WoodsWagon

Sounds a lot like the fuel pump, they will still idle pretty good, but as soon as you get on the accelerator it falls flat. T a pressure guage into the hose between the fuel filter and the engine.

The type of pads you use in the front brakes makes a huge difference too. The cheap $15 pads really don't cut it with oversized tires. I didn't realize that until I swapped in some used Wagner brake pads I had lying around and the brakes worked much better.

The condenser has no where to go forward, and the radiator needs to move up to there anyway. Just leave the compressor on the motor, unplug the clutch wire and hoses and don't worry about it. 6cyls sound cooler than 4cyls.

Sounds like a crack caused by letting water freeze in the cooling jackets from filling the radiator with water instead of coolant. Patching is the right way to go with that, the block is junk at that point so any extra use you get out of it is free miles. Loyales are carry overs from the 80's cars, and the engines and transmissions are EA series designs. In 89, subaru came out with the legacy, which has the EJ series engine and transmission, and there were a whole bunch of changes for the better. They kept selling the previous design loyale's until they replaced it with the impreza in 93. The loyales were obsolete at the time they were being sold, but were a low price alternative to the Legacy, so they filled that market niche until they could get the Impreza to market.

My mom's 98 outback is louder than a diesel, doesn't quiet down that much when warm, and has been that way for the last 50k miles. Don't worry about it, even if it's bad, it won't affect how it runs.

A 2000 legacy should respond well to a spark plug anti-fouler on the rear o2 sensor. I know of a lot of cars running with no cats, and no P0420 code because of the anti-fouler. The 16 bit ECU's aren't all that sophisticated about the monitors they run. You get a flat washer spark plug anti-fouler from the Help! section of your auto parts store, drill through one with a 1/2" bit, thread that into your exhaust, and then the sensor into it. There's a few different sizes, you want the larger one with the flat, not tapered, seat. If you stack them you will get a sensor slow response code. One is enough to pull the tip of the sensor back out of the exhaust stream, which slows down the sampling rate and smooths out the readings from the sensor. That makes the ECU think the cat is there and working. Oh yeah, it's a federal crime to tamper with the emissions equipment on your car. Just a FYI.

There's this thing called a time/date stamp, it's in the upper left hand corner of each post. By checking it you can help avoid bumping 4 year old threads back from the dead. $100k for "unspecified pain in left thumb" was the settlement. As far as parting the car out, I drove it for 2 more years after the accident, it was a fender bender and the car wasn't even close to totaled. I still have a bitter taste about this incident. Whatever, I guess that's how you work the "system"

If it's going in the lifted wagon in your avatar, you may not even notice the difference. The VLSD's are very soft in their application, and can't redirect a lot of torque to the wheel with traction. Don't get me wrong, it's an improvement over an open diff, but don't expect to be impressed. The clutch type out of an RX is much better offroad, but you need to regear them.

Here's my thread on the traction control line of thought: http://www.ultimatesubaru.org/forum/showthread.php?t=72962 95-96 FWD only legacys. If I found an actuator and a TCS computer, I'd be all over it. It would be fairly easy to wire in, and there's a link to the wiring diagrams in that thread too.

Cable setup works if you move the clutch release fork pivot ball to the other available spot inside the bellhousing and use all the cable clutch brackets, fork ect. Not an issue at all.

That's the right attitude for wheeling with these things. It's not a hardcore offroad rig, but damn if they don't go some interesting places for a econobox car. 25mpg on the street, and if you had a bad day at work, give it hell in the woods on the way home.

The head bolts end up right around 90ftlbs when you follow the tightening instructions. I did the degree turns using my digital torque wrench, and they all tighten about the same on the final quarter turn.

Cable vs non cable trans are the same, and I've got a stripped d/r case half here too that's the same style. The seal is pressed into a smooth bore, just like a crank or cam seal. The threaded portion is a bigger diameter bore, then it necks down to the bore that the seal presses into. The problem is accessing it through the narrow gap between the shaft and bore, and the fact that it's 3/4" down a hole in the side of the transmission, and you can't get a straight shot at it without pulling the transmission out of the car. It was really frusterating, one of the sparkplugs was seized in the head so I couldn't replace it, and this thing turned into a cluster************, and he had to drive it home with no speedo and three new spark plugs.

That's nice, I said I was "one of the few east coasters that owned a lifted wagon", not the only one to own a lifted subaru, ever. Going back through my posts, seems I lifted my wagon May of 05 with the lift I bought from PK. Put it through 4 years of hell before retiring it. I switched to a Toyota truck, which is not nearly as good in the woods as the subaru was. I don't even take this thing wheeling because it leads to getting really stuck, or dents in the body because I'm backing and filling in the trees to try and make it around a corner. Big downgrade from the subaru that I had in the woods all the time. So, my point, as rambling as it may be, Is that there's no reason to not look into new alternatives for improving the lifted subaru. They can be capable cars and work very well in varying terrain while being a heck of a lot of fun. They're not just a stepping stone to a rock buggy, if you can be content that you aren't going to make it everywhere. Buy a skidder if you need that. People being dismissive of ideas to improve them because "it doesn't fit the formula" is what pisses me off. Go out and try something, don't stand around and harp "it'll never work, no one would pay for that, they don't make one exactly for our application, don't bother modifying anything else to fit" pile of bulldung.

It's not threaded, it honestly looks like an oversized valve stem seal that you press in upside down over the speedo shaft. Like this; but coated in rubber instead of bare steel: There's not much space between the shaft and the bore, and the seal is pressed 3/8" down from the top of the shaft, so you can't really get down in there too well. The firewall also blocks straight access to it with anything longer than about 3 inches.

I'm one of the few east coasters that owned a lifted wagon. My wagon built it's own reputation around here, no one knew about the BYB's or the Hatch Patrol, there was no subaru crew to keep up with. Just me, the crazy bastard with the lifted station wagon using it to commute on the weekdays, kick rump roast on the trails on the weekends, and haul anything out that needed a tow. No one talked trash about the wagon because I was the only one who would come out into the middle of nowhere and pull their broken junk out. I know just as well as any of you how far you can push a subaru. I swapped axles, wheel bearings, differentials, transmissions, engines, everything. I have a huge hoard of parts because you can't find EA82's on the road or in the junkyards here. If I shredded a trans on saturday, i had a spare in it by sunday night so I could drive to work monday morning. I put so much stress on the strut rod mounting points that the firewall tore away from the transmission tunnel and we had to pound it back down and reinforce it. It got wheeled hard, and got me to school and the dealership reliably. If you know how to drive, you can make these econoboxes do amazing things. It has nothing to do with keeping up with rock buggies, it's about getting a station wagon someplace it would never be expected, winching out a stuck/broken truck, and getting back out of there. My wagon excelled offroad in many places my Tacoma doesn't have a chance. Deep mud or snow for example. The light weight, good weight distribution, and flat bottom make for a potent combo in those conditions. The tacoma is so nose heavy it sinks like a stone. The turning radius also sucks, so the subaru could literally run circles around it. I take offense at the attitude that the Hatch Patrol had been there, done that, and has the final word on what works on subarus. There is still room for innovation, which SJR's wild projects prove. If I was still running the wagon (I lost the battle with rust and unibody fatigue) I'd think it worth it to try adapting an axle lock. $750 for something that makes locking in a welded rear diff as easy as locking the hubs on a 4x4 truck would be worth it. Especially as I used the car as a commuter, and needed it to be completely streetable 6 days a week. The convenience of giving a locking coupler a quick twist when out of the woods vs jacking the car up, punching out roll pins, and removing the axle every time would be worth it. Subarus can't do slower. The available differential gearing and lack of a real low range limit what you can do, especially since the motors can't produce enough torque to make up for it. Something a truck with appropriate gearing could walk up, a subaru has to hit it harder and faster so you don't power out on the climb. By the time you're swapping transfer cases in to compensate for that, you might as well have gone and gotten a Samurai.

How the heck do I get this seal out? It's pressed in from the outside of the transmission case, so it should be able to be pulled out the way it came in. It's down in the well that the speedo cable threads into. It failed, so the cable was pumping gear oil up into the dash and dripping down on the drivers feet. It's a 93 legacy 5mt that I swapped into a 94 Legacy turbo. I tried hooking it out with bent piano wire, seal picks, then tried folding it in with sharpened awls, tried threading screws into it and pulled on them until they snapped, then tried melting it with glowing hot screwdrivers. It's in an awkward spot under the firewall so I can't really see down into it. I threaded a later speed sensor into it just to plug the hole because my friend needed to use the car. I'm tempted to convert the cluster to an electronic speedo and just eliminate the whole cable. What a flaming pain in the rump roast, I've already got 4 hours into this damn seal and it's worse than when I started.

The axle-locks are built to go on FWD cars, where 100% of the torque is going through that axle. If it can stand up to a 3.8l v6 in a buick, it should stand up to whatever a subaru can put through it in the rear. Plus, the diff stubs are much more likely to snap than any other component back there. I think it's a real option, and shouldn't be dismissed. I don't have a wheeling wagon anymore, so I won't be persuing it. People splice axles all the time when they swap powertrain packages into cars that didn't come with them. Sleeving the cut stubs of the axles and welding them in seems to work fine. The cv joints are the weak point, not the axle shaft.

The whole point of the Remco axle lock is that it installs midway in a stock CV shaft. It should not be difficult to retrofit that to a subaru shaft, you could even buy one of their shafts, cut it apart, then sleeve and weld that into your subaru rear shaft. That's the whole locking assembly that you were thinking about, pre-made, tested and known to work well, in a package that gets retrofitted into existing axles. You just have to adapt it to the diameter of the subaru axle. Lot easier than machining up the whole locking mechanism from scratch. Has anyone talked to Remco? They might sell just the locking unit with no axle for a reduced price. Locking hubs at the rear wheel has been attempted before. Someone was trying nissan 720 front hubs and brakes attached to the subaru control arm in the rear. I don't know what came of it. Edit: SJR did it in his shortwagon: http://www.ultimatesubaru.org/forum/showthread.php?t=118811 My solution was to find a clutch type LSD out of an RX. It made a big difference in snow, mud, and loose dirt. It doesn't help the flexed out one wheel in the air situations, but it made it a much more capable wheeler for most situations and I could drive it on the street without dicking with it.

Obviously fairies are stealing your oil while you sleep then. Don't drown in de-Nile, the engine is beat. Run Rotella 5w40 and carry a spare quart all the time. Check and fill with every gas tankfull. Just got done swapping a ej257 block into an 02 wrx that had some serious oil consumption issues. The rings were so spanked that it would slowly lurch down a hill if you parked it in first with the engine hot. The E-brake doesn't work either, so you had to be careful where you left it. Still had good power right up until the #2 and #3 rod bearings spun. Everything was so worn in that engine that it couldn't keep the oil pressure up anymore. The light would flicker at idle when warm.

Might want to look into how much it would cost to have a good used engine shipped up to you. It might be cheaper and faster to swap another one in and just keep yours for spare parts. Cylinder damage is rare, and usually due to running out of oil or sucking debris in. Most used ea82's are going to be in decent shape.

The bulb is probably too low resistance, so it will effectively be a short and overload the driver in the ECU. You can get vacuum solenoids from loads of cars in the junkyard and just splice the wires to the subaru connector. I used one from a Cadillac Seville for a while, worked fine. You kind of want to keep the purge control solenoid working, it sucks the gas vapors from the charcoal canister into the intake.

If it isn't leaking it, it's burning it. The oil is going out the tailpipe. If you see blue smoke when you start it, it's for sure burning it. I bet if someone followed you they'd say it smells like a 2-stroke when you accelerate. The turbo can leak oil into the exhaust or the intake. A failed PCV valve or clogged hoses can force oil into the intake. A cracked piston or worn rings will let it leak into the combustion chambers. Worn valve seals will let it leak into the intake/exhaust. There's lots of ways that oil gets burned, and most are expensive to fix.

You can swap the whole cluster, but then you have the wrong odometer reading. If you pull the clusters apart by springing the clips on the sides, you can take the clear cover and the black bezel off. Then pull 3 screws out of the back, drop the tach out of one and bolt it into yours. Snap the face back on and reinstall the cluster. You can also put in rear speakers, the wiring is there. You need the speaker and the door card, or if your careful, just the speaker grille and cut/drill your door card to fit it. The tweeters replace the sail panels on the front doors, just clip in, and the wiring is there for them too. Map lights swap in, it's easier to run a wire from the dome light to them behind the headliner than run the factory wiring down the a-pillar. Outback fm/weatherband radio/cd package bolts and plugs right in. There's also a later style of cupholder that comes out at a diagonal and has one big hole and one medium, which is better than the 2 medium hole ones that pull straight out of most Brighton dashes. Outbacks also have a higher center console cover/armrest that swaps right on. Rear wiper motor bolts in, the wiring, relay, and hose are already installed. You need the dual pump washer fluid resevoir for the front, the hoses and plugs are already there. Then you need to take off the steering wheel and replace the wiper switch with a rear wiper one. If you get one from a GT wagon, you also get variable delay wipers for the front. While you have the wheel off, you might as well swap in the cruise control switch, module, actuator, pump, and piping. That all bolts/plugs in as well. Outback struts and wheel/tire packages bolt right on too. Gives you higher ground clearance than an outback. Heated seats bolt in and are easy to wire to the power feed for the cigar lighter. Just strip the harness that runs to the seats under the carpet in the donor car, and run the blue power wire up to a vampire tap on the cigar lighter power. Fog lights have to be wired in, and it's hard to find the 95 only foglight assemblies. They are not plug and play at all. I've got them but have been putting off messing with the install. It's called de-Brightonization, and it's a fun project. My dad's brighton is now better equipped than a lot of Outbacks, done one upgrade at a time.

As a total aside, the rims on that brat are great. I used a set on my lifted wagon, and the backspacing was perfect for tucking the wheels in without rubbing. Came off a mitsubishi mighty max/dodge d50 truck, right?