Well, having gleaned a wealth of info from the forum while being a silent member, I thought I'd pipe up and share my lifter success story with a 91 Gen 1 Legacy 2.2L Wagon/AWD/ABS/Auto.
This project had been my daughter's car, and always had been plauged by intermittent lifter noise. After t-belt, seals, oil pump swap with O-ring, VC gaskets, and H2O pump was complete, my last task was to address the tick. I used some gunk cleaner by Berryman Chemtool added to the oil, but when it made it worse, I hit the boards, accepted the ultimate solution and task at hand, went to Starbucks for a hot coffee, suited up for outdoor fun, and grabbed my 10mm tools. I dissassembled both banks, starting with the right side, and blew out all the passages of the rocker arms and shaft with compressed air, while paying special attention to the lifters one-by-one. I did not notice any with the typical spongy description or find plugged oilways as in many posts, however I popped them from the RA housing, blew out the housing, and blew out the lifter. There were 3 or 4 that had a bit of varnish on their sides I scrubbed off and blew clean. I depressed the ball bearing and pumped out the existing oil, then submerged them in fresh 10/40 and pumped them with the bearing depressed until I felt consistent resistance and no air bubbles. I filled the RA cup with oil and pressed the lifter back in it's original location. I used generous amounts of oil when reassembling, and had no major issues reinstalling onto the head(s). The whole procedure took me a little over 3 hours for both sides. I pulled the igniter and cranked the engine beyond the oil light going off for about 1 minute, then reattached the igniter and went for the start. I got nada. It spun without even so much as a sputter. I spun it some more, and more. On my 3rd or 4th spin, I finally got a tumble, just a bit faster than the starter. This went on for about 5 minutes, spinning about a minute at a time. I was just about to get discouraged when I got a bit of a cough, and a very rough idle that held for a second or two. The next spin it sputtered to life, and I held it at 2k for about 5 minutes. When I let off, it purred like a kitten. There was no trace of lifter noise, and the loping that accompanied the tick was gone. I let it warm up, then took it for a drive. What a difference! I was truly amazed at how much pickup it had (now like our other 2 Sub's), especially off a dead stop. I will know the true status of my efforts after an ice cold start tomorrow morning, but I must say I am cautiously optimistic it is cured.
Thanks to all for your input and the dedication of Legacy777 for sharing his excellent pics and SM pdf's. This board is great.
Craig
