WoodsWagon

With either the green test mode connectors or the white ground connectors plugged together, it won't flash the LED in the ECU. It's a 86 turbo wagon, and sometimes it runs good, then it switches into a wierd default mode, where it cycles the injectors at a preset interval. You can slowly rev the motor up in neutral, but it's limited by what the injectors are putting in, so it leans out as you rev it up. There's not enough fuel being injected to move the car though. If you stall the engine, it keeps cycling the injectors as long as the key is on, so it will drown the engine in fuel if you let it. The diagnostic connectors are under the dash next to the computer. There's the usual green non-locking connectors, and when I plug those in and turn the key on, it does the normal fuel pump cycling, unplug and it stops pulsing the pump. In the same bundle, there's a pair of 2 pin white locking connectors, with black wires coming out each side. There's also a pair of 9 pin square connectors, probably for some diagnostic equipment to plug in. When I plug the white 2 pin connectors together, nothing happens. When they and the green connectors are together, it does the cycling of the pump. No combonation of connectors or key cycling will get the led in the ECU to flash. Either I'm doing something wrong, or the ECU is screwed I'm thinking. Sometimes it runs great. I just want to beat the bag out of it before I EJ swap it.

By a groan while doing a full lock turn, do you mean driving in a tight circle? That can be "torque bind", an issue with the AWD system. It will also give you a "bad feeling" in the steering because the driveline is binding up. With an auto transmission this can often be fixed with 3 drain, refill, drive, drain cycles of the transmission fluid. The anti-theft lock is a non-issue. Don't even worry about it, because it's not related to the rest of the steering system at all. It is somewhat normal for the rack to make some noise when shifting the wheel back and forth while stationary. However, there shouldn't be a loose feel in the steering wheel. With vibration in the steering, that's almost always an issue with a wheel or tire rather than the steering linkages. Hitting a bad pothole could dent a rim or make a tire lumpy. Try rotating the wheels front to back and see if the problem goes away.

Yup, broken timing belt. Oh, and the reason the rotor won't pull off of the distributor shaft is because there is a phillips screw that holds it in. It threads in at a 90 degree angle to the shaft. If the screw isn't tight, it falls out and the rotor can freespin on the shaft, so when you do replace it make sure you do the screw up tight.

It's not just a high HC reading, it's a 1,200 rpm idle. If the SPFI is never idling down, then it thinks it's still cold. So, it will be dumping more fuel to richen up the mix while it's cold. So you get high HC readings. This has got to have taken the gas millage down a fair bit too, if it's allways in warm up mode. Replace the engine coolant temp sensor, and check the connector and the wire leading to it for green corrosion. You may have to replace a couple inches of wire and the connector to get it working right again. Get the throttle stop back to the right position. The SPFI system is really simple, and it's better and easier to fix it right rather than rigging it with retarded timing, denatured alcohol, and a backed out throttle stop screw, or whatever hack fix you can come up with.

If the engine coolant temp sensor isn't working right, or the wire leading to it is corroded, you will get a high idle, and rich mixture. It's like a carb leaving the choke on because it doesn't think it's warmed up yet. So that would explain both the high idle and the high HC numbers. Now, by screwing with the throttle stop screw (it's not an idle adjust) you've made a bunch more work for yourself. The throttle position sensor needs to be set in a particular spot for it to idle correctly. You need to get the throttle stop back to the right point. If you counted exacly how many turns you backed it out, try turning it back in. Also look for the corrosion line on the threads and thread it back in until they line up with the top of the bracket. If that doesn't work, then you will have to use a mulitmeter to get the TPS reading right for idle. Is the check engine light on? Here's a good quote with a link to the FSM from another thread:

Pics on the outside usually tell you nothing. What you need to look at is the "frame rail" on the inside of the engine comparment. It's the sheetmetal box tube that runs next to the head of the engine, the engine crossmember bolts to it, and the bumper bolts to it in the front. If it's straight, and there isn't any kinks in it, then hanging a new fender and bumper could get you close. If you crumpled it, and I'd suspect you did, use a chain on the lower tow hook and a solid object (put a strap around a tree if you use one, it will kill the tree otherwise), and use the car's momentum in reverse to pull the front end back out. Do some sledgehammering, get a new fender, and get it close enough to hook up. Check the lower control arm, radius rod, and strut on that side, it's not hard to bend stuff like that and the allignment will be off.

Put an auxillary oil-to-air cooler in the tranny cooler lines and they will hold up fine. You can also manually control the duty c soleniod to lock 4wd, or 2wd if you need to slide the front end sideways. It's a good tranny. Some came with pretty low ratios too.

Same problem with my mom's 98 outback. Steering would not return to center, but felt fine other than that. Sprayed penetrating oil on the steering coupler u-joints and the problem went away. Put a new coupler in a month later, about $75 from the dealer. Ran across the same problem on a 99 outback recently, it was binding, releasing, binding, ect as you turned the wheel. Dribbled bicycle lube oil on the u-joints, has mostly gone away. Recommended he replace the coupler when he gets the money. It's a shame you replaced the rack and the pump, you could have avoided that by asking about it here first. *edit* I did tell you it was the coupler in your last thread:

Yup, the 3.0l H6's have chains. I belive the tribeca 3.5l do to.

Is it leaking on the exhaust, or is it steaming out the tailpipe? If it's steaming out the tailpipe, it may take a bit for any coolant trapped in the exhuast to evaporate.

What year turbo car are we talking? Turbo car's aren't that much more high maintenece, but they have usually lived a harder life due to the buyers they attract. Go by the condiditon of the car, not turbo vs non turbo. You will grow to enjoy the turbo a lot more if you get one. If you never get one, you won't know what you're missing, so it works out the same either way.

Did you check for a cracked head or cylinder wall? It's rare but depending on how badly overheated the engine was when the headgasket went, possible.

In the legacy's too? I know it went phase 2 in the imps, but I thought it stayed the same with the legacys. Funny thing was I had "98", then changed it to "99" before I posted because I was unsure.

There are no cam bearings, they ride directly in the head. So, you need a fresh head and cam. Best to get one from a junkyard. Check to see if it siezed first.

Needs to be out of a 95 automatic to bolt in. 96 up it will need a single port exhaust manifold, but will bolt in otherwise. Needs to be out of an automatic to have EGR. Swap the flexplate from the 2.5 to the 2.2, won't fit otherwise. Swap A/C compressor bracket too, and use the 2.5 compressor. No wiring as long as it's a 95-99 automatic.

If the area on the outer cv joint where the inner wheel bearing seal rides is rough, it will let water into the bearings. Also, there are 2 styles of inner wheel bearing seal, the right one should have an extra lip that sticks out and rides further up on the cv joint that acts as a dust shield. The spacer between the 2 bearings can get crushed, and will preload the bearings too much. A deformed hub bore will do the same thing, the bearings won't be properly positioned and the preload will be wrong.

The front fender lip isn't protected by the fender liner, and it holds up just fine. I take them off. I'd prefer the area to be open to washing than being a closed groove holding saltwater against a seam.

Yeah, and it took him less time to slap on a new pre-compressed tensioner than it would have taken to compress the old one. He needed it off anyways to put the t-belt back on after doing the headgasket job. So that was extra labor he got for nothing. Last guy to do the t-belt job either compressed it wrong and didn't catch that he trashed it, which is easy to do. Or, he didn't know that due to the crappy job subaru did with the new lever arm style tensioners, you have to replace them with every t-belt job along with the idlers to keep them from failing. Most other manufacturers let you reuse that stuff without any concern. Piston slap that doesn't go away with warming up isn't a concern either. They will go forever with loud, worse-than-diesel tap piston slap. You can hear my mom's car coming, tap tap tap, and it runs great and has for 3 years that way. Bad noises are a spun bearing. They can squeek squeek squeek from running dry (not for long), or trashed bearings, which will rap, and more importanly, you will get a back-rattle when you rev the engine up and snap the throttle shut. T-belt tensioners can make the same noise as rod bearings, so you need to isolate it. Failed t-belt idler pully bearings can make squeeling noises. Prety much if there isn't a rod sticking through the block or a rod bearing pounding, the engine is fine. Idlers and tensioners are all things that should be replaced with a timing belt job.

Protecting the safety of you and others by informing the police you were speeding, where, and when, and for how long, and where to intercept you and issue the ticket. No more taking the rental out for some harmless rough-roading on dotted roads in the southwest. Yeah, rent me a 4x4 blazer in Albuquerque NM, and say "don't take it off paved roads". Plus, they don't even have to send spotters to the drag strip, the car does the calling for you.

I had a GCK that was tight, waited for it to "wear in", and noticed I was starting to have shrapnel poking out through the boot. The bearing retainers on the 3 tripod roller bearings had come apart and gotten rolled through the rollers and poked through the boot. Then the rollers came out, and the rollers were riding right on the tripod center. Nice, got mabe 2k miles out of that axle. Then I had an outer CV on the other axle grenade, the race for the balls split into two rings, all the bridges between the balls cracked. So I cleaned up the axle with the broken inner and the the one with the broken outer, built one completely grenaded axle and one working one, and traded the busted one in for an autozone reman. I installed the combined new one, and then had the other GCK I had in grenade it's outer CV in the exact same way as the first one. I traded that one in for another autozone reman, and they warned me to back off on the warantee tradeins or I was going to get flagged as a problem customer by autozone corporate. "I know what you do with that wagon" he said. So now I have one GCK in the car, and one subaru mix and match in it, and 2 autozone remans on the shelf. These are all EA82 body style parts, mabe that was the difference? My best luck has been with re-booting used subaru axles. They've all lasted way longer than the GCK's did, and they start clicking for a while first, not a sudden BANG, and no power to the wheels. I nearly got rear ended on the first one, I was accelerating, the CV shattered, I was no longer accelerating as I was fishing for 4wd, and the truck accelerating behind me was caught by surprise.

No, rotors are not rotors. Using crap recycled low grade steel in them makes them rust into oblivion in no time flat in the northeast. Cheap rotors will dissapear in a poof of rust, the rust blocks the vents in the middle of the rotor and they cool unevenly, and warp.

As long as the car has the origional air intake system, you can go into a foot of water without worry. Don't drive into the water fast, and don't stop in the water. Keep an even, slow pace through the water and you will keep a wave in front of the radiator that will help keep the engine dry. The occasional water crossing isn't a cause for concern. My old lifted wagon spent a lot of time in rivers, ponds, and mudholes, and the only thing that I had problems with was wheel bearings. Remember though that I was taking the car through 20" deep water on a weekly basis, and spending time in the water getting stuck/unstuck/pulling other vehicles, not just driving through. I also had 30" diameter tires which put a lot more stress on the bearings. Oh, and soggy carpets. I ended up tearing them out and opening up the drainholes in the footwells. Water in, water out. Your 1996 legacy has the engine control computer in the passenger footwell, so try not to let that footwell fill up with water. I hydrolocked and badly damaged the first motor in my wagon by going too fast through too deep of a pond. The water was up over the hood though so I deserved it. I nearly lost the car another time when spring runoff had swelled a river and the bottom had shifted. When I went to ford it, I ended up getting pushed downstream into the boulders and barely made it out the other side. That was another time the water momentarily came over the hood but I got lucky and there was enough of an air pocket in the engine bay to keep it running. Nothing like haveing water spashing up onto the sidewindows from the river pushing on the side of the car and having to hold the throttle and hope for the best.

What were the specs on the leafblower? MPH of air, size of motor? You may have just not had enough leafblower to make MAD poWAH! Did you have it tightly sealed to the airbox?

Not on the newer ones there isn't. Up on the bellhousing of the transmission where it meets the engine there should be a sticker with a long string of #'s. You can use that to decipher what you have.

My 86 3-door had the same issue. I never did anything about it. I'm pretty sure you can swap all the 86 switches onto the newer column, and the harness is just threaded through and zip-tyed into place. So swapping the older switches onto the newer column should let you put it in.