djellum

i would prize dependability over power any day that I am off the beaten path, but theres a few things that come to mind. opening up the exhaust is always good, if you can bump the PSI from the turbo up it will give you more power than anything else, but if you do I would put in an exhaust temp gauge and get some injectors from a junkyard car and clean them up. any 150ish hp or higher car with the same style of injectors as we have will help the fuel keep up. exhaust temp gauge will let you know when you must take your foot out of it (no sense blowing it up intentionally). I don't know if you can use control unit to increase the psi of your stock turbo, but if you can find a turbo out of an early legacy (vf11 I believe) then you can use a controller to turn it down to 8-9 psi (11 psi at max). not a lot of just tuning upgrades to do so your pretty much stuck changing parts, so there will be some cost. Jy turbo and injectors and a cheap exhaust gauge shouldn't be terrible. even with this it won't be omg hold on power compared to what it was. your best power will likely be just redoing the motor and resealing everything. if you can do the work yourself then it won't be a huge $$ to do head gaskets and timing belts, whats wrong with the car?

yah, do some research. the aftermarket axle market is horrible and many companies put out crap axles. at least give extra time because sometime you go through a few that are bad right out of the box before you get one that holds.

to do the sound deadening is a huge project. you will need the entire dash out of the car (the sound deadening goes all the way up behind the dash to block motor noise). the carpet is its own sound deadening so theres not much to be gained pulling it up, most comes from the front firewall. if you do the paint on it will go on the outside of the car. it adds a ton of weight and makes it hard to work on some things if you paint them over. these cars are a bit noisy and theres only so much you can do realistically. id just turn the radio up.

probably the axle shaft inner joint. clunk when turning is usually the outer joint, clunking on accel or decel is generally the inner joint. generally you replace the whole axle, do a search here and there 1.3 million posts about axles.

the top butterfly shouldn't be fully closed. activate the choke when its cold but don't start it. loosen and twist the choke housing until it has a gap between the housing and the top butterfly. i cant remember the actual measurement but just make sure there is a gap and it should be a starting point.

of true mods the limited slip is a great one for snow, but a little involved I think for what your looking at. nothing beats a nice set of chains. studded tires are great for the ice, but deep snow is a different beast. made sure whatever tires you buy leave enough room to clear your chains. and I mean chains, don't buy cables. whenever you get out of the car in cold weather prop your wiper blades up. if you do that then any old blades will do fine, though you nicer ones do a better job. also if your planning for cold weather change you antifreeze. not talking a system flush though you can do that as well, but antifreeze is actually supposed to be drained and replaced about 10x more often than people actually do it. same goes for all the other fluids, make sure they are fresh and rated for the temperature zone. shocks and struts allow a lot of road noise in when they are worn, might try replacing them if they are suspect. also lookup sound deadening kits online. its very common in the old resto trade since the old batting sucks and often has mice living in it if the car was in the barn. fairly major job, but the good stuff is kevlar or some fancy material sandwiched in rubber and goes down under the carpet. also they make sound deadening undercoat that you pain on the inner wheel wells and such, but its pretty nasty stuff to use and you have to make sure you treat any metal that its going on or it will help it rust underneath it. done well and fully cured its tough as nails and stops a lot of sound.

id throttle back the boost a bit. the actual turbo models have much lower compression as stated above and even at 7.7 CR they don't take much more than 7psi of boost. on the old XT forum people used to recommend an exhaust temp gauge. if you see your combustion temps going way up take your foot out of it. doing this will help your motor survive the experiment. be careful of leaning out under full pedal and boost, if the spfi cant keep up and leans out the motor will have issues. check out the rating on the fuel injector. the actual turbo motors were multipoint and still had a tendency to lean out if they werent in top order, injectors have rating system so make sure whatever injector (s) you use are rated for the target numbers.

both of those plastic containers are part of the ASV system. there are 2 ASV valves on the back side of the motor, one on each side. they go to those plastic chambers and then to the air box.I think the boxes are for sound, but either way they are useless if you remove or disable the system, and if you keep the system just put a breather cap or hook them to the filter. you really can't get all the metal lines off of the manifold with it on the car, but all of them will be useless so you can dremel them off or something to get them out of the way more. when you hook up the dist you have to make sure its on ported vacuum. use your finger or tongue to plug the hose and rev the engine. if the vacuum gets stronger with rpms then its ported. the port on the weber is likely right but you will want to verify.

fair warning, subaru ran 7 psi boost and lowered the compression ratio below 8.0 to do it. with your higher compression be careful about the boost (just saying don't pick 5 psi from a hat, do the math).

+1 on the trans dapt. I have 2 of them and they fit perfect and they are easy to get to both sets of bolts. generally around $25 on any website (think i got mine on amazon with free 2 day shipping with prime). either way the adaptor should have everything you need to bolt it on. If not Id be calling the people who just took 300 bones from you.

if your just going to do a 2 inch lift and some larger rims/tires then Id just run the trans for a while. eventually you will want the dual range but it swaps in as easily later as it does now. Tires and rims are pretty easy to come by, and a 2 inch lift can be made for about $30 of steel so both of these are the cheaper option (well tires may not be as cheap as the trans but they are much easier. if you find a trans though, and you have the cash id get that started.

theres an overlap that I believe starts in 84, when they switched to the EA82 (loyale) body style but kept many older models in production for a few years. be extremely careful when buying parts cause they get mixed up all the time. personally I wouldn't buy things sight unseen due to how often things get mixed up. even counter parts like disty caps and axles get mixed up all the time.

if an EA was manufactured with todays technology…. it would be an EJ lol. They are all part of the natural progression of an H4 motor. the hard answer isn't hard its just expensive. one of the guys on the old XT forum was running around 200 hp, but that was a full custom job and he had to watch his temps like a hawk to avoid blowing it up. If I remember right he did everything, custom forged pistons, copper head gaskets, independent fuel system, new turbo setup, cams, exhaust, the works. he had said once that he had around 10k into the car (over time of course). so for 10k you can have a spooled up EA82T that will make almost 200 hp as long as your careful, or you can put an EJ in it for $1500 and drive it like any other car with the same power.

like most any motor choice it begins with a desired outcome. the reason people always say EJ it is because someone is asking how to wring out the most power from their car. in order to make your power goal you need to start with a base that is capable of it, and an EA is capable of very little (without knowledge and skill that most askers don't seem to have). when you look at the cost of an average EA build (cam grind, weber or FI, SPFI pistons, maybe turbo) it will cost quite a bit of money and still not produce the power of the EJ. its the same as the big block and small block debate. theres no benefit to the big block if you want to make 300 hp, but if you want to make 1300 hp you start with a base motor that can handle it, which isn't a 305. People have pushed huge power out of any motor, but most of your big hp drag cars start with a big block cause the platform and supporting products can handle more hp in general. the question that is usually asked isn't "how can I tune my motor for more power" its "how do I get the most power". An EJ is the easiest way to get the most power into one of these cars, so it becomes the default answer. there are a lot of reasons not to swap, just like there are lots of reasons not to lift, or lower, etc, but we can't know all variables.

shouldn't have the second one for an EA82 carb. just the one by the rear tire. no harm in a second one though, I put an inline filter in the bay when i did my weber swap so I would have a place for the return line. why is your idle so high? your idling at 1100, when it should be around 800. just wondering if the fuel mix is off and you have your idle increased to compensate. is your carb fully stock or have you removed things in the engine bay (noticed the tape over the EGR light).

simple head rebuild/check doesn't cost much at the machine shop. Id at least have them surface the bottom so it mates well with the gasket. Id stay away from parts store axles. once you get one that holds they do great, but sometimes you go through a few bad ones first. rebooting them is best if you can catch them early enough. I'm going to try some MWE axles in the next few weeks. I have heard good things and at least I'm buying them direct from the rebuilder.

I would definatly take a look at your ignition system to make sure its up to par, but as said above unless you have a specific build or reason to need the higher output then it won't make much of a difference over other parts. I think a lot of times people replace old worn out equipment with new fancy stuff stuff and think its making more power when either part would work as good if it were new. I do suggest buying a quality set of plug wires. I have seen so many lately that just fall apart or need to be re-crimped. If you do buy a new coil, stocker or a blaster, then make sure it can run in the direction it will be sitting. Some use an oil bath to cool and can't be mounted sideways. others use different methods to cool and can be mounted in any direction. Not going to die in a day or anything, but heat is bad mojo for electrical systems and a huge waste of energy. never been a fan of K&N. no evidence to anything, but cleaning and oiling was a pain and I have heard mixed reviews on how well they work.

I thought the large tube off of the EGR went to the Anti Afterfire valve not the Air suction system. thats how it was on both of the ones I have, the ASV's just went to the air cleaner. Not disputing, mine could easily have been messed with. just making sure it wasn't a slip of the tongue/fingers. yes the bottom hole needs to be, well, a hole. check with a vacuum pump to make sure that the baffle holds a vacuum. No oring on any I have worked with, but there is a metal gasket as mentioned above. definitely a different looking can on that one. it would operate the EGR fine, but you wouldn't have the tube feeding the anti after fire valve, which probably wouldn't affect emissions but it might affect an inspection.

no but its been listed here before. do some searching and it should turn up. the subaru dealership can show the whole breakdown on the screen and you can pick whatever parts you want.

Im willing to bet they either ground the cone down to allow it to fit back in and/or they left the spring washer off and just put the nut on. that would give it a fair amount of space and let it sink to deep into the threads. call or go to the nearest subaru dealer and get "center piece axle" assemblies. they should have the new cone washer and spring washer. torque is 140 lb minimum, and its better to be a little over than a little under. many people torque way over 140 but that is the actual spec. if It were me I would check and replace those cone and spring washers and road test it. Its possible that something else is messed up but sometimes tightening everything down with good gear will make the difference. if its still making noise then check the hub, bearings, etc.

a holley 5200 is a similar carb to the weber. don't know if that was what you meant saying you wanted a holly for it, or if you truly meant a 180. another avenue if your looking for used carbs to rebuild yourself. have to be careful of where they come from though since they were changed for the application a lot of times. I've run higher advance without using premium, and many others have as well. i did start to see some loss in the mid range over about 12 degrees though. Ive run it as high as 20, but unless you live somewhere where you only need light throttle I would at least start around 10-12. never seen too many cars where a hotter coil made a ton of difference. I think many times people are replacing old crappy coils to begin with and any new one would have made a difference. if you do go to buy an aftermarket coil make sure its rated to be sideways mounted. many have oil in them to keep them cool and can't be mounted sideways. or at least make sure to change the mount. also don't forget the rest of the ignition system, wires, etc. the system will still only work as good as its weakest part.

my first thought would be basic tune up stuff like cap/rotor/plugs/wires. other than that I would probably start by checking for a vacuum leak.

could try a machine shop if you can find one nearby. they deal with bearings and races all the time. you could maybe pull the whole assembly out of the car and take it to them. I took my front section into the local shop here in vancouver and for $35 per side they pressed out the old bearings, tanked and cleaned, greased and pressed in the new ones with seals. you could actually do what I believe it says in the manual and have them press in the axle and torque it. its not much more than a half dozen bolts to get the whole rear hub assembly off in one piece. won't be cheap but will probably be cheaper than paying shop hours, and you still get the critical work done by a professional.

yah, the bar is what I'm referring too. whatever piece it is that actually flexes. but you don't have to directly heat it for the heat to spread into it so be careful what you heat around it as well. coil spring, leaf spring, torsion bar, they are all designed to flex and return to their set position without snapping or cracking. adding heat will just impact their ability to do one of those things. even if you only affect the last 2 inches of the bar its enough to cause it to snap rather than flex. spring steel is a term that gets thrown around a bit loosely, but it actually is a designation of metal. its a specific alloy and treatment that is designed to create the spring action. I don't know a torsion system all that well since I have never had to work on it, but I just didn't want you to ruin the piece or wreck a car cause you heated what you shouldn't. one of the projects in my metallurgy class was reviewing an insurance case that my instructor was assisting with. a guy was heating bolts to remove them under his car and ruined the treatment on some parts that later snapped and caused him to wreck. technically I should advice against welding on any suspension part, realistically a lot of us do it. with spring material though you really can't get away with much.

with suspension parts theres a lot of basic stuff that still has heat treatment and isn't always just plain mild steel. with anything that is heat treated it only takes a few hundred degrees to start changing the structure. with the spring piece its heated and then cooled in a specific method to create the spring. your torch will return it to the pretreated heat, but unless you can recreate the cooling process you won't get the spring back to its final state. you can generally get away with stuff on hard metal parts but springs will almost always be ruined by oxyfuel levels of heat.