CNY_Dave

Yeah, you don't really need to remove much to do an inner. That tool goes around a tie-rod end (outer) or ball joint (non-pinch type, or on subies the control arm end bolt of the ball joint) and pushes the tapered end free without munging the boot with a pickle-fork. Dave

I bought it for undoing the tie rod end and removing the ball-joint from the lower control arm on my wheel-bearing job. No messing with the pinch bolt that way, too. Dave

For the first time I recently used one of these: http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/displayitem.taf?Itemnumber=99849 Worked pretty sweet. Dave

There are a couple of nuts, the only hard part is not dropping them taking them off, and getting them started again without dropping 'em. I have a 1/4 drive socket set that grabs the nuts pretty well. You could also place a small magnet in the socket- get it loose with a deep socket, get it near the end, then switch to a short socket with a magnet in it. Dave

If it is flooded, crank with the accellerator floored. If it starts right up, it was flooded. Dave

The way he said it made it sound like the tire caused the bearing to fail. Dave

Did a mechanic infer a bad tire damaged the wheel bearings? That sounds a little sketchy. Dave

I hope they checked the hub- if the wheel loosened up while loosening the axle nut, I'd suspect the hub was damaged. The inner races are a very tight fit on the hub, and the bearing could not loosen up unless the races slid on the hub. Dave

Bad wheel bearings usually make noise. Humming, thrumming, sounds like noisy tires. If you jack up that wheel, you may see looseness in the bearing if you grab the top and bottom of the tire and push at the top, pull at the bottom, and reverse. You may also hear/feel notchiness or vibration when rotating the wheel. jacking up both front wheels and putting it in neutral makes turning the wheel easier. Compare the left and right wheels, and try turning the wheel as fast as possible with your hand on the strut spring. This was the only way I could tell my bad one from the good one. Dave

The cheap bastard in me says 'hook up a switch to activate the fuse when you have a tight turn you have to take'. Listening to the cheap bastard sometimes pays off, sometimes it does not. Dave

I went by this guide http://forums.nasioc.com/forums/showthread.php?t=787070&highlight=wheel+bearing Having just done this on my '03 OBW, a few observations (I think they are relevant to the '96)- I got my bearings from the dealer. Tongues of semi-clear brownish grease were sticking out in between the bearings, I'd call it 30% packed or a bit better. The dealer said they were packed and ready-to-go, and the two inner races were held in place with a plastic keeper that was not supposed to be removed until the bearing was installed and you were ready to press in the hub. The manual made a big deal about packing the seal lips with matching grease- the seals from subaru are pre-loaded with grease. The PDF manual I was following said it was extremely important to put no weight on the bearing until the axle nut was fully torqued. I can see this as important. Seeing the way the bearing goes together, and following what was happening to the bearing internally as I torqued the axle nut, I am skeptical you could damage the bearing over-torquing the nut. I am fairly sure when fully torqued the two inner races are touching each other, meaning the bearing preload is set by those parts dimensions and not by the nut torque (as long as the nut is tight enough to get the races into contact with each other). When tightening the axle nut, for a long time all you're doing is pulling the races together. When they meet, the torque goes up dramatically and rapidly, and reaches full torque in less than a quarter turn. As long as you can turn that nut and it's about the same effort, keep turning it! The hub must be primo- perfect- no ridge. I think the best way to tell a bad hub from a good one is that if there are *any* lines tracing around the hub where the inner race sits (or any 'smearing'), the bearing has spun on the hub and the hub is trash. I would get a hub and be ready to use it, and if you don't need it, return it. My dealer was fine with this. The special subaru tools set all the depths automatically so all us backyard guys are on our own on this. Before pressing out the hub from the bearings, measure how far the end of the hub projects from the inner end of the inner race, and re-install the (new) hub to this depth. The outer race just gets pressed in all the way, until it is hard against the stop it rests against. When pressing in the hub it is critical to support the inner race of the inner bearing, and that all pressing force pass through that inner race. If I had a bad knuckle assembly with the bearing installed, I'd cut that sucker apart to see if those inner races truly are touching- that'd be good to know, and would be good to know. Dave

Mothballs are said to be effective in keeping the critters away. They do not eat the mothballs and are not poisoned by them. Using mothballs in this fashion may technically be illegal in some areas, but the hell with 'em. Safe and effective. Dave

Does the pedal vibrate like the ABS is kicking on when this happens? If you unplug a wheel sensor I wonder if the rest of the system will still function? If so you could disconnect them one at a time in sequence and when the problem stops, it's that wheel. Dave

</Gilda> Nevermind... <Gilda/> Dave

Drum rears should be self-adjusting enough so that you don't need to adjust the star wheel as grossgary describes. (rear disk with the little internal drum are not self adjusting). Most likely, you either never back up and come to a full stop with the brakes, the adjuster is sticking (and manually adjusting it may free it up) or the brakes are just about worn out. The auto adjust works when you roll backwards with the brakes on and come to a stop, either backing up or stopping on an uphill and getting that little bit of 'rollback'. Does the brake pedal seem to engage a bit low? That's a sign the rears are out of adjustment or worn out. Dave

I think you have to drive about 100 miles total, something like that. I found this: "Subaru recommends the following conditions and drive cycle to get the monitors on its vehicles completed in the shortest amount of time: 1. Make sure the fuel tank is between one-quarter and three-quarters full; half a tank is ideal. 2. Start the engine and immediately drive the vehicle for at least 15 minutes at a speed greater than 50 mph. During the warm up, try to avoid sudden acceleration, hard braking and/or lane changes. 3. Drive the vehicle at a steady 55 mph for three more minutes. During this stage of the drive cycle, it's crucial that you keep throttle angle changes to a minimum. 4. Bring the vehicle back to the shop, hook up the scan tool and look at the status of the readiness monitors. Repeat the drive cycle, if necessary." I've also seen that the coolant must be seen to warm up 20 degrees or so, and hit at least 150 degrees or such. Dave

If your brake hoses are in good shape, they make little clamps to put on small hoses to squeeze them shut. Great for keeping the brake system from draining in an uncontrolled fashion when replacing calipers, etc. You could put one of these on each wheels brake hose in succession, then when the shaking stops, you've clamped off the culprit. I have used these before (as well as needle-nose vice-grips with fuel line over the teeth) and never had a problem, but you could theoretically permanently crimp the hose or knock a chunk loose in the hose. Dave

Do they still make split boots? I installed several of these with good luck years ago, even the outers seemed to hold up fairly well with careful install technique. Yes, you can't clean it as well, but if you're just going to shove a new axle in there, you may as well get as much use out of the old one as you can. Dave

If the engine is not revving up (as you say) then yes, it's not the trans. The 4eat (some of 'em) does have a delayed engagement issue where it revs freely for a bit in D before the car starts to move. Sounds like a classic too-lean condition, or maybe weak spark from bad plug wires or old plugs? It may have a stored code stored even if the CE light isn't on, if you can get it to autozone etc. you can get the codes read (if any). Easy to check is look/listen for vacuum leaks. Dave

Either one could be the one that filters down to a smaller size, the fuzz wouldn't really make a difference to that. The fuzzy one might clog less for a given amount of filtered crud, though. Dave

Depends where you drive, and what you normally do. No FWD car could do what I do in the snow, and where I am in CNY snow capability can be important when you have a 50 mile commute (well, if you want to get home at better than 15mph, anyway). The additional capabilities the AWD gives me are invaluable. Dave

Tire rack will shave new tires ordered throudh them. Dave

As far as a bit of quick research can tell, if you had no problems/noises while shifting or taking off, it's still good. One telltale of a problem is a squeek during shifting. I would imagine the shop can tell you if it's broken at the moment, or not, but I can understand them being reluctant about guessing how much longer it will last. I'd do a bit of searching here and elsewhere (other subie forums) to see if this gets mentioned- if not, it's probably good for the life of the engine, if not abused. Some talk about it here: http://www.rjes.com/html/flywheel_types.html " There are four basic types of flywheels used on Subaru engines from 1990 to now. There are then multiple different interchangeable flywheels within some of the three types. Fortunately they are all interchangeable, in terms of bolting to the same design of crank flange, whether naturally aspirated or turbo, four or six cylinder, manual or automatic transmission. All standard Subaru flywheels are cast iron, with a shrink fitted steel ring gear. Steel and steel faced aluminium flywheels are available from aftermarket specialists. Naturally Aspirated Flywheels Most naturally aspirated Subaru’s have a conventional single mass flywheel. The exception is the MY00 - MY01 models which have dual mass flywheels (see below). ... " Dave

Are you getting all 3 O2 sensors? http://www.subarupartsforyou.com/cp_partlistbymod.php?model=Outback&subcat=Engine+Parts%2C+Sensor+O2&year=2001 shows 2 front sensors (C,D) PN 22641AA03C and one rear sensor (F) 22690AA45C (the number you give) Dave

If the car shook at all I'd call it a balance problem, and I will get the wheels balanced, but I haven't seen this before. The steering wheel it moving back and forth at about the right cadence for it to be a balance problem, but the dash, shifter, body wherever I can reach it has no vibration at all. The steering wheel doesn't have any up-down vibration at all, just a quick rotational vibration. Is that just how an out-of-balance wheel or two shows up on these subies? There are so many other things that are 'just a little different' on these cars, figured I'd ask. When I get a chance I'll get 'em balanced, rotate the tires if need be, maybe I'll have to (finally) buy a dial indicator... Dave