slo5oh

Cookie (see my other post Synthetic Motor Oil wt question) I ran 0-30 wt for 10k on my '98 and I had no piston slap. I forgot to mention this in my other message... off to edit in a sec. I only ran it because I found it at wallyworld for $1 each. $1/qt for full synthetic is one of those offers I could not pass up so I bought all of them... (about 20)... It was somewhere between 80k and 100k at the time.... probably the entire 20k... but I can't recall.

Don't want to start a "my motor oil is better..." discussion, but here's my history: bought '98 2.5RS with about 50k on the odo. Changed oil from junk dealer put in to redline 5-30wt (this was over 3 years ago... and I swear it was 5-50wt, but I don't see that as an option now). She got the subie notorious piston slap when cold. I lived with it for a couple weeks until I swapped out to 5-30wt Mobil 1. No more piston slap. Changed oil every 10k up to now. No piston slap. At 120k I changed to Mobile 1 10-30 (thinking older engine, thicker oil...) Piston slap is back! My car is in the shop right now but I'm about 1k from another oil change and I already have a 5qt jug of Mobile 1 5-30 just waiting in the garage. ** edit to add ** Ran Mobil 1 0-30 "racing?" oil for 1 or 2 oil changes. Walmart clearance for $1 each Qt so I bought all (about) 20. No piston slap with it either... that's what got me started thinking about this. ** edit end ** I've read A LOT about the subie piston slap problem (on this site... p.s. thanks)... I'm seriously thinking the problem is caused by thicker oil. That's reverse from EVERYTHING I have read, I know! but bear with me... I've got piston slap on only 2 of my several oil changes. The recent one was thicker Mobil 1, the first was Redline and I swear I read somewhere that redline runs thicker than advertised. When my car comes back in (probably) 2 weeks I'll do the 1k in a week or 2 and then I'll know for sure. I guess this was not really addressed as a question, but my question is if anyone has seen the same thing I am theorizing.

Best I ever got was 28mpg when I took the high road through Yosemite. It was a lazy day and I probably averaged 40mph. When I'm doing 70+ my average is almost always within .5 of 25mpg. I do a lot of miles, and it's currently just under 130k on a '98 2.5RS (in the shop because someone side swiped me). I don't keep a nifty chart. I just keep my gas receipts and write the milage on top of each new receipt and do the math in my head most of the time. Sometimes I use the calc in my phone to get exact #s, but never write them down. As for a $4 or more in gas tax... DEATH TO ALL DEMOCRATS THAT THINK THIS WAY! A car is a necessity in this life just like food and water. To tax fuel, oil, and other necessities SHOULD BE ILLEGAL! Most taxes are a worthless ways for big brother to line their pockets for other stupid ideas. I pay a water tax… think it gets be BETTER water? NO! My water is over 250ppm borderline UNDRINKABLE! Anyone know where tobacco tax goes? I do. The city I live in has a “main street” that bottle necks down to 1 lane each way for a 2 block stretch and for the past year it takes about 10 minutes to get through those 2 stop lights (I just go 1 block either way and avoid the mess now). I was happy to notice they started working on that section of road a month back. I was not happy when I realized they are digging holes and it appears they are cutting out the previous street parking to put in what look like large planters for trees. I was expecting the morons to eliminate the street parking… but expected to see main street stretched to 2 lanes (each way) all the way through town.

I just picked up a set of OE 2005 16" wheels and tires for $300. Tired of the gold wheels on my '98 2.5RS. http://www.craigslist.org

Do any of you even know what a throw out bearing is? It's the Bearing that allows the clutch to spin on the fork as you press and release your clutch. To say a driver can abuse this part is ridiculous. That's like saying someone that drives too hard can wear out their wheel bearings. Engine bearings are different because you can spin them beyond the RPM they are designed to withstand (in older cars without rev limiters). Now Pistons needing replaced at 30k is a different matter, but short of the owner running NOS or upgrading an existing turbo to push more boost a stock piston should have no problems to live 200k or more. Even a 600 hp engine needing new pistons at 30k means the engine was running incorrectly... usually too lean and will cause the piston to over heat and either crack then explode or melt. Sorry for your problems with your subie, mine's been good to me, but then I have a 98 not a 00 and newer. I do agree with you on fords... I have a friend that recently sold his f-150 4 door 5.4ltr 2x4 that averaged 25mpg. Short of missing the 4wd it was a beautiful truck. Only reason he sold it was to buy a house. I am a little on the biased side when it comes to Fords... I own 2 late 80s 5.0s... and I can say that a stock 5.0 would easily go 200k without any major work... I've seen it done EDITED for spelling

I bought mine with about 50k on the clock. First oil change I did was with 5-30 (may have been 5-50) wt. Redline. Serious start up noise followed. Sounded like a tin can tied under the car until it got warmed up. After a couple weeks I changed it out with 5-30 mobile 1 (hearing it's a little thicker) and no more noise. At 110k I decided to try the thicker 10-30 wt. mobile 1 and my noise came back. I've since drained that and went back to 5-30, but the noise is still there. I ran some Mobile 1 0-30 wt. oil (found on clearance at wally world for $1/qt) over a year ago and there was no noise with that weight oil either. I would think the thicker oil would quiet the piston vibration better, but it seems the thinner oil did a better job. Anyone else have a similar experience???? I'm going to try some thinner oil to see if the start up noises go away... I don't understand it... but then I'm no engineer.

Take a picture of how your car sits (space in the wheel well) before and after the shock install. I know the rears are toast in my 2.5 RS and I think it may cause the rear to sit lower. I need to do all 4 also... I think one of my fronts is toast, but I know both my rears are.

as stated "interference" means that your valves and your pistons will hit eachother if your crank is not in time with with your cam(s). the advantages? #1 is compression. This is how much the air/fuel mixture is "compressed" (i.e. 9:1, 10:1, 14:1 etc.), more compession = more power. The less room between the head and the engine block (or pison more specifically) at Top Dead Center (TDC) the better off you are, and the more compression you have. Now we get into the complicated part. An engine will have a better burn on the air/fuel mix when both the head and the piston have a dish cut into them. This allows for a pocket or ball area in the center of everything for the explosion. This unfortunatly usually makes compression under 9:1. Therefore most engines use a flat top style pison (lowers cost also) and run them up almost flat to the head. Without the engine maker cutting a groove or "relief" for the valve there is no way that valve can be open with pison at TDC. I don't know of any modern engines that are not "interference" style. If you have a playstation watch the begining of Gran Turismo 3, it shows a cut away view of an engine running with the valves and pisons moving. Modern day engines are a work of science. So much time and money goes into design that it amazes me. I learned much about engines when I was sold the wrong cam for a 5.0 mustang. There's all sorts of fun terms like dwell, quench, valve float, duration, duration at 50 (actually written .050), lift, lobe center... i know there's more...

Shell gasoline will eat up the insides of your exhaust, snow (salt actually) will eat up the outside of your exhaust... Otherwise a stock exhaust system should last you about 10 years.

Yep, he's trying to rip you off. I know there's no way they would go for it, but you offer to bring in a new timing belt for him to use when he's putting everything back together. If he gives you the standard "we can't use parts we don't supply for xyz reson" then you should walk over to parts and ask for the price on a timing belt. If it's that much you should tow your car to a different dealer.

Bob Hagin/Syndicated Columnist/ Seattle Times disagrees with GM’s rational on piston slap: Bob Hagin is the guy that owns Hagan Automotive (in Martinez, Ca) and used to teach autoshop at College Park Highschool. I went there!! He used to (still does?) write for Contra Costa Times. Knew I should have taken autoshop.

Need More Info!!! Do you have rod knock, blown HG, burning oil bad? what???

I've done it both ways on a ford 302. If memory serves me I was pulling between 175 and 180 on the engine stand... Had to have someone hold the engine to keep it from tipping over, stand and all.

How about some history... What have you done? If you have new (piston) rings then you will get #s all over the place until the new rings seat. I wouldn't use thick oil in the combustion chamber. In the past I've used WD-40 to keep the cyl walls moist. I usually crank an engine over 2 to 3 times to get a good reading for each cylinder. What made you want to check?

so you had it towed from somewhere on the road to your apartment? or you had it towed from your apartment to somewhere else (like the mechanic?) Check on both ends... where it was towed from and where it was towed too. I have a couple friends that used to tow for a living and it's a toss up on getting the flatbed. It changes every day. They are the ones that have told me about towing awd cars and also to always latch on and pull any car with an auto trans by the side with the drive wheels.... ie fwd cars pick from the front, rwd cars pick from the back. I wouldn't count on "jack never drives the flatbed" for your case.

http://www.local6.com/automotive/3378460/detail.html Should not cause a CEL, but Shell gas does destroy all sorts of stuff including the fuel guage sending unit.

Summit racing or Jegs Automotive Both should have the parts... summit's shipping is cheap as hell and prices tend to be below everyone else. Summit's website is www.summitracing.com, but I usually can't find the parts I want on their site, they look like a performance only shop, but they are not... call them at (800) 230-3030 and ask, you'll be surprised.

Agreed on the power loss at altitude for N/A cars I have a 5.0 (mustang) that can easily rip 2nd gear loose here in the bay area... but on a trip to Tahoe I could barely spin the tires in first... It felt like I was making 50% of normal power.

Auto or Manual? I drained my Auto (98 2.5RS) and only got about 3qts. I know the thing holds something like 8 to 10... so I was very disapointed.

Thanks for the reply. Tell your son good luck and GOD BLESS from me. If he wants to find a couple thousand boys and girls that like himself to talk to, question, etc. tell him to check out the general discussion forum on www.ar15.com. He'll probably get 50 to 100 positive replies if he justs posts once with a simple "looking at Iraq deployment in March, talk to me" or something like that. Please don't take this as me starting a fight, but Bush did not lie to any of us. He has not been forth coming on admitting we had some bad intel, but right now (and in the end) we did a good thing. Don't fall into believing Fahrencrap 9/11. If you have watched it you should also watch Fahrenhype 9/11 to see where all the lies are. If you total all our soldiers plus all the Iraqi civilians that have died since this war started they still don't equal the number of innocent civilians Sadam, his sons, and his police would have killed in that same time frame. Watch how the news is going to change now that the election is over. I have a friend that went and fought, and know a few others that are also back now. All of them have told me it's roughly 90/10... 90% of the people are happy as hell we are there, hugging, kissing, praying, thanking, our troops. 10% either ignore or give dirty looks to troops. Not to say it's easy, it's still war, but just like after WWII some left over former Nazis didn't like the idea of Democracy and formed groups of gorilla fighters resisting, hoping to overthrow the new government.

Long story short... 2 days ago I started my car (cold morning) and 10 or 20 seconds later I shut it off. 5 seconds later I turned the key (from ign to start) and it started and immediatly died. I then turned key to off, back to start and it again started and immediatly died. I did this again with same results. I started it again only tapped the gas pedal once as it started. It revved up to about 2k and dropped to a low idle (for cold.. probably 800rpm). I stopped 30 miles down the road for gas and it started back up just fine. 2 days later and it has not repeated the problem. So my questions: Has anyone seen this before? Did I fool the computer into thinking it was no longer cold by shutting it off and starting it back up? (Thus nothing to worry about) Does anyone think it's a bad coil? If you care why I did this... My right wing, gun owing, knuckle dragging, Bush supporting AM radio stations are not coming in very well anymore. I wanted to see if it was noise from the engine causing the problem... thinking it's a bad coil or other electroinics.

ME TOO!!! I've sworn by Redline for the past 10 years.. but when I put it in my Subaru I would get pistion slap when cold and the RPMs go over 2k. I was using 5-50 (I think), and considered going with a thicker one... but ended up putting Mobile 1 10-30 wt with no more problems. I was at 40 to 50k when I went Redline for one oil change.... I'm over 110k now and buy my Mobile 1 at Walmart for $20.02 with a $1.50 walmart filter. I've been running the Mobile 1 out to 10k... sometimes a little more and my engine runs good, sounds good, and feels good. I went with Redline because I know you can go up to 50k on one oil change (with 3k filter changes). I have also ran 0-30 wt Mobile 1 (found at Walmart for $1 each on clearance, bought all 20) with no problem so I think you'll be ok. I'd love to know what redline has to say about this. I know they make a great product, I've seen first hand what redline protection has done for some friends race engines. Upsetting it's too thin for our Subaru engines.

Right now I'm between 112k and 113k... on a '98. She had about 60k on her when I bought her. It's no record, but I am adding over 120 miles a day 5 days a week.

Unplug your battery for about 30 min... should reset everything.

You wouldn't think so... but I remember replacing the shocks in a jeep I had. The new shocks took a good 50 to 75lbs just to begin compressing them. As soon as you let go they (slowly) expanded back to full. The old blown ones that I took off would compress with about 5lbs and moved rather fast compared to the new ones. Those were rancho shocks and made the Jeep ride rough. I agree it is the springs that determine ride height, but I'm thinking the shocks can have a small effect on the height... just like grabbing your rear bumper and pulling on the car you can raise the rear a little... so too can a stiff shock? Just wondering...