WoodsWagon

I put the 04 sti spec MLS gaskets in an 04 SOHC ej25 I did for a friend and they have been working fine. Didn't seem to be any significant port mismatch when I laid them on the heads. It was the weird CA emissions spec EJ259 though, with the big H6 exhaust port and 4 cats.

The concern with that area rusting out is that the wall of sheetmetal that is gone goes through the seam where the box of the strut tower attaches to the inner fender. So if the rust progresses through the sandwich of spot welded metal layers there, the strut tower can tear off and fold inwards. I've only heard of a few that actually collapsed, but every single subaru wagon of that age I've checked around here is rusted through in the same spot. If you're worried about it, you could put in a strut tower brace that went across behind the rear seat. It reduces the usefulness of the wagon space, but it would make it harder for it to collapse. It's a PITA area to fix. I've temp-repaired it with grace ice and water shield. Slap it on, use a heat gun to help it glue in, and spray undercoating over it to seal it up. That at least keeps more salt water from pouring into the whole inner fender area as you drive.

When using them offroad it's advisable to put some sort of protection on the transmission pan. It doesn't take much denting before the solenoids get smashed inside the pan. Either weld a plate onto the pan or build a skidplate underneath it. An aftermarket transmission cooler in front of the radiator would be good too. When you're offroad, the torque converter is going to do a lot of slipping while you're going slow, and that puts a lot of heat in the fluid. The stock in-radiator heat exchanger works ok, but more cooling on top of that is better when you're working the torque converter hard. Hook up both coolers in series.

Well, until the heater works constantly, you're still having air bubbles in the system, and that will cause overheating. Overheating does not necesarily equal blown head gaskets. Unless you start the car up and it's puffing exhaust out the radiator cap, you can't be sure it's the headgaskets. I had an EJ25d that was that bad by the way, and I put headgaskets in it and it went another 90k before the car rusted out. If there's any question as to the cooling system being fully burped, work on that first before condemning the headgaskets.

The 00-04's are all rustbuckets around here. As bratman said, the rear dogleg and the triangle inside the rear side door openings where the rubber door stop hits are a major trouble spot. It's caused by a lack of seam sealer on the pinch weld at the front of the wheel arch. So are lots of the rear subframes, where the lower links attach. And the usual spot on the rear quarters at the back of the wheel well. 95-99's the rear strut towers go bad from inside the wheel well. Door bottoms rot out. Rear of the rockers rot out. Gas tanks rot out right around where the filler tube nipple goes in, as well as the filler necks rotting out. Rear quarters of course, and rear subframes occasionally.

Getting all the air "burped" out of the cooling system after draining it and refilling can be hard. The thermostat on these engines is on the return side of the cooling system, so if there's trapped air pockets, hot coolant won't circulate back to the thermostat and it never opens, overheating the engine. Parking it nose up, like on ramps or a curb can help to get the radiator cap higher above the engine and heater core. Filling it with a snug fitting funnel in the cap can help. Revving the engine can help. I had a 2011 in the garage the other day that took 20 minutes to finally get it burped after doing a t-belt water pump job. Main thing to check for is hot air coming out of the heater. If it blows cool or makes gurgling noises in the dash, then there's still air trapped in the cooling system. I once got a 1992 EJ22 so hot it lost power when I was stuck offroading in snow, and it was unharmed when it cooled back down.

The clicking in front of your left knee with the key off is probably the power lock/ alarm module. If it looses battery power, it tries to flash the parking lights until the reset procedure is done. There's usually a yellow sticker on the radiator support next to the battery that describes what to do. If not, there's a button switch hanging from the harness under the drivers side of the dash that you hold when turning the key or something, it's been a while since I've had to mess with one. Any interruption of the constant power from the battery to that module will put it into alarm mode. That's the only thing under that side of the dash that would click on and off in time even with the key turned off. The main relay does nothing when the key is off. The fuel pump relay could cycle if the green test mode connectors were plugged together, but that's only with the key on. You have a main power connection issue. Whether it be a bad cable, fusible link, connection, ect, but somewhere you have an intermittant conductivity failure in the main power distribution circuit. Connections can test OK with a ohm-meter, but not conduct electricity under load. That's where voltage drop tests come in, you see how well the circuit is performing while it's under load. SInce you said you had a fusible link that looked like it got hot, that would be the logical first place to start. As a side note, being a jerk to someone volunteering their time to try and help you, a stranger, is not the way to build good will around here. Feel free to ignore suggestions or advise, but don't mouth off. It's really rude.

The EJ22 option makes sense for quick fix. You can get a good running 1995-1998 automatic transmission EJ22 from a junkyard and directly swap it in place of the EJ25. Less power, but easier to find in good shape. Swapping the engine out is less work, and less skilled work, than doing the valve job right, so it should be significantly cheaper total option,

' I used a couple pieces of heavy box tubing drilled so that longer bolts could go in the stock bumper mounting holes. I put them on first, squared them up, and welded the middle tube of the bumper on. Then i ran thinner box tubing down to a piece of angle iron that I saddled on the front of the lower radiator support. That way the bumper couldn't rotate down while the winch was pulling. The skid plate frame (shown without the 1/8" steel skidplate in this pic) bolted to the bottom of the angle iron on the radiator support. It wasn't pretty, but it took a heck of a beating. I winched out much heavier trucks more often than I pulled the wagon, so it got stretch tested too.

No, no subaru since 1989 sold in North America has had a dual range transmission. No, we don't get EJ jap import boxes. Most of the importers are dealing in turbo engines. The very few EJ dual range boxes that have made it here are usually in the northwest or California. There's a couple people on here who sell the flywheel redrilling service. They know they're at minimal risk of ending up in court because there's minimal risk of anything going wrong with the modified flywheels. If you have seen an EA flywheel, you would understand why it would not be cheap to machine a steel copy. There is a deep step in the flywheel, so you would either have do machine out a ton of material or make a bolt on spacer ring for a flat flywheel. I've had stock EA82 flywheels up over 8,000rpm before. The EJ's are computer rev-limited to 6750rpm. There's a margin of safety there. If you feel that more power would be detrimental to the driving characteristics of an EA car... well leave it stock then. In my opinion, excess power is just fine. The EJ's are not some high strung peaky engine, they run just fine at partial throttle, so the car is just as controllable as it was before. Except now, you have the option of breaking the tires loose or accelerating quickly when you want to. The EJ22 sometimes wasn't enough power for me, I could still bog it down to a stall when doing a long steep hillclimb. An EJ25 would have been better. Or an EZ30. Thank goodness we don't have engineering prudes controlling things in the USA to the extent you do in AUS. Very few people get hurt by car modifications here, and we have a ton more variety and fun.

I cut the flared section out of an early 90's Chevy Cavalier and welded them on. I had cut the fenders before, but it didn't cover the tire and the cut fender was really easy to bend in.

Subaru flywheel is ahead of the front axle centerline and the blast radius would go transverse to the car, so even in the highly unlikely event it grenades, it's not going to touch the occupants of the car. The bolts don't locate the flywheel, it centers on the step in the crank. That step is same EA to EJ, so the flywheel will still be perfectly centered. The bolt hole modification is happening near the center of the flywheel, which is the lowest stressed area of the piece. The closer to the rim you are, the higher the stress on the spinning flywheel. All the bolts do is clamp the flywheel to the crank flange. It's the static friction between the rear face of the flywheel and the crank flange that transmit the power of the engine, not the shear strength of the bolts. So the bolt holes don't have to be perfect. The re-drilling is taking the asymmetric pattern of the EA (which ensured the timing degree marks would line up) to the symmetrical pattern of the EJ, which had no timing marks on the flywheel. You aren't drilling new holes next to the existing holes, you are offsetting the existing holes just enough to fix the pattern. So the amount of material removed is not huge. Have you ever put an EJ flywheel next to an EA one? Or tried to stick an EJ flywheel into an EA bellhousing? It's pretty plain why the flywheel has to match the transmission. We use the EA transmissions in the US because they are our only option for low range 4x4. But if going to AWD means loosing low range, the trade off isn't worth it for an offroad capable car. For a street car, then yes it makes sense to swap in an entire EJ powertrain. Yeah, the traction isn't great in FWD with a more powerful engine. I could spin 235/75r15's easily in the rain. But if I didn't drive like a jerk it was fine.

But the factory one is welded... So if you took one, did a nice job of welding it, and painted it, how the heck would they know it's not a factory part? Just wrap the joint in a wet rag before welding the shaft so you don't cook the U-joints bearings. I used a 1998 Outback one on my 3" crossmember blocked EA82 with powersteering. It was a little long, so the column shaft stuck further down but it didn't hit the joint's cross so I never bothered to shorten the column's splined end. That would be another option for you if a stock one is close but too long, you could nip off the end of the steering column splined shaft to clear with a cutoff wheel.

http://www.shoptalkforums.com/viewforum.php?f=19 is a good place to ask

Flywheel must match the transmission. So if you use an EA transmission, you must redrill the EA flywheel to match the EJ crank. The clutch disk is the same part# EA or EJ, so you don't gain any surface area. What you can gain is better pressure plates if you go EJ transmission, but if you machine your EA flywheel to ER27 specs (XT6) and use an XT6 clutch kit it works out alright.

Good pads are a must. I ran 29" tires and an EJ, and the cheapo parts store pads made the braking dangerous. It would slow alright in normal easy stops, but you couldn't really stop quickly when you stood on the pedal. With quality Wagner pads in it, I could lock up the fronts on pavement. Honestly, engine power doesn't have much to do with braking unless you're running laps on a race course. As long as you can lock up the tires on dry pavement, then you have as much braking power as you need to be safe. Bigger brakes help when you're doing repeated stops from high speed, or holding back a load decending a long grade. But for normal driving you don't need anything too fancy.

It has to be a phase 1 4eat. If it has a spin on filter on the side it's too new. 98 and older model year, so 5/98 build date or older. There was some shop in Ohio advertising online that they did 4.44 swaps for svx's. No idea on their reputation, but might be worth taking it to them if the rear diff work scares your mechanic. One thing you could do is have him put in just the transmission, and leave out the rear section of driveshaft. It will drive fine as a FWD car until you can tackle the rear diff swap and make it AWD. There are write ups on how to do the swap and what parts need to be transfered over on the SVX forums. Do some searches so you know exactly what needs to be done.

If you want to keep your odometer reading the same, swap just the tachometer into the Brighton cluster.

That's a terrible idea. How did you judge the integrity of the tire, by poking it with a finger? Would you drive across a suspension bridge over a deep river if some of the cables were snapped and hanging free? Because that's exactly the situation inside the structure of your tire at this point. Sure, the bridge may hold, but what if it doesn't? Is that a risk you're willing to take, and are you also willing to take that risk when sharing the road with other innocent people you may crash into if the tire fails the rest of the way? Snipping the wires off and continuing to drive is burying your head in the sand in the worst way. Be glad you spotted a warning sign, and take advantage of the chance you have to fix it now, instead of after something worse happening.

Legacy turbo transmissions will be a 3.9 final drive, so you have to do the same work swapping the rear diff too. I don't see the point in putting in a legacy turbo transmission when it's the same work to put in an outback transmission. The outbacks were way more common too, so the transmissions should be cheap. CCR recommended the legacy turbo transmission because it uses similar extra frictions and steels in a couple of the clutches to what the stock SVX box does. Internally, all the transmissions are similar, with the SVX probably having the strongest parts stock. What kills it is the final drive ratio. The transmission is always working hard to push the car through those 3.54's, if it had 4.44's it makes the transmissions job easier.

Show me how the hub grappler does the job without getting the axle out of the center of the bearing? That's where the nightmare comes in because the lateral links need to be disconnected to get the clearance to pull the axle out of the hub. Not the actual pressing of the bearing.

The 4.44 outback or forester transmission is a direct swap, but it also requires swapping in the rear differential from the same donor car the transmission came from and putting your lsd carrier inside that differential. Since there is more gear reduction in the differentials with an outback or forester transmission, the stress the trans sees from the larger motor is reduced, so overall the reliability ends up being the same. The added bonus is the car accelerates quicker and is more fun to drive. 96-98 Outback's or 98 foresters are the usual donors, and they are plentiful in junkyards. Usually with blown headgaskets, so the transmissions are still fine.

A number of manufacturers are very careful about how their TSB's get published, I know the one I used to work for was. They were private about them for just the reason of the course you are following. They are only meant to be in house informational help guides to make diagnosis and repair in their dealerships go quicker when the company tech line has seen the same problem crop up a few times. They are not recalls. They are not warranty extensions. If a service writer was ambitious he could have recommended the TSB banjo bolt check to you when you were in for another service and upsold you the job. That said you could see about asking the dealership, and then regional manager, about any goodwill coverage they could offer. If you split the cost so they cover parts, you cover labor, that is often a workable solution. Dealership is happy because labor is where they make their profit, subaru doesn't mind because the parts are cheap wholesale. And it takes some of the sting out of it for you. You shouldn't need a whole engine? The filter should have caught most of the metal that came out of the turbo's bearings, and the impeller wheel is aluminum so if it ground into the compressor housing all those filings will pass though the engine without incident usually. How long did you drive it after the turbo failed? It's a 10 year old car, and used turbos can be had for $200. Even with the "cookies in the pan" as you put it, it would be well worth tossing a used turbo on it. After you remove the banjo bolt filter of course.

To clarify what Imdew said, the non-threaded part of the Outback strut rod where it goes through the strut cap is longer. So when you run the nut down on the strut, it jams on the threads before it clamps the older legacy style strut cap. That lets the strut rod clunk around in the strut cap. If you take the nut off the strut and put a washer under it, it can then clamp tight. You can do this without pulling the struts out of the car, just don't bounce the suspension up and down while you have the nut removed because you risk popping the strut out of the cap and turning it into a PITA job.

2000+ Legacy's and Outbacks have a completely different rear suspension design, so the massive body rot issues those cars have are a separate issue from what this thread discusses. But before you put too much time into fiberglassing the wheel well rust, check out the rear subframe that the suspension and differential attach to. Those are well known for crumbling, and that's a serious safety issue. You can ignore the wheel arch rot, but if the crossmember breaks you'll likely lose control of the car.