lostinthe202

Nah, disassembling a roller bearing would be a challenge.

The OD I can see on a centerless or cylindrical grinder, not much of a problem there. I'm having trouble picturing how you'd do the ID without taking the bearing apart, but then the world of grinding isn't really my forte. I've mostly just used surface and blanchard grinders

This is intriguing, you mean you've had off the shelf bearings ground to a different size? Who did you use? I'd love to see the setups for that. I'm a machinist by trade, but my experience with grinding is limited to typical machinist needs, pedestal grinders, surface grinders, Blanchard grinders, etc. I'm having trouble picturing how one would grind the OD or the ID of a bearing with disassembling it. Maybe that's exactly what they do?

Yeah, I don't know enough about the setup. I was thinking, that the bearing sandwich would be replaced by a chromoly ring that the belt would ride on, that had a bearing bronze sleeve pressed in to ride on a shoulder bolt with whatever width bearing bronze spacer necessary to put the pulley in the right place so the belt tracks right. The shoulder bolt's head flange would want to not be any larger than the bronze sleeve so it doesn't contact the chromoly. The spacer and the shoulder bolt would be the tight-tolerance items as they would establish position. Well the bore too obviously, but that's easy, either boring it or a reamer of the right size. Buuut, all that said, is it actually cost effective? And how many engine hours that setup would last, no idea, but nowhere near a proper bearing set. Of course THAT said, if it sees light use and the point is just to keep it on the road without spending $700 or whatever on a timing kit just to get those bearings. Could be a fun project.

This is true, but I doubt the rpm ist a problem, it's called bearing bronze for a reason, and it's used in electric motors and other stuff, though not sure. But you're right on the side loading. That's something I forgot about in relation to the bearing setup in question. The last bronze pilot bearing I changed in this '94 Nissan pickup I had that had a vibration at certain speeds and I had convinced myself that the pilot bearing was shot, pulled the trans and it had the bearing bronze style and sure enough it looked beat to poo, I pressed it out and replaced, put everything back together, vibration still there, made absolutely no difference, ha. Live and learn. Anyway, the point is that a bronze pilot bearing can get malformed and still do it's job just fine because even though malformed, the lubricity of the material was still there, and the input shaft/trans setup can take up a bit of slack, but the timing pulleys, I wouldn't think, would have the same forgiveness I'm a little rusty on my Subaru engine lore, they didn't make an interference engine before the 96+ 2.5 dual cam right? Or to put it another way, any stock engine for an XT6 wouldn't be interference, so in theory if Gary wanted to give it a shot, if it went south the worst that happens is he's trying to call for a tow truck at 3:00am in a blizzard while being chased by bears and malevolent clowns juggling chain saws , right?

Hey Gary, If that doesn't work out, Rick's suggestion of an oilite bronze replacement would be easy for me to whip up if you want to try it out. I don't really have any clue what the bearing in question looks like, but bronze plain bearings are used all the time for pilot bearings in standard trans of various makes, so might be they'd do just fine. But that said, a trans input shaft hardly needs to stay as rotationally true as a camshaft, so who knows. If you feel like shipping the old bearing to me, I can make one and you can guinea pig your engine Will- Edit, Rick sent me a pic of the bearings in question. Bearing bronze might work, but it's expensive, could maybe still be cost effective if say just make a bronze sleeve pressed into a 4140 (chromoly) steel ring, still not hard to make. Let me know, Gary, if you want to talk it over.

Ah, gotcha

I don't know what a speedy sleeve is, a shim basically right? But any kind of shim is going to require material to be removed from either the cam or the sea so that the same geometry is maintained, right? Or am I not understanding how that works?

I don't know the numbers for the diff backlash, but there def is some. If you're gauging the backlash by how much the tire rotates, remember that the rotation of the axle at the axle's diameter of something like 1.25" inches and the tire at something like like 24" is going to look dramatically different. Watch an analog clock that has a second hand. The tip shows much more movement than a point on the hand close to the hub. Add to that motion that when you rotate the tire, you're not only taking up the backlash for the side you're rotating, but also the backlash for the tire on the other side of the diff. Do you have access to another vehicle? Jack that one up and do the same thing, bet you see the same motion.

This thread is three years old, dude

Don't forget to use a cutting fluid when tapping those holes. If you have a good hardware nearby, they'll have something. If not, just search online for "tapping fluid" just about anything that comes up will work fine. Once you have the pieces apart, if you can see the broken pieces of the woodruff key, try knocking them out with a flathead screwdriver you don't care about. If you're feeling brave, WD40 will do in a pinch, just make sure you're using a new tap

You know, I never thought about replacing the cup holder. I have the same problem in my '00 wagon. My coffee cup fits in the console cup holder, but it means I'm wresting my arm on the top of it when I'm shifting (5mt) so i get lint and other crap in the lid. Cup didn't fit the one on the dash so I widened it out with an 80 grit flap wheel on my die grinder. Not the most elegant solution, but it was effective and didn't take long. Had the nozzle of my shop vac right below it so the dust cleanup was pretty minimal.

Maybe put it on four jack stands, run it in gear and listen with a stethoscope (or a long screwdriver with your ear to the handle) to both the center dif and the front dif areas, see which is noisier?

I figured cast Al, but surely not solid on the inside, probably a lattice work of some sort? Is there a weld seam visible?

Aluminum alloys have the advantage of having a lot of flex, meaning it can be bent further than steel can and spring back to it's original dimensions . I don't doubt that Al replacements are a thing, with the right geometry, Al would do nicely. Just curious what that geometry is. The auto industry is hard pressed to meet MPG standards, so lightening the vehicle weight has got to be part of that equation

Wow, I would never have thought aluminum would be a choice for suspension parts. I know Al alloys are up to it, 7075 aircraft aluminum, other alloys I've probably never heard of. But aluminum is much cheaper than it used to be, I guess the industry hit the tipping point? Edit: Greasemonkey03: I don't suppose you got a view of the internal structure, like how thick the wall of the structure is? how do they weigh in comparison?

Update: Well, I guess it was a sticky thermostat after all as I haven't had any trouble since i replaced it. That said, I haven't really been on any continuous multi hour drives. Farthest I've been so far is about an hour of run time with a four hour break in between, so jury's still out, but I'm cautiously optimistic. Seems like every time I've had cooling trouble in the past, the thermostat is always the first suspect, and the first cleared of all charges. Maybe this time he actually did it. Thanks for the brain lube everybody!

As a machinist, I've never heard of solid titanium drill bits, Titanium is not suited to that kind of work, and, yeah, the price, yikes. That said, Ti-Ni coating is definitely a thing. But like the old saying, "you get what you pay for." Buy cheap, get cheap. Also, cobalt drills are legit, again if you pay for quality. You're right that all HSS tools have a cobalt percentage, but what a "cobalt" drill refers to is that they have a higher percentage. They do better than your typical HSS in hard stuff, chromoly, tool steels, etc. I could see not noticing a difference in aluminum, wood, other softer stuff. Here's some good info on it, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-speed_steel#Cobalt_High_Speed_Steels_.28HSS.29 That handheld induction heater you linked to is amazing! I've seen induction heaters, but never in a handheld form, just bench top coils that heat an envelope of a given size Bingo, gotta have the motion lotion. WD-40 is an OK solution for aluminum, but apply frequently. McMaster-Carr.com MSCdirect.com Both good sources for all things nuts and bolts and fluids

Makes you wonder if the engineer was just too lazy to change the defaults in whatever CAD software they were using, or, I suppose, more likely the engineer was following the SAE/ISO rule book without thinking about working on the vehicle in practice. The best engineers are the ones that have actually had to work with their hands

I can't offer first hand experience either, but I'm with you, the thin plastic ends of the cheapo rads are BS, i've had those crack off on me as well. It's bothered me for a long time that all rads have an AL tank and plastic ends, I bet you couldn't even find a brass one no matter how much you were willing to pay. I agree that having the aluminum inlet/outlet is preferable, and LOVE that it has a drain plug, something my cheapo rad in my '00 Legacy doesn't have, grr. It even comes with a cap, something that current rads never come with it seems. A couple of red flags, for me anyway, is that their mumbo jumbo implies that this is US made and they are trying really hard to make you think that, with all the red, white, and blue, and the "ships from NJ." Only their mumbo jumbo is clearly written by someone who speaks, or types, English as a second language. I'm not saying this means the product is bad, just I don't like being misled. Might try sending them a message with a question about the product, like what aluminum alloy they use, see how quickly they respond and how well they answer your question. Let us know if you get it and how you like it

McGyver is thinking, "have I taught them nothing?" Yeah, it can be hard to get into, but you can get a good starter kit from home depot for about $150, though GreaseMonkey03 has a totally valid point. Another way I've approached tackling things I don't know how to do, barter with someone who does with something I know how to do that they don't. I've had a lot of success in the past with this approach.

Just be aware that it doesn't always work out. I tore into a '96 outback's 5spd to change a bad bearing going off of a great writeup I found on this board, didn't know what I was doing, didn't know if it would work. It did, but the moral of the story is, only venture down that road if you're prepared for it to not work out. For me, I love knowing how the world works. Even if I fail at what I attempted, I know more about it than if I hadn't done anything. But back to biz, If you have the tools to rebuild a trans, you probably have the tools to instal one. Why not get a used trans, put it in, then put the old one on the bench, drag your kids away from their devices and learn how to rebuild it together? That way, when they are of driving age, they will be able to change their own oil, change their own brakes, ya know, just generally know how to do things for themselves. Ha, now I'm getting preachy, sorry.

When tightening the clamps, make sure nobody has replaced the original kind that don't have serrations with a worm drive hose clamp. the worm drive ones can crack the lines if overtightened

If the mechanics all agree that you've got some time, you could source a unit from one of the places suggested above, have it rebuilt, then put it in once the old one breaks, this spreads out the cost, though any kind of warranty you get won't be worth anything while it's sitting in your garage waiting for install.

"Time cut to this week, where there's suddenly a weird choking shimmy while turning right and accelerating up hill. " Doesn't this also sound like torque bind? "He said there is a way to get at them without having to pull the differential, but it is difficult and about 20% of the time he's done it there is "gaulding" upon removal of the part of differential case that is the access point, in which case it's impossible to put back together and the whole housing would need to be replaced which would mean having to pull everything and could wind up being really expensive." I'm not sure how different the differential and it's bearings and their housing is from the 5spds which are the only ones I've worked on, but if it's like the manual, I don't see how this could be done successfully, but then I don't know everything, by a stretch. But the auto could easily be different. Here's a breakdown of the workings of the diff, not much help for the questions you asked since you can't see what kind of access you have to the workings after taking out the bit that adjusts the backlash This link includes the part numbers of the parts in question. I think Subaru uses Timken bearings, at least for several model years. But regardless, if you can manage to find the trade number, the industry standard number for those bearings, you can order them from Granger for a lesser price, same bearing just not marked up as being a different bearing sold by Subaru, something that mechanic probably knows. http://opposedforces.com/parts/legacy/us_b12/type_21/train/differential_transmission/ "(Apparently nobody sells just the differential case separate of the transmission.)" This is because the front diff is integrated into the transmission, so there is no separate case to sell.