jono

I wonder if you could use those cast iron spacers some EA81s had between the head and Y pipe? I think part of their purpose was to add in EGR outlet

used to be miy unnerstanding too !!

Hmm, I still run factory EA81 pea shooter exhaust from Y pipe rear back and my EA82 twin port has no trouble exhausting and is so quiet I can hear my induction ROAR !

I KNEW I forgot something in my order !! cam box O ring

Curious little blighter they are. My oldest 3/84 sedans EA81 does not even have one to leak ! No room on end of crank. EA82 deleted them. Subaru will still stock for sure. I even got a black one in a rebuild kit, but turfed it in preference for the used orange one. I used to always gunk them up with oil friendly sealants as a precaution.. How was the crank case pressure inside , not excessive blow by helping push the oil out ?

act on impulse and buy it, then deal with all the positive and negative comments. I certainly would. The reason Subaru is so popular now is due to their reliability through late 70's, building up to the eighties and early nineties. Dont expect it to be a performer or reliable at this age WITHOUT putting in some broken nails, debarked knuckles and a few cartons of beer - at least. A wise old Subie nut once told me not to take shortcuts with these old girls, treat them right and they wuill show you respect. That advice has paid true for me nearly twenty years and many different versions Dont ask anyone as a comparison. Whatever you do will only improve the old two door. Much better to drive than a four door if you have height in you like I do. In a four door, seat right back, look sideways and a foor door will give you nice view of middle pillar ...two door nuh uh

Sin Bin the friend for starters !

If you wanna follow my advice and put your order in, I also have part numbers for seals and O rings and prices- all you gotta do is ask.

Mate...go genuine...every time I have used genuine and gone in to retension after run in - never taken a cracker more- so essentially dont need the pesky retension. Sube dealer told me their staff never do retensions on genuine gaskets. That is worth paying the extra. Currently 38 US at subarupartsdepot.com part number 11044AA013 need two ! cant get any better help than that!! except for gethelp@vwsubaru.com I think is their help desk or you could try buy them from an Australian Subaru dealer A$120 each

Power steering ...think about it for a moment....power ....you really don't want to add something to the engine that is going to rob the engine of any power at all coz a pump will use some of that power you want more of. So, don't worry about power robbing steering. I don't have power steering on any EA81, never did except for a donor that I drove around the block. It was gutless, but may have been due to the auto and worn out condition. I rebored and rebuilt that motor with a cam (requires split the block) An exhaust header/ Y pipe from an EA82 is said to have larger extraction pipe diameter internally So, I believed like you do on the internet, and found I got an extra 10 kph in second and third. I also resolved an issue I got because the cam I selected 20/60 0.235" lift solid cam lifters was a bit too wild for towing small loads - got a bit breathless until I fitted Y pipe. The pipe is a bout 3/4" longer so you really only just push the rest of your exhaust further back a little - unnoticed by any underbody stuff except maybe remake the hanger at gearbox. The join lines up, and ring gasket at rear fits to factory EA81 mid section pipe. All EA82 should have a cat. Tends to quieten things Should be cheapest most cheerful mod you should spend on first Put want ad for weber instead of buy new? Surely many have upgraded to EJ and have weber kicking about cheap? Has the Hitachi ever been rebuilt? Could be your problem also? Another weird mod I have done, so comes from my experience not www BS, was to fit an upper cylinder lubricant dispenser to the base of the carb of a Ford big six. I used the correct lube in a bottle that fed a dripper with an adjustable drip rate. One litre may have lasted about 10,000 miles from memory. After fitting, I drove about 10 miles, pulled up to stop at the lights, engine was racing with a much faster idle. After a few more miles, same thing, popped bonnet thinking something must have been caught up in the totally mechanical linkages no cable set up. Nope, nothing. Everything was perfectly unchanged, no interference. I had to physically wind the idle down a few hundred revs! I figured the upper cylinder was indeed get lubricated beyond any claims or expectations. Never tried on a subaru. But another cheap and cheerful mod. But, seriously...if you can find an EA82 donor vehicle to test drive all its components first and feel like a big job - an EA81 body with EA82 driveline difference is one hell of an improvement. Just keep EA81 radiator for its twin tube cooiling efficiency I have done this twice now...still rejecting 12 years of "EJ it" comments

Looking at EA81 rocker gear and pushrods takes me back to schol tech room where I had the opportunity to stare at an 850 Mini engine cut down of a sixties engineering example likely started back in the 50's. OHC EA82 anyday, just use genuine seals and good gasket goo rubber bands tutt, tutt.....

if after a challenge - I am running EA82 struts, springs and their bearing style strut tops in my EA81 body. EA81 uses bush style strut tops and can get dry and stiff after many years. Bearing styles can too. "just" requires some thought to fit the three hole strut tops with some reinforcing washers for the new holes drilled in strut tower. Running them in the EA81 4WD hubs, required emery paper reduction of the base that fits into the hub, by about 0.25mm. Done by hand. Much nicer ride in my beast Despite the struts and tops being over ten year old after market out of my GLTA How healthy is your strut top ? Not torn to pieces?

A good rule of thumb for reliability in a lot of cars is to renew the cable when renewing the clutch. You missed the cable adjustment section of the manual eh? At least you have had some clutch work practice !!

You are telling us a lot of detail crammed in together. Those bubbles appearing in overflow reservoir - while overheating idling in the driveway ? Do they also appear when temperature is normal and you are cruising the highway? What is the outside air temp while you are doing all this? Any car almost anywhere will get hot idling away without cooling fans to draw air through the radiator

Throw us some part numbers in case we can spot something

Ooh YES, you better believe it - that is exactly how a clutch cable goes - without warning Eliminate the hill holder from your thinking There is cable adjustment that will change between clutches so needs adjusting as per manual Can you express or take pics how much space between radiator side of the clutch fork and the mating faces between engine and box? At the fork, the fork should pull back 25 mm from rest to fully depressed for EA82, only about 15mm for the EA81 4 speed.

If I hadn't believed the bulldust about the EA82 not fit the EA81 body all those years ago, I would have years more fun with the EA82 At std height, the EA82 fits without cutting chassis rails, might need to massage them a little, file down the flutes on the dizzy side rocker cover, but jeepers, so much a better engine format to rebuild for an EA81 body, use the EA82 5MT Any upgrade on EA81 is gonna have a timing belt set up, OHC and hydraulic lifters I admit I have the mpfi twin port heads and feed it propane - making the conversion a little easier. I do wonder how a carb would go hanging off the rear of a spider inlet, or sit atop the flat mpfi inlet manifold - deffo wont fit under the bonnet, but nothing a jigsaw cant fix.

Bloody Willy Fister probably bought up the lot !!

pull plugs to see if they are getting wet from fueling but not firing

the first job i ever did on a Subie was ea82 timing belts 25 years ago. I was so impressed at the manufacturrs respect for the technician in the step by step logical process, the three marks permanently marked into the flywheel and the top of the cam box marked top and bottom into the timing belt rear covers. With all this design catering for the tech not to have to fight the valve spring tension experienced with so many other engine designs. I think I have since done timing belts without the one full turn by setting LHS cam 180 from the LHS, making use of the markings at the bottom of rear cover aligning with cam box top. Once heads have been machined you lose the perfection of teeth lining up a tiny bit, so beoing "out" by half a tooth seems to be forgiveable. The instyruction to rotate engine a few revoloutions to make sure belts are correct by continuing to align after each two two turns alternating from side to side , if you get what I say

They have been found on ebay.com.au as discussed in here previously, think the seller is or was called philsrotary. We aussies buy stuff from the US even at the current exchange rates. You guys get a great deal

Best cooling efficiency thing I have found for EA82 was to put it in an EA81 body and use the EA81 double core radiator, best cooled EA82 ever had !!

where is it leaking from. YOU need to know that before doing any more work.. Assume you scraped all old gasket and goo n rust off mating surface first, then dry fit pump to face to make sure no weird stuff going on, then gasket and no go should work fine. I like to use fine smear of some sort of sealant. Some use grease lightly

Not looking at any diagrams but if it is the big one up front and centre it is much the same as EA82 models with 4WD. I have used the entire moutning to use a newer bushing, also swapped EA82 rear diffs into EA81. Much the same if not the same. been a little further into transfer EA82 parts into EA81 but wont go into that

a note on keeping timing belts clean will likely come with belts, waring to not get coolant, oil or anything else on them or they may likely rot before your eyes. When you put timing belt covers back on , notice either side of the water pump, not always best seal going on there, I add silicon to keep crap out I do like the water pump weep hole plug idea !