-up too. Yes, the 2016 CAFE standards are very tough, but some of these issues aren't related to that.