WoodsWagon

Why does it need towing? Can it be towed on a dolly with the rear driveshaft unhooked, or does it have to be on a trailer?

Yeah, there's a bunch of gas below empty, at least another gallon below empty on the gauge to where the low fuel light comes on, and then another couple gallons before the pump starts sucking air. I drove my dad's legacy 50 miles after the low fuel light came on and it still had enough gas to keep running. I was trying to run it out because it had a rust hole in the tank that I needed it empty to fix, so I was driving it around with a 2 gallon can of gas in the back for when it ran out. Always calculate MPG based on gallons to full. Fill the tank, reset the odometer, and check it when you fill it again. It doesn't cost more to keep a tank between half and full than keeping a tank between empty and half. Do a search for "vibrate gear" using the search this forum tool in the upper right of the window. and a bunch of threads will come up, including one from me asking about the same issue with my mom's Outback. I never bothered to do anything about it, and years later it's still going fine. If it annoys her at a long stoplight, she clicks it into neutral and the vibration disappears.

Ask them if they have an inductive heater for loosening rusted nuts. It uses a high powered magnetic field to warm up the steel in the nut. Here's a demo video of the tool: http://www.theinductor.com/index.php?m=41 Then they can use an impact driver to get the nuts loose.

If everyone responded to long dead threads just to put the right answer in them in case someone else might search for it later, the board would be clogged with random threads that no one still active was involved with or cared about the answer. That's why it's always better to add to a current thread or start a new one, anything else just adds confusion. That's why necro-bumping is considered a sin and an annoyance.

That may be normal actually. When idling in gear with the brakes on, a lot of subarus will vibrate the whole car. If you click it into neutral, the vibration goes away. The problem is actually the CV joints in the front axles. If they are worn, or if they are aftermarket axles, they end up hammering back and forth because they are held by the brakes on one end and being pulsed with power from the idleing engine at the other. It's a wierd phenomenon thats due to the low-stall torque converter that subaru uses. The low-stall torque converter is still hydraulicly coupled at idle, so it puts more of the engine power pulses into the transmission than a higher stall torque converter would. Those pulses go through the transmission and act on the front axles. I know it sounds thoroughly crackpot, but that's the way it is. Replacing the axles with MWE ones or good subaru ones makes the problem go away. The P0420 is probably 02 sensors. If not, there is a cheap trick to fool the rear O2 sensor into reading like the cat is working by using a drilled out spark plug anti-fouler to space it out of the exhaust stream. It's a federal crime to modify an emissions system, but $5 is a lot more affordable than $$$ for a new cat.

That's the rear cat, not the front cat. There's a flange and bolt connection between the broken piece of pipe and the front cat. If you could use a coat hanger or something to tie the cat up to the body, you could drive it to an exhaust shop. The rest of the cat really isn't too rusty, most of the ones around here have replacement split flanges bolted on for both sides of the springloaded joint just behind that cat because the factory flanges rusted off. That one still looks in reasonable condition. I'd get a muffler shop to weld the cat back on. Take a look inside the cat to see if you smashed the ceramic honeycomb inside by letting it bounce off the road. If it's smashed, get a new cat, spring bolts, and gaskets. If it's not cracked, have a shop weld it back on.

If you rip all the insulation off the back of the carpet, you can toss the carpet back in and be fine. No carpet is noisy and cold, and you end up breaking the antenna wire with your feet.

The bumper bolts come from inside the engine bay as 2.7 turbo said. Two are under the overhang of the battery tray. They go in sideways, and are a pain to take out because the wiring harness runs right in front of them and radiator is in the way as well as the A/C lines. A flex head ratchet helps as does different depth sockets and extensions and a ratcheting wrench. Do not try to undo the nuts on the bumper bracket that you can see if you pull the fender liner out, they are welded to the bumper bracket. If you get another bumper, try for a 85-86 mayby 87 bumper. They are much shorter because they don't have the 5mph impact rated foam block in between the bumper and the plastic skin. That makes the turn signals flush with the face of the bumper so they show much better, and it takes away the fat lip look. Get the new parts, take the old parts off, and test fit the new ones. Do some hammering to straighten things out enough for the new parts to bolt on. That hit doesn't look hard enough to need professional body work.

Clean out the idle air control motor with carb cleaner. You may have to take it off the intake manifold so you can really get in there and blast all the gick out. Make sure the valve in it can move freely.

Hocrest, I'm going to try and not be an rump roast about this, but this was a foolish necro-bump. This thread was me asking about an engine, and not caring about the transmission, but hoping the bellhousing was the same. The answer to that question is yes, the 8 bolt bellhousing is the same 4cyl or 6cyl, and is reverse compatible with the 4 bolt bellhousing. Your link is helpful for people trying to match ratios with trans codes, and would have made much more sense in a thread asking about auto trans swaps. That engine is still sitting where it lay because I wasn't going to pay $750 for an unknown condition engine with no wiring harness, and he wasn't willing to come down on the price. It still tempts me.

That gas tank is about normal for the 95-99's around here, they're all like that so you can't hold out for a different car expecting it to be better. New England teaches you how to deal with rust, because it destroys all cars more than 5 years old. When you have to regularly use a torch to work on cars in a dealership, you know the salt is evil. The fuel pump mount ring is usually fine if you're careful not to snap the studs off when getting those nuts out. Heat, a good 6 point socket, and an impact driver usually get them loose. There's a whole skillset for the task of taking apart terminally rusted parts without "inevitably" breaking them, you just have to be patient and know the limits of force you can put on a corroded part. Dropping the tank is hell because all the bolts that hold in the subframe and rear diff are rusty and liable to break the captured nuts loose in the body. You don't drop the tank if you can help it. And if you do drop it, you better put in a new one and all the metal fuel and evap pipes and brake lines above and hidden behind it because they will all crumble. The tanks usually rot through where the rubber hoses from the fuel filler neck and the vent hook to it right next to the fuel pump sender. You get evap codes and a leak when you fill the tank up. Again, all of them are this way, and that's why the 95-99's are common in the junkyards right now. Earlier ones are non-existant. Did subaru ever switch to plastic tanks on the newer ones? That would be a huge improvement.

The metal pipe coming out of the sending unit is rusted through, it's unlikely to be the hose. You also don't want to yank too much on that hose, it's hooked to a rusty pipe that runs across over the tank to the other side. You need to get those nuts off the studs on the tank without snapping the studs or stripping the nuts, then put a new/bettter sending unit in. Those are the nuts I've had to use a torch on. I wouldn't recommend it, but it was a last ditch effort to save the tank. They can be a huge pain in the rump roast. An inductive heater would be better, they make them where it has a coil on the end of the tool that you wrap around the nut, and it heats the nut up without flame or sparks.

The leads should have a year written in white on them, you might be suprised to find they are original. NGK leads work well and are about $50 online, shipping to NZ may be a problem though.

That's an oft-reported cautionary tale about auto transmissions. The reason it happens is the new fluid has a fresh detergent package in it, so it cleans all the grunge off the inside of the transmission. The filter catches all that dirt, clogs, the hydraulic pump starves, and the transmission starts slipping. You have to do filter changes with the fluid changes on cars that use media based filters. A flush just means hooking up to the cooler hoses and swapping out all the old fluid with new. It doesn't involve dropping the transmission pan to change the filter. Subarus use a fine mesh screen that doesn't clog in the pan, and some of the newer ones also have a spin on oil filter on the side that makes it easy to change. So you can change the fluid with wild abandon on a subaru and it won't hurt it, because it doesn't have a filter to clog. It's a 2000 legacy, so it should have the extra spin on oil filter. Change that at the same time the fluid is flushed and you should be good. It's also as easy to change the transmission fluid on these cars as it is to change the engine oil. There's a 17mm drain plug on the pan. Make sure the new oil goes in the right dipstick tube. The drivers side is ATF, the passenger side is 80/90 gear oil for the front diff. A lot of shops screw that up and trash the transmission by leaving one fluid empty and the other overfilled with the wrong oil. The delayed engagement is nothing to worry about, they will go for ages like that. The trans-X seems to help, so chuck a bottle of that in. Forester struts don't apply to 2000 and newer legacys, the rear switched to a multilink suspension design that's completely different.

Yes, it is full time 4x4 if it has the "diff lock" switch. That switch runs the solenoids that switch the vacuum to the big vacuum can on the side of the transmission. That also makes it a 3.7 final drive transmission, instead of the 3.9 final drive that your loyale has so you need to swap the rear diff too. It also means you need the 25 spline front axles instead of the 23 spline that the loyale has. You will get worse gas mileage because you are now a AWD car instead of a part time 4x4. You have power going through both differentials which creates heat and drag, rather than just the minor friction from an unloaded rear diff coasting along for the ride like the part time 4x4 normally is. It also will spin whichever wheel has the least traction, so it's a pitiful AWD with 3 open differentials. You can lock the center diff, but you might as well leave the pushbutton 4x4 in there at that point. The low range in the FT4wd's is also less of a low range than the part time 4x4 d/r's, and the final drive gives you even less gear reduction on top of that. The transmission is kind of a bundle of suck. Will it fit? Sure, buy why would you want to?

I'd get someone who can weld to patch it back together if they can. If it's too rusty, you'll have to just buy a new rear cat. The piece of pipe that broke off the cat is only about a foot long, and has a 3 bolt flange at the end of it.

XT turbo or non turbo? Does it have a big vacuum can on the side of the transmission with a cable running from it to a shift rail on the side of the trans?

A skid plate for the engine oil pan and the automatic transmission oil pan would be a good idea. Bashing those in on rocks can leave you stranded. Good tires is a must, and bigger ones are a good idea because of the increased ground clearance they give you. A full sized spare would be a good idea too, trying to drive back down a trail on the donut spare doesn't work so well. Your existing tires may have plenty of tread, but if they're car tires they don't have much strength. It's easy to tear a sidewall or puncture the tread. Going to a small light truck tire will help.

If it's leaking on top of the tank, and he says it's the pump, then it's the metal fuel lines that come out of the top of the passenger side sender. Easy to replace IF you can get the bolts that hold the sender into the tank out. They are tiny, rusty, and snap/strip easily. I have had to use a torch on them to get them out in the past. Not very fun using a oxy/acetylene torch to heat bolts up on a leaking gas tank. The gas tanks often rust through where the filler neck and vent hose nipples are welded to it, which is right next to the fuel pump sender. Tanks are dealer-only, expensive, and you have to drop the rear crossmember/differential/exhaust to get them out. Rusty trail of tears doing that job. If you flip the rear passenger seat back forward, you can pull up the rear floor behind it and there's an acess panel with phillips screws holding it on. Take that off and you'll see the fuel sender, and will be able to see where the gas is leaking from.

You want to keep the stock subaru axle if you can, all the aftermarket ones are crap. You can buy new boots to go on the axle, and I used a universal strechy boot on the last one I did that's worked well. The 2 piece glue/screw together boots don't work. This boot was meant to be stretched over the CV joint, then shrinks back to fit. I used 4 screwdrivers and silicone spray as lube and it worked great.

That metal piece is the dust shield attached to the axle, so it spins with the inner race. You just need wheel bearings, not a knuckle. Pull the knuckle off the car and take it to a shop to have them press the new bearings into it, then reassemble. The axle just pushes out of the hub once you have the nut off. Mark where your camber bolt on the strut is oriented with a chisel, so when you put it back together you don't have to get an alignment to set the camber.

Yup, a few have. They work, but they are not rated for the weight of a subaru and are not DOT certified so you can't nor would you want to run them on the street. Feel free to run them on a woods rig through.

Have you tried brake-torquing the auto trans from a stop? Left foot on the brake holding it stationary, right foot flooring the gas, the torque converter should flash to the stall speed and boost should start building. Sidestep the brake and keep it floored. Don't hold it like that for more than a couple seconds because you're dumping the full power of the engine into heating the transmission fluid. You'd be surprised at how quick they'll launch when you do that. With a good transmission cooler, it doesn't harm the transmission at all like dumping a clutch on a manual would. You can also wire up the 4x4 lock, fwd for smokeshows or AWD for normal driving switch. There's also people that have wired up paddle shifters for the 4eat and reprogrammed the TCU. They also do sell high stall torque converters for the 4eat: http://www.importperformancetrans.com/catalog/subaru-torque-converter/subaru-custom-high-stall-torque-converter--4eat-1721.html Put a good cooler on it and have fun with the auto trans. It's stronger than the 5mt by a good bit as long as you keep it cool and full of fluid.

Do you think you make have dropped any parts or tools into the bellhousing while you were working on it? They can jam between the flexplate and the block. The other option is the engine being hydrolocked, so pulling out the spark plugs might let it crank over.

It would help to know what subaru it was... If it's an EA82, then that sounds like a normal timing belt break. Take off the distributor cap and crank the motor. The rotor should turn as the motor cranks, if it doesn't the timing belt is broken. It's also pretty easy to pull off the drivers side timing belt cover to take a look to see if the belt is stripped.