hankosolder2

OK, I looked it up on cars101.com. Unless I'm completely misreading it, it's a phase 2, EJ22 in this vehicle. It's a 30th Anniversary Legacy, not an Outback, unless the OP has left something out. Why are people still posting info on 2.5 to 2.2 swaps? If I'm wrong about what engine is in this vehicle, I'm prepared to be set straight, I just don't want the OP to get incorrect info. I did once test drive a '99 Legacy 30th with a 5MT and that was DEFINITELY a phase 2 ej22 vehicle. Nathan

Isn't a 99 Legacy 30th anniversary a phase 2 ej22, not an ej 25? I'm also not sure the phase 1 EJ 22 is a straight swap for the phase 2, but I may be wrong on that. Nathan

I have heard very bad things about that auction house vis-a-vis extra fees and general jerking around of consumers. I don't have any personal experience doing business with them, but you might do some google searches to look at complaints before going forward. Nathan

Wow. I'm not sure I'd even want to own a new car that had been jacked with that much as part of a recall. That's quite a procedure. I wonder if the dealership techs are going to love or hate doing this job? Nathan

Why not go for a used manual trans? I don't think they're particularly failure prone... of course, there's more risk, but there's also a huge savings. In lieu of borrowing the GF's car, why not rent a truck for a day? Nathan

GG- FYI, your title is asking a different question than the body of the post. Are you asking about mixing & matching heads & blocks, or mixing & matching engines and chassis?

There are separate fuses for the main cooling fan and the sub cooling fan. There are also 4 (?) relays. Check both fuses first. If they keep blowing, you may have a faulty (shorted) fan motor. Good luck, Nathan

Nipper- I misread your post. You were talking about adding a relay to the seat pressure sensor circuit, not directly to the airbag inflator circuit. My apologies for my 'not a good idea' comment! Nathan

I will not tell you how to do it, but I can describe how the airbag computer functions. The airbag computer checks the resistance of both the airbag inflators. I believe they are about three ohms. If the airbag computer sees an open circuit it will set the SRS warning light and I THINK (not sure) it may disable the entire system. If it sees a three ohm resistance, it will not trip the warning light. I would not advise EVER doing anything which leaves the wires to the airbag electrically floating (open circuit.) All the airbag connectors are designed to be self shorting when unplugged to prevent static electricity or other things from setting off the airbags accidentally. So I would respectfully suggest that the DPST relay mentioned earlier would not be a good idea. One other thought: do the front inertia reel seat belts have the 'pull out all the way to engage the latching mode' function that the rears do? If not, airbag disabled or not, I don't think it's a good idea to install a car seat up front. The seat can shift quite a bit before the inertia reels lock in 'normal' mode. Nathan

I'd be happy to try it but I have a 5MT, so I don't think the results would apply... plus the roads around here are pretty well cleared at the moment.

I'm all for using engine braking in slick conditions. I will say though that it's peculiar that the "dumb", steady drag of engine breaking helps with stopping in an ABS equipped car. If ABS was perfect, any non-modulatable drag caused by engine braking would seem to HINDER its operation, yes? I won't expand on this any further out of respect for your "no whining about ABS" request, and I do think that ABS is very useful in some driving circumstances. Nathan

As a side note RE: safety and the Justy- people tend to forget that the NHSTA crash ratings are only valid to compare vehicles which weigh within 400 Lbs of each other. The Justy's crash test rating is great if you're tangling with a Festiva or something....but the real world performance of a Justy in a crash with a normal sized car is apt to be most unfortunate. I would argue that a more valid rating system would be comparing the crash performance of a vehicle to the weight of the AVERAGE vehicle on the road (or at least the average weight of a vehicle of the same type-i.e. cars to cars, trucks to trucks.) Unfortunately, this would mean that almost all compact & subcompact cars would get poor ratings and it wouldn't allow consumers to meaningfully differentiate between different small cars. Plus it would tend to encourage consumers to buy larger cars which wouldn't be good for the environment. Sorry for going a bit OT here. Nathan

Nipper- are you A.) suggesting that there's some sort of interconnection between the ABS controller and the TCU? - that could be easily proved or disproved by looking at a wiring diagram or B.) Suggesting that somehow the mechanical interaction between the AT and the drivewheels reduces the tendency for lockup? Just curious. Nathan

SPECULATION CORNER: I'm guessing your OB is an H6 engine? Dual catalysts? Does the code specify which bank? If so, I guess you could just space the rear 02 sensor on the side that's throwing the code, but the other side is probably not far behind. Are the front 02 sensors fresh & OEM ? Nathan

You could also rent a compressor, or if you want to be a weasel, buy and return a compressor. They're good things to have, but there are lots of other tools I'd buy first for the money. I'd say that pipe+ breaker bar should do the trick though.

Do you have the heater controls set to defrost or heat/defrost? If so, the AC compressor runs (as Nipper noted) to dehumidify the air in the cabin to reduce fogging. When the AC compressor runs, the radiator fans must run to pull air through the AC condenser.

I have seen failed PCVs cause > 1Qt in 500 miles oil consumption, but that wasn't on a Subaru. Rather than speculating, why not check and or change the PCV valve and see what happens?

Do make sure that BOTH radiator fans are running when the compressor comes on. If only one or no fans come on, it can cause short cycling. I suppose you could find someone to throw a pressure gauge on the AC to check the state of charge or look for bubbles in the sight glass... (does it have a sight glass? We've been mercifully free of AC problems with our Subies....)

Are you replacing halfshafts and need the old parts as cores? If not, take a Dremel tool & heavy duty cut off wheel. Cut a slot in the nut (holding the cut out wheel parallel to the axle shaft)- get as close to the hub as you can without damaging it. A bit of penetrating oil in there and it should come right off. If not, you can pound a wedge shaped item in the slot (like a regular screwdriver) to loosen things up further. You can also try drilling through the "flange" on the hub end of the nut, but I don't want to advise you to do anything that could damage the hub. Nathan

What's lame about securing car seats with seat belts? (Aside from Subaru making the clasp side of the seat belt so long that it makes it difficult to get a good fit?) I think I've mentioned this before in other discussions we've had about the LATCH system, but most cars & car seats have a higher allowed weight rating when the car seats are affixed with the regular seat belts vs. LATCH- that implies that it's stronger way of attaching them....

What are you bolting down back there? Is this some crazy car seat mounting scheme? (Just curious!) Nathan

Happy to help you with a few of those terms. I'd say your first port of call would be to recheck the fuel pressure though- you know how to do it and it's important to eliminate that before wasting time going down diagnostic blind alleys. -Kludge is (i believe) a computer derived term for an inelegant work-around or half-assed way of fixing a problem. -algorithm in this context refers to the math or internal equations the engine control computer uses to deduce how much fuel the injectors should supply under a given engine operating condition i.e. the computer takes the input from the MAP sensor, coolant temp sensor,o2 sensor, throttle position sensor etc and factors all those together (using an algorithm) to decide injector pulse width and thereby amount of fuel needed for the amount of air going into the engine. As to cam lobe, a picture is worth a thousand words there. Nathan

Yes, just as an example, suppose the return line is almost fully crushed or a hose has an internal blockage- it could cause high fuel pressure, especially at idle and still be able to pass air bubbles to the tank. As the return fuel volume decreases at higher speeds and throttle openings (i.e when more fuel is used by the engine, less goes through the return line) things would be closer to normal. I'd sure want to know that the fuel pressure was normal before doing anything else.

Many years ago, when I was working at a gas station we got a Ford Ranger (2.3 4 cyl) in that would stall whenever it was put in Drive. (This was pre OBD anything.) It had the speed/density algorythm with a MAP sensor type EFI. It was running super rich, especially at idle. Long story short, the mechs discovered that it had wiped out a cam lobe-which was causing it to not pull enough vaccuum which confused both the MAP sensor and the fuel pressure regulator. Is the performance of the car normal above idle? I know subarus aren't prone to wiping cam lobes like the 'Pinto' engine, but any car with 200K miles can have various mechanical wear issues. I think a partially worn cam lobe could possibly still give decent compression and slightly low vacuum readings at idle? Finally, was the fuel pressure verified to be normal after the FPR was replaced? I've lost track in this lengthy thread. Depending on how long the OP wishes to keep the car, I'd be tempted to start trying a kludge to get the idle mixture in the ballpark- you could add a either a padding resistor in series with the ground lead of the MAP sensor or a voltage divider on its output to shift the fuel curve around a bit. (Don't know if the MAP puts out more voltage at higher vacuum or vice versa- anyway, you want to fake it in the "more vacuum" direction.) An adjustable fuel pressure regulator would be another kludge. These are strictly last resort "ghetto" suggestions, but if it's a matter of squeaking another year out of the car 'till you can afford something else, it's a thought, especially if the root cause is determined to be engine wear causing low vacuum. Nathan

If subaru's evap emissions control logic works anything like Hondas, I think the car will eventually set a code due to your resistor voltage divider fakeout. The ECU cycles various evap control solenoids and looks for an appropriate change in the tank pressure. Frankly, I'd rather have a well done repair to the existing harness than have a dealer tear the entire car apart to replace it. It sounds like they half-assed it for sure in this case. Nathan