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I have absolutely no idea why they put SOHC heads on the 2.2t. The turbo heads have smaller valves than the n/a heads!! But if you swap some 2.5 DOHC heads on there ...

The only 2.0 we got here was in the wrx. We never got a n/a 2.0. Also we don't have nearly as many turbo cars as you guys do down there. The legacy SS and touring wagon were 90-94, then we had a n/a wasteland all the way till 02 when the wrx came out. Still didn't gen another turbo legacy till 05, and those have issues. Whereas you had turbos in pretty much every single model of car, so there's gotta be a lot more turbo parts floating around. 2.2 and 2.5 are pretty much the only n/a engines offered here. There was a 1.8 in the mid 90's, but not a whole lot of them. They're getting kinda hard to find.

Probably because that's not the proper way to adjust idle, have you removed and cleaned the IACV? But what is the code for?

You should have the engine out no problem. The clutch R&R only took me about three hours, not much really to it.

My god is that car beautiful! Jealous as hell.

Pulling an EA is stupidly easy. My clutch failed 1200 miles from home. This is how I got it done. I had a come-along and some basic tools. Nothing fancy.

How are the bushings at the front of the trailing arm and and control arm where they bolt to the cross tube? I had the same problem on mine, and it turned out those bushings were completely dicked. After fixing that my camber was back on target. Also, at least on my car, there's a surprising amount of adjustment in those 3 annoying bolts on the trailing arm thingy. Anyone know the subaru part number on the block of wood in step 5? LOL

I wasn't gonna argue about that, but yea. An outback should be what you said.

Oh really? Huh. I didn't know such a thing existed. I thought it was a unique invention. Heh. Mine only cost a couple bucks because I had most of the bits in the scrap metal pile.

There is one trick I figured out in desperation changing a balljoint on the side of the road. Pull the dust boot off. And get a big pipe/monkey wrench. You can grab the balljoint shell just around the collar that sticks out from the bottom of the knuckle. Twist the piss out of it, and MOST of the time that'll snap it free and it'll just come out. This also works when you have a knuckle on the bench, you can do it in a vice. If you have a spanner wrench or chisel, etc you can CAREFULLY and VERY SLIGHTLY open the crack in the knuckle. Like 1thou, or you'll break it. But that's often enough to get a bit of PB blaster in there. This is probably not recommended. Another thing I've done is use a saw or thin cutting disc and cut the balljoint shell open between the slit in the knuckle (you know where the pinch bolt goes through). Now you can shove a screwdriver or punch or whatever and bend the casing a bit, this can help break up the rust and then you can twist it out. The thing I usually try first is a bigass prybar between the control arm and bottom of the knuckle. A lot of the time this will break it free. I did however break 2 ribs doing this when the prybar slipped out and I landed down on the front bumper of my GL.... Oh I almost forgot. I have a tool I made. It was a steel sleeve that was just bigger than the OD of the balljoint that sat down against the knuckle. It had a screw with a coupling that attached to the threads on the balljoint. And I had a hex head made to the top of the threaded rod. Hold it still while tightening a locknut and it would just suck the thing straight out. That worked fairly well most of the time. Sadly I have no pics of the tool, and it's in storage.

I honestly don't understand the whole thing with tightening before even trying to loosen. If you're gonna go back and forth with it, at least start off going the right way. I have had the pinch bolts with no heads left when I worked in the shop. I just welded a nut to it, heated it good and hot with the oxy/ace, and it came out. I hate getting ball joints out. Almost every time it turns into an ordeal, and flat rate doesn't account for things like using a die grinder to get the balljoint shell out of the knuckle after the whole assembly falls apart....

The bolt won't break if you don't hamfist it. It's that simple.

There's really honestly no reason to ever break the pinch bolt off. Soaking it for a few days with PB helps, but that's not always an option. I heat it good and hot (I don't have oxy/ace, just mapp gas), douse it with PB, heat it some more. And wrench on it CAREFULLY!!!! Don't go BAP BAP BAP BAP with the gun, go at it CAREFULLY by hand. If it's not coming with low to moderate force. Heat it more, PB blast it more, etc. Heat breaks rust bonds, cooling it with the oil draws the oil in lubricating things. This makes it come out easier, not gall the threads, and to break off. Breaking fasteners off on a whole can be avoided almost all of the time by patience and heat. Breaking the pinch bolt is just plain stupid and can be avoided by being careful.

It's looking a bit low on blinker (corner light) fluid.

A r160 is a r160. They have the same casting throughout the ages. The internals have changed in terms of axle splines, etc. But they'll all bolt up just the same.

99 legacy 2.2 would be a phase2 as you stated. You can tell it's an ej22 because it's stamped into the block under the alternator. You can tell it's a phase2 because the spark plugs go through the valve covers, as opposed to the funky shaped valve covers on a phase1. It will swap into any 99-04 car that came with either a 2.2 or a 2.5 sohc if you put the right intake manifold and cam/crank gears on it. Phase2 land is fairly plug and play lego game.

Yea, I get that. But I don't have a colour code chart in my head. If it's like blue or silver or green you'll probably find one in a junkyard. White seems to be a bit less common, and good luck with red.

Why don't you just go to a junkyard and get another hood that's the right colour? There are tons of junkyards in mass. Some colours are more common than others. I have no idea what 22g means.

Yea, you can pull the driver's side timing cover cap. It's 3 10mm head bolts and it comes off. Good luck getting them out if they've never been off before.... It helps to also remove the coolant overflow bottle. Two more 10mm heads, pull the hose off, and it just pops out.

Why is it a very small risk? For all you know it's dry rotted and cracked right now. And yes, it is an interference engine. A timing belt breaking is the cost of head gaskets, plus the cost of a timing job, plus the cost of rebuilding the heads. It's up to you. But you should know the facts here.

Throw in a bottle of the subaru coolant stop leak conditioner stuff. Keep an eye on the coolant level. It'll be fine for quite a long time if you don't run it low. Do have the timing belt, idlers, and pump done, though. They've probably never been done. At this point the belt is getting old and probably cracked. If that goes, you have a very expensive bill on your hands. Subaru, or anyone for that matter will probably put headgaskets in it that are listed for that engine. Which is the same part that failed on you. You can use the STi headgasket that's a MLS gasket vs the steel gasket coated in spoob.

If you're spending hours searching, you're doing it wrong. It takes me maybe 5 minutes.

My only issue with electric impacts is that they're GIGANTIC. They don't fit in a lot of places my 1/2" pneumatic does. The one bestestest air tool, though is the right angle air ratchet. That thing kicks so much butt on hard to access fasteners. Break it free with a wrench, but then stick the right angle down there and just zip it out. Sure beats the hell out of getting 1/8 of a turn at a time on a ratchet.

If a lug nut has been on over the whole winter, I don't care if you torqued it to 75ft/lbs or 300, it's gonna be on there good and wicked tight. An impacting that's barely pushing 300 may or may not zip that loose. I really like my craftsman 1/2 impact. It's not very heavy and it pushes something ridiculous like 650 ft/lbs. It'll zip off axle nuts, suspension parts, lug nuts, whatever. It's really sucky to get a car jacked up only to find out your impact doesn't have the balls to pull a lug nut or axle nut, then having to jack it down again. The 1/2 solved that for me. Putting lugs back on I zip them on with low torque. Usually gets to about 30-50 ft/lbs. Then I drop the car and use a torque wrench for the final torque.

Great post, this should be moved to the USRM.