zyewdall

Actually, if your e-brake isn't tight enough, you can still move the car if you try to start it in gear with the clutch out. If you were adding a switch, would you just wire it in series with the start wire coming off the ig switch?

Yeah. I bought a '87 GL that hadn't run in about a year, had a blown head gasket and loud TOD. I jumped the dead battery, and it started on the first crank after about 2 seconds of cranking. I know that's not the 5 years sitting, but I still thought it was pretty impressive. There's a nice mostly rust free '83 blue GL wagon sitting in a field up in the mountains here that I haven't seen move in 4 years since I first saw it. Probably several before that. I'd like to see who owns it and try to start it...

Keep the suby running gear. I still want 4wd with dual range. Connecting the VW engine and suby tranny is the hard part. I tried talking to the kennedy adaptor company, which makes one to go the other direction, and they said that subaru trannies are crap. I wrote back that when VW made a dual range 4wd tranny for cars, I'd think about a non-suby tranny.

Nope, the old GL's don't have clutch lockouts. I think this is good -- I hate those things. I suppose you could add one if you really wanted one.

Yeah, I forgot. That display that shows the little picture of the car is pretty neat. I've been in cars 15 years newer than mine that just beep at you and won't tell you why....

Here's a not really great picture of my touring wagon. The yellow parts are the sides of the raised up part of the roof. Gives about 4" extra headroom for the back hatch and rear seats. How can they not know the paint color? Light blue seems to be the color of half the subaru's around here. I've owned four subaru's that color (none presently though, or I'd go get the code)

Yeah, those 5 and 6 cylinder diesel mercs weigh more than most american V-8 engines. I'm still plotting to put a VW 1.6TD in my GL wagon at some point. But it's only about 330 lbs. I think the merc might fit in an old landcruiser or a pickup or panelvan of some sort.

Not too hard, in this area. Most have over 200k, but every once in a while (once a month or so) I see one thats more like 130k. Usually about $1000 for an EA81 with that mileage. If you are willing to travel, check the Craigslist postings for denver and you'll see alot. Looking a little sparse today -- few EA82's, and of course the next gen ones. But there is a nice 1986 hatchback with 170k miles, for $1000. If you see anything located in Boulder, I'd be willing to go check it out, so you don't have to buy sight unseen. I'm sure there's other USMB members around here who might help too.

I wait about 10 or 15 seconds for the oil pressure to get all the way up there, then I go off, and take it real easy for the first few minutes. I figure it warms up faster with some load on it than idling, and I use synthetic oil in the winter, so it can get around the engine sooner after starting it. This is if it'll run when cold. My old carbureated one didn't have any power till it was warm, so I had to wait a few minutes to keep from stalling it. The SPFI one is good to go right after starting. If it's really cold (like 10F or below), I let it run a minute or two, with the headlights, radio, and windshield defroster on full to put some load on the engine to warm up faster, but not as much load as driving would be, before I take off. Alot of times I'll start it, then scrape the windshield, which takes me about a minute or two.

Well, the ECU raises the idle rpm to warm up the engine. Perhaps you jammed a whole bunch of snow in the engine compartment charging drifts, and cooled the sensor the ECU uses, but not the one the guage reads from? I don't know if this is possible with where they are located (I have a loyale, so I don't even know), but that's my half baked theory. Glad you made it through the snow alright. We're getting a little here tonight, but not more than an inch or so. Too cold to accumulate much. (9F now, 3F forcast for the low tonight).

HAHAHA. I guess that means I'm a nerd, that when I read that I was thinking. Yeah, yeah, that makes sense... My EE degree coming through. When I was a kid I had a series of books by Forrest Mims that Radio Shack sold, and they had circuits in there for building a PWM circuit out of a LM556 or pair of LM555's and few transistors. Not too hard -- just follow the diagram. But, I liked the idea of just having a switch which disconnects the power to the solenoid to give full lockup though. If you are on any surface where you don't wan't full lockup, you probably don't need a locked center diff anyway, and regular AWD would be fine.

My driveway on April 20'th last year. 19" powder overnight. I fired up the loyale parked on the left, and drove away.

Yup -- that's mine. '89 GL touring wagon. In 1990 the GL was replaced by the Legacy, and the DL was renamed the Loyale.

Ditto to what Syonyk said. Except I don't mind that lack of AC (I hate hot weather in general, but I took a trip to western Africa for a month in June, and now it doesn't seem hot when I get into my car and it's 115 degrees in there) Pros: I take it off road more than my friends in SUV's do. With less hesitation. And I get better gas mileage than them too. Cons: It still runs on gas. Can't wait to get a turbodiesel in there so i can run it from used restaraunt oil like my other vehicals.

There's a cable that comes from the clutch release fork, and goes over to the hillholder valve, which is right under the master cylinder. It could be out of adjustment, or the actual hillholder could have sprung an internal leak. I'd try adjusting it first. I can't remember which way to adjust it, but I do remember that if it's too far one way, it will never release the brakes. To far the other way sounds like where you are.

HUH???? And here I thought it was rediculous that the DMV here told me I had to get a certified VIN inspection at the local law inforcement place when I swapped an engine from the parts car to the out of running car. Identical engines.

If you can't find one in a local salvage yard, try superrupair online. A manual tranny should't be too expensive, or too hard to replace. Grinding sounds like a tranny gear problem -- not the viscous coupling which I believe is inside the tranny too.

Get a diesel rabbit. They get 40+ mpg, and actually handle really well in the snow. For a FWD of course. Good luck finding one in running condition under $2000 though..... And of course, it'll be just a tad slower than an EA81 subaru even. Eventually, I'm going to replace my EA82 with a VW turbodiesel, so I can get 40mpg in a 4wd Eventually keeps moving farther off it seems.....

How much does something like this cost? I've never used them on cars, although I've thought about it a couple of times. I do know that the current craze in the HVAC industry to increase efficiency is going to variable speed pumps and fans, instead of using constant speed ones and just throttling back on the flow rate by shutting the valve off (which is what a traditional car thermostat does). It looks like the controller for this is a variable speed controller to adjust flowrate to required cooling load, so in theory, it should save a bit of energy.

Old subaru hatch + sawzall + a little welding = subaru jeep

If at all possible, I'd keep the old one. 150,000 miles isn't much for these engines, and they're quite fixable to go to 200k or more. Not many creature comforts, or near as much power as new ones, but for a reliable point A - point B car, they're hard to beat.

By dry, do you mean that gasoline gives it more upper cylinder lubrication when starting cold? Although I'm not used to thinking of gasoline as having any lubrication properties, I suppose it's still got more than propane/LPG I think the electromotor is what we call the starter motor.

I've read all that stuff about acetone too. Since it was only $2 for a 16 oz can of it I decided to try it, so I added about 3oz in the last 15 gallons of B20 I put in my truck. No noticeable difference in performance, and so far it looks like I'm getting lousy mileage on this tank, but it's been really cold too, and I've been doing short trips where it just gets up to full operating temp by the time I shut it off. If I see any drastic improvements, I'll post em. BTW, every says that biodiesel will do all the same horrible stuff that Kingbobdole mentioned that acetone would do (many of which are true, although the filter clogging is the only one I've experienced so far), plus I am about to start running old restuarant oil, so I figure acetone can't be much worse than that....

That last word's the problem. Swap in a 5 speed and it should liven up a bit.

I haven't seen people trashing dealers without providing some sort of personal experience they've had to create their dislike of dealers. Asking them to talk well of the dealers after their experience would be like asking you to ignore you experiences with independents and start recommending them. It just happens that your experience has been the opposite way from other people.