porcupine73

Early 2.5L SOHC were known to get a head gasket external peeping leak it's possible that's what's happening?

One brainstorm easy item to check: front sway bar. I've seen a few posts (and had it happen to me) where the sway bar fractures and then clanks around under there, especially when turning if the broken bit happens to contact the tire or anything. Other common things are exhaust heat shields.

Probably not your issue but I had this problem on my '00obw. It turned out it was because of the rubber cargo mat. For some reason on mine if that's even slightly back too far, the door closes like normal but the light stays on. It must press the door just enough to make the dash light go on though it feels completely closed.

I was trying to find some threads on it but I think I might have gotten that confused with the power window switch intermittent issue. I think that's the one a few people said they cleaned this greasy ick that had metal flakes in it and it seemed to get it going again.

Before you get that work done if you're willing to pay that much you might want to just get a quote from ccr engines. You'd still have to get it installed but if paying that much the ccr engine would be far more trustworthy in my opinion than potential unknowns in having a shop do it. Another option is a 2.2L swap.

I think there's been a few posts where people said they took it out and cleaned out some kind of gunked up grease inside them and got it working. I replaced it on my '00obw and it was a really simple replacement. My '96 it does make a clicking almost buzzing sound when first engaged or if the stalk is jiggled while the wipers are on but so far it still is working ok.

Well it would be smart to do the timing belt etc if doing the head gaskets. Price seems really high. They might be quoting by adding together HG labor plus timing belt labor which is a rip off. Timing belt basically adds only parts cost since they have to take the old belt off to do the HG's anyway. If you get it done make sure they replace the timing idlers too, especially the geared/toothed one - those are prone to fail. Valve clearance should also be done.

How bad was it leaking? The external drippy leak if needed can often be just lived with by keeping the overflow plenty full and making sure the rad cap is good and checking the radiator level periodically. My '00 had that peeping leak I drove it that way for a few years, just had to top off the overflow every week or so. It would suck in what it needed. (Also have to check the rad level under the cap too though in case it sucks air in somewhere instead of coolant from the overflow). To me it seems like as those era auto trans approach 200k miles the pinion bearing goes out often and then it's like $1500+ to get a used transmission put in and hope that it is a good one.

Borrowing money to pay $4600 for a '98 for head gasket replacement to then try to flip it in Denver I think is a bad idea for a number of reasons. If you need a vehicle but are low on funds possibly look around for another shop or option to repair. HG's normally you can get for maybe $1000 though if you're in a big city (Chicago) that might be more. It has to be a place that knows what to do like resurfacing the heads, using the proper head gasket etc., else they may fail again soon. If the rest of the vehicle is good and the repair is done right you will normally end up with a generally reliable vehicle (considering it's approaching 20 years old.) If you get the HG's done to keep the car you might as well get a timing belt kit put on while that work is being done since a lot of the labor would overlap. It's not so much that '98 was a lemon year, it's just unfortunately the 2.5L engines had a crappy head gasket.

Under the intake manifold where the fuel tubes run there are a couple short lengths of hose. Often these will leak a little esp on older soobs when it's really cold.It doesn't take much to leak to be able to smell it, even a drop or two is noticeable.

Ah ok got it, not sure if this is helpful I found this piece of diagram labeled 97 awd solenoid: But the only wires showing colors seem to be on the harness side which is probably the 97 harness in this pic so it might not be good.

I have not used those pumps so I don't really have any input. I do know that the genuine pumps are excellent and though they are say twice the price that's usually what I get because the cost of replacing it again later if necessary is going to be far more than that irregardless of if the part has a lifetime warranty.

The little L or S shaped rubber piece underneath is a piece of gasket just to help seal crud form getting inside the timing belt covers. The round thing on top is a thermostat gasket.

This might be a little tricky to do but maybe would work, is after the battery has been connected say overnight for everything to settle in, put one of the meter terminals on the battery terminal, and the other on the cable lug, then lift the lug off the terminal? That way nothing ever loses power and maybe you would see the true parasitic draw without anything taking extra due to powering up?

YES there is a trick, at least on my scangauge, on my '96 it will NOT work unless I go deep into the options and change the setting for 'PIDS' from 'all' to 'supported' I think is the wording. I think they made that automatically pick the right option in later scangauge versions possibly. I only knew that because before mine arrived I happened to read through the owners manual and noticed it saying something about some vehicles that option has to be changed. If that's not it, I have also noticed that you have to wait about 20 seconds after connecting it (until it starts reading values) before trying to clear the codes. As mentioned above it seems to have to get the communication working first.

Right the duty c bleeds pressure off the transfer clutch, so if it is not energized it will be stuck in AWD. It's not really an on/off control, the TCU uses a 50Hz square wave and varies the duty cycle between 5% and 95%. Does the ATF temp light flash at all on startup? Do all your tires match? Was the trans replaced or anything? It could just be good old fashioned torque bind. For various reasons the transfer clutch plates can wear groves into the drum and then they stick or get stuck in there and it causes torque bind.

Welcome Cheap power is a little tricky because there isn't really much in the way of 'hidden power' that some simple mod will unleash on these vehicles. Delta cams can be an option. I'm not sure the twin turbo will fit, I think there's some issue the second turbo not fitting because it comes out of a left hand drive vehicle. In the early 90's people would use the postal bodies so that it would all fit. The cool air intakes many people use though stock on the soob draws the air in from the fender or under the hood lip where it is actually cool whereas the underhood filters seem to me to actually draw in warmer air.

Ah a mystery fuse maybe someone snuck in a datalogger. This one looks interesting at least for showing the relays and such but doesn't unfortunately have this particular sbf5 info. On some it seemed to indicate SBF5 goes to the power windows and sunroof but not sure if that applies to this particular model+year.

Is it any of these?

You mentioned the check engine light came on, what is the code or codes? Was the light flashing or just on steady? Make sure all the little hoses are connected under the intake snorkus thing. There's one going to each valve cover and one bigger one going to the idle air control valve. That's something easy to check and those do pop off when doing other work sometimes and will cause idling and other issues. As already mentioned checking the timing marks is probably a good idea even though the previous owner has paperwork saying it was done in the past. It can still have jumped timing, etc., you don't know for sure that whoever did the work did it right or an idler could be failing or the tensioner bad etc.

Hm does that include the main fuse? One thing I can think of off hand that has no fuse of course is the cable to the starter. The meter in series with one of the battery terminal connections will just show the current flowing between the battery + and - terminals (it wouldn't show any internal leakage inside the battery itself).

It's pretty common on the rust belt soobs. I knew I was going to have that issue. The advice I saw on here that I did was to just drill out the entire bolt hole, then put as large and strong a bolt as will fit through that hole and two nuts on the end. It's not perfect but it seemed plenty adequate to keep the pinch shut. The main issue I had was you have to then make sure all the threads/material that might be blocking the ball joint from coming out are out else it won't budge no matter how much force you put on it and it won't be obvious what the problem is. The biggest issue I had was when drilling it out the bit caught in the hole, then the cordless drill hit me in the face and pushed my head into something sharp under the car, that hurt.

What kind/brand/source of half shafts did you use on the front? What you describe has been associated strongly with many aftermarket axles, especially those from chain parts stores. The rear shudder brainstorming a few things are possibly the propeller/drive shaft, sometimes the u joint gets flaky, though then I think it's more of a whomp whomp almost all the time up at cruising speeds and feels like it's under the driver seat moreso than just on/off the throttle. Not sure on the belt. Any parts store should be able to look up the correct belt for that year/model, but if the alternator really is slightly different then maybe it needs a shorter belt.

No, no cylinder is at tdc when doing a timing belt on Subaru. There's a couple good PDF's that were on endwrench about how to do it. If you have the 2.5L DOHC that is a little more tricky due to having to manage aligning both cams on each side.

I don't know how much change a given inch of lift makes. I used Outback struts with King Springs lift springs on my '96, and the rears did need a fastcam bolt in order to get it to 0 camber (partly because there is no camber adjustment without replacing one of the stock strut to bearing housing bolts with a fastcam bolt). The fronts I think I was able to 0 but the stock camber bolt was pretty much at the end of its adjustment range at that point.