homebrewz

Thanks. At this point I'm wondering if its the motor getting weak and not being able to retract the sunroof. I also took apart the passenger door yesterday to lubricate the window track and it didn't make a difference in performance. The window motors on these vehicles seem to get weak with age and then stop working.

It's getting hung up when the glass dips down to be retracted into the roof. The glass seemed to want to move slightly so I loosened the nuts and gently pushed it. I was able to open the sunroof completely, but it still gets hung up at that point when it reopens. I was hoping it was just an alignment problem, but perhaps the motor is too weak to fully retract the glass? I've read where someone replaced the motor brushes and got it working again.

I have a 2003 Forester XS and the sunroof will not open. I removed the glass and with the glass off, the mechanism works with no problem. However, with the glass installed the sunroof will only open about half an inch. I think there might something obstructing the glass at the back end, closest to the rear of the car, but I can't figure out what it could be. The sunroof was stuck partly open last time it worked and I had to gently coax it back into position and since then it won't open. I'm wondering if this is a common problem with a simple fix, or perhaps the electric motor is worn out to the point where it won't move the glass.

I have a 2003 Forester XS with 217,000 miles and a misfire code for cylinder #3 (P0303). The plugs were replaced with NGK's 7500 miles ago and the wires about 17000 miles ago with NAPA lifetime made by Belden. After looking for obvious problems (loose wires, shorts), I replaced the coil pack with a used one from a '04 Forester. The junkyard just said that the engine ran well that it came out of. When I switched out the packs, it ran better, but its still skipping occasionally and throwing the same code. I also have a small evap leak (P0442), but I doubt that's related. I decided to check the wires with a timing light. FWIW, these are the results: Original Coil: #1 Fast light, occasional skip; #2 Slow and intermitted light; #3 slow and intermittent light; #4 fast light, no skip. Junkyard Coil: #1 Fast light, occasional skip; #2 Slow and steady light, occasional skip; #3 Fast light, occasional skip; #4 Fast light, no skip. I'm wondering if I got a second bad coil pack. Also, is there any protocol for bench testing the coil pack?

It's all back together now and running great, thanks everyone for all of the help! I must have observed the rotation of the cams wrong, because of course one full revolution will provide intake and exhaust strokes. What led me here in the first place was the blockage in the cylinder. I thought I had something messed up, but I think it was just a piece of carbon from the valves or some speck of something. A little penetrating oil took care of it. While everything was apart, I replaced all of the front seals and resealed the oil pump. The crank timing sprocket was difficult to get off.. had to tap the two holes in the sprocket and use a gear puller and lots of penetrating oil. Probably the first person to do the timing belt didn't tighten the crank pulley down enough because the front half of the slot in the pulley and the crank had been messed up, and the woodruff key had broken in half. The previous owner said a shop didn't replace the front seal because of a "curved piece of metal" in the way. I knew something with the woodruff key was messed up. Anyway, it's all back together correctly this time. Thanks again.

So it's not possible to have one cam out of phase with the other? I noticed one full cam revolution seemed to be intake and the next one was exhaust. I figured I'd need to take the other valve cover off and see where they are so I don't have both cams in intake or exhaust at the same time. Sorry to still be stuck on this. Thanks for your patience and assistance. I just want to put it back together correctly. I will do some more research into timing and hopefully get it back together tonight.

I'm wondering about the timing between the two cams though. With all of the marks lined up for the timing belt install, can't one of the cams still need another 360 revolution? Should one cam be on the intake when the other is on the exhaust?

I took the driver side valve cover off and rotated the cam a few times. Everything seemed normal. The tops of the valves appear to be in contact with the rockers and the springs seem to be in place. I rotated the crank again and still only a 1/4 turn before getting hung up on something. Not knowing what to do next, I sprayed some PB Blaster into #4.. just three quick sprays. I rotated the crank, and it went around two full revolutions without getting hung up! I guess some surface rust had formed just from sitting for a few days. Weird though, as I only pulled the plugs after this had happened. I really hope a piece of a ring isn't caught in there, but the penetrating oil seemed to clear it right up. I guess I can line up the timing marks again and try for reassembly? I also observed the valves on the driver side cam while I was rotating it. One 360 rotation seemed to be for the intake stroke, and the next for the exhaust stroke. I can get all the timing marks lined up of course, but how do I know which stroke both cams should be on?

Everything was lined up correctly and I've only rotated it by hand. This happened after I had the belt installed and I thought I had slipped the crank pulley a bit from tightening the cam bolt, and realizing my error, I tried to rotate the engine to see if everything was still lined up. I got through 1 to 2 revolutions of the crank before things got hung up. I tried to rotate backwards to get things alined again where I could take the belt off and start over. Thanks to ccrinc, I know I shouldn't have done that now. When I realized it was hung up somewhere, I did put some firm pressure on the ratchet just to make sure it wasn't compression, but I didn't ram into it and don't think I could have bent a valve. Though I suppose that is a possibility. The only thing I can think of is that by rotating the engine backwards with the belt still on, I messed up something on a valve and now it's stuck open enough where I can't get a full crank rotation. I will take the valve cover off and see if I can see anything.

Manual. No, I knew someone would ask that . I use a chain wrench on the crank pulley to get the bolt on and off.

It was lined up according to the timing mark on the nubs on the back. Though, I set the cams as Fairtax suggested and I should be able to rotate the crank all the way around and it's getting stuck with the back timing mark at 90 degrees. Is it possible I've got a valve stuck open on #4? Kind of at a loss as to what to do now.

OK, I put the passenger side cam notch up, driver side cam notch down. I still can't turn the crank more than a 1/4 turn CW. It's still hitting something. I have had all of the timing marks lined up and have the same problem with the belt on. I listened for the sound in each cylinder using some rubber tubing. It's coming from #4, which is the driver side rear cylinder. It seems odd, but the cam that I think slipped a few teeth with the belt on was the passenger side cam. I only took the plugs out after this problem, so nothing could have fallen into the plug hole.

Thanks for the reply. The crank is already at the proper mark, but I can only move it a 1/4 turn before it gets hung up. I will give that a try with the cams tomorrow morning and see if I can turn the crank a full turn. I can get all the marks lined up, timing marks on cams and crank pointing straight up, it's just this rotation problem with the crank. Something is not right and out of sync. The belt doesn't appear damaged, but if I can get this fixed, should I replace the belt? It's a brand new Gates.

Hello everyone. I have a '97 Outback Sport with the stock EJ22. I was replacing the timing belt and the front oil seals. I had everything back together, and had rotated the engine forward several times with no trouble. I decided to use the belt tension to torque the cam nuts, and when doing the passenger side one, I think the cam slipped forward a few teeth on the belt. Sure enough, I rotated the engine again and somewhere after one or two revolutions of the crank, I hit a blockage and it wouldn't turn any further. I rotated it backwards (counter-clockwise) to try and get it back to zero and I found it was blocked after a certain point too. I pulled the timing belt and zeroed everything only to put it back together and find I can't tun the crank more than a quarter turn clockwise and it won't turn more than a half-turn counter-clockwise. I pulled all the plugs and that didn't change anything. I just took the belt off again, and zeroed everything. Without the belt on, the crank won't turn freely more than a 1/4 turn and a 1/2 turn in those directions. The cams turn freely, but advance forward on their own quite a bit when turing, possibly from the lobes? At no point has the car been started since I took everything apart. All of the turning has been done by hand with a ratchet. Any ideas what could be wrong? The crank is physically blocked by something. Is this thing hopelessly screwed up? At this point I'm considering towing it to a shop, but I don't want to spend a lot of money to be told I need a new engine.

Hello, I was looking at a 95 legacy wagon recently, 5spd. It had all the quirks you would expect with a car that old and about 140kmi. However, when driving, the transmission sounded pretty much like an old 79 Jeep pickup I used to drive with a 4spd. Just sort of loud and truck-like. Also, when in certain gears, especially 2nd, if I moved the shifter the noise would change a bit.. kind of like something was tired and worn out, but I don't know enough about transmissions to know what. Now, I would have bought this car if it wasn't for the noise. When I asked about it, he said his wife jammed it into gear once when it wouldn't go into gear and its made that noise ever since. The owner thought there may be a chipped tooth on the main wheel. Theye replaced the clutch maybe around 100k... kind of early for a clutch. Maybe they were hoping to noise would go away... My question(s) are: Is this somewhat normal for an older Subaru transmission? I had an '83 sedan for a while and I remember having a hard time shifting sometimes. If I pick up this car, would I probably be looking at a transmission replacement later (or sooner) or would I just have to live with the noise? Thanks very much! Bernie N. (New to this board.. thanks in advance!)