Ravenwoods

Whenever I get a replacement battery, I don't go for the biggest or most expensive. I just go for the middle of the road battery. If you plug your car in and have an oil pan heater, your engine will spin over very nicely. Also with the warm oil, it cuts down on engine wear very much. Just a couple weeks ago we went to Chena Hot Springs resort for the night. They are not connected to an electrical grid and so have to produce their own electricity through geothermal processes. So they only have a limited number of places for cars to plug in. When we got there we could not get parked in a spot where we could plug in. I just replaced our battery last August as it was about five years old and showing signs of not being as strong as it used to be. The temperature was about -25 F and the next morning early I went out to see if there were any empty parking spots so I could move my 1998 Forester (215,000 miles) to a place where I could plug it in. The car had been sitting overnight for about 14 hours and the engine and oil were totally cold. I just barely got the car started. I moved the car and plugged it in. Six or seven hours later when it was time to checkout of our room, the car started as if it was summertime. This is how dramatically effective a block heater and oil pan heater are. This really does reduce wear and tear on your engine.

Heet can be useful if you live in a warm wet area like Seattle and you travel over to a colder place such as over the Cascade mountains to Eastern Washington where it can get colder at night. Sometimes moisture in your fuel can cause problems and putting in a can of heet before you drive over can help.

Plugging in your block heater and oil pan heater all night is totally unnecessary. The electric company says that in extreme cold weather such as 50 below, that plugging in for more than four hours is wasteful. Usually 2 hours is plenty. You can get a timer to set so that the extension cord is energized at a certain time. Also there are kits you can install on your car that turns the block heater and oil pan heater off once the block has achieved a certain temperature. As far as sludge forming because of an oil pan heater, that is nonsense. Every car in Fairbanks has one. I change my own oil all the time and no sludge every comes out. The oil pan heater would need to get hot enough to burn the oil to create sludge and that just is not the case.

Check to make sure the block heater is actually functioning by putting your hand on the block near the block heater to see if it is warm. Here in Fairbanks, Alaska, they urge everyone to plug in their block heaters and oil pan heaters when it is 20F or colder. A warm block greatly reduces the amount of unburned hydrocarbons your exhaust pipe puts out into the air. We get temperature inversions here that trap pollutants in air and the air can get quit bad. The oil pan heater really helps the engine to spin over nice and fast and reduces engine wear at those low temperatures. If you cannot find one in the stores there, let me know and I can mail one to you. You just use some silicone sealant to glue it onto the bottom of your pan.

An oil pan heater pad and engine block heater are more important than a battery warmer. Here in Fairbanks Alaska we routinely get cold temps like this. I used to have the battery heater also, but as long as your battery is healthy and you have a block heater and an oil pan heater, your engine will crank over easily and start pretty good. Will run rough for a bit and make all kinds of aweful noises. This is if your engine is well maintained. Ours has 215,000 miles on it and still going. But fortunately we have a warm garage for it to enjoy at night.

Thanks for the help. I found some pictures online of where the purge valve is and Napa has a nice picture of the part: http://www.napaonline.com/Catalog/CatalogItemDetail.aspx/Canister-Purge-Solenoid/_/R-CRB2283725_0347584587#Full0 Found it on my car. Looks like one bolt is holding it on. Since I cleared the code from my car on Saturday night the check engine light has not come back on. I interpret that to mean it is not a leak from rust or a cracked rubber tube. This seems to point to the Purge Valve or Evaporative canister itself. Most likely the purge valve acting up from time to time. The check Engine light only came on about two weeks ago and then went out by itself, before coming on again. Will a faulty Purge Valve cause the intermittent rough engine idling I have noticed? It is not that noticeable since my wife had never noticed it. Anyway, this morning while dropping my daughter off at the school bus stop, I did not notice any of the rough idle episodes.

I went to the Napa Car parts website and they call it a Canister Purge Solenoid. Should I get OEM subaru parts in case I need a new purge valve solenoid? Or will the Napa Echlin part be fine? How about the Canister? They want $87 for the canister and $107 for the purge solenoid.

I took the plastic shield off of the filler tube and there was only a bit of dirt. Some rust but not too much, mostly up around the top and on the smaller pipe that connects to the rubber hoses to the canister. Took a small wire brush and cleaned it up a bit. When I took the gas cap off, there was the standard vacuum sound you get when you take off the cap. I opened the hood of the car and looked for anything that might look like a purge valve but did not spot it.

Thanks for the help. I'll check this all out. What is the "number 3 runner of the intake manifold" that you mention?

Heating bill is not so bad since I heat with wood that I gather myself. Huge amount of work every summer to get 11 or 12 cords of wood to heat garage, house, and all our domestic hot water. We have one of those wood burning boilers that is connected to our oil burning boiler. But it helps keep this 53 year old alive. But since I heat with wood I turn the thermostats up to 74 or 75 and we have floor heat so the floors are nice and toasty and our cat worships the warmest floor spots. Yes, we have a block heater on the Subaru and an oil pan heater. Some people even have a battery warmer. But if your battery is strong, it really isn't necessary if your block heater and oil pan heater have done their job. The engine will crank over nicely at 30 below. My diesel truck has a spot on each side of the block for a block heater and I've been tempted to put in a second block heater for really cold days like 30 or 40 below. At night it is in the garage, but after being outside while I'm at work for 8 hours, it runs pretty rough for 15 seconds when I start it up. I'll check the connection to the canister to see if I can spot any problem and maybe get a new gas cap. Last summer I left the gas cap on top of the car after filling it up and drove off. While going down the freeway I heard something rolling off the car and saw it hit the pavement in my rear view mirror. Later on I returned on my motorcycle to look for it and found it. Also got a bonus: a very nice ball thrower for our dog. Apparently someone left it on a car bumper or something.

Rooster2, I think I have you beat on the cold and snow. Here in Fairbanks, Alaska temperature is currently about minus 7 and expected to drop tonight to about -25 and Monday night to -31. But fortunately I have a heated garage. But at the moment I'm a bit worn out from installing new laminate flooring to do much checking out on the old Subaru. Here in Fairbanks, Alaska, we don't get corrosion on our vehicles as our snow is a dry powder snow and they do not put salt on the roads. So I think a corroded fill pipe is unlikely.

We have a 1998 Subaru Forester S with about 215,000 miles on it. Our check engine light starting coming on intermittently in the past two weeks. Last night I went down to the O'Reilly Auto parts store where they loan you the code reader for free. So it said the problem is: P1440 Fuel Tank Pressure System Range / performance no. 1 The car runs great. But at idle one gets an intermittent rough spot in the idle. This has been going on for many months -- possibly a year. But I think maybe it has gotten more noticeable. Would this rough intermittent idle be related to the P1440 code or it is possibly just a coincidence. Also, I googled this error code and found this information: Possible causes - Faulty EVAP Purge Control Valve - EVAP Purge Control Valve harness is open or shorted - EVAP Purge Control Valve circuit poor electrical connection So is that the plastic box thing at the back right of the car near the bumper? Sounds like this might be an easy fix? Any suggestions on how to fix this? Read more: http://helpforcars.net/obd_codes/p1440_subaru.html#ixzz2nYuNgbPf

Our -30 F. weather has moderated a bit to -15 or -20. But this morning when I started up the Forester, I immediately heard a new noise. Later as I stood in front of the car and listened, I thought, "That is probably the alternator bearings starting to go in this cold."

I forgot to mention I just replaced the upwind oxygen sensor. Also the cat was replaced maybe 40,000 miles ago. I did replace the knock sensor also--maybe 40,000 miles ago. I forgot about the water pump. Hope it holds out for much longer. Radiator and hoses look good to me. Up here in Fairbanks, Alaska they don't use much salt on the roads as it is not effective in our extremely cold temperatures. So as far as external corrosion to the radiator, there isn't any. We have short summers so hot weather doesn't have much effect on the rubber parts. In the winter our car is in a heated garage--but that has only been for the past few winters. That cuts down on wear and tear on the car a lot. We've replaced the radiator fluid a few years ago.

Our 1998 Forester has 191,000 miles on it and we got it when it has 103,000. It seems that it is due for an alternator failure any time. My GMC truck, with 143,000 miles, had its alternator die yesterday with -30 F. weather. But fortunately I've got a heated garage, so got it changed easily. Just getting it home was the struggle. I had a Nissan Stanza once and it seemed its alternator gave up sometime after 170,000 miles. Just wondering what alternator experiences other's have had. I'm just trying to guess the most likely problems to turn up next. My guess is the starter motor and the alternator are the most likely things. I've already replaced plugs, wires, injectors, timing belt, timing belt tensioner, clutch, lots of pulleys.

The car is running great now. No more misfiring and has normal power again. Next time we fill up the gas tank I'll post the miles per gallon we are getting.

Since the oxygen sensor was so old I decided to replace the front one. I had cleared the misfire code for cylinder 2 on Monday at O'Reilly auto parts and the next day it came back on the same way by flashing first. I dropped by O'reilley again tonight and it was the same code: Misfire cylinder 2. I changed the front O2 sensor this evening and then started looking at the spark plug wires. I immediately discovered the number 2 cylinder spark plug wire was not attached to the spark plug. I just sent an email to my mechanic about this. I wonder if the plug got damaged from the sparks arcing to the spark plug. Seems the spark plug was able to fire enough of the time that the engine ran very smooth except for the occasional mis.

Front Oxygen sensor was replaced about 40,000 miles ago I think. This was not the original timing belt. Last timing belt change was maybe 40,000 miles ago.

We had a compression test done and a leak down test. Valves passed the leak down test. But eventually the problem turned out to be that the timing belt had slipped a couple teeth. So we replaced timing belt and belt tensioner. While we were driving it with the teeth slipped, could the valves have gotten burned?

We've been using the Iridium plugs all along without any problems. That is what the mechanic used and we just replaced what was in there.

We have a 98 Forester with 190,700 miles. Yesterday the CEL started blinking. I dropped by the O'Reilley Car Parts store and discovered they will use their OBD II code scanner to read your DTC. The only code was Misfire on Cylinder 2. I've recently replace all spark plugs with those iridium plugs, all the plug wires, and fuel injectors. The car runs fine, but every once in a while it misses a beat--I guess a misfire. Anyway, I've heard a blinking CEL is some sort of bad news about the Catalytic converter. The gas mileage is terrible. I haven't had the chance to measure the miles per gallon, but at the rate the gas gauge needle is dropping, the mileage is very low. Could this perhaps be a bad oxygen sensor (before the catalytic converter) even though no code is being thrown?

I suctioned it out and put in ATF Dexron. Will be getting a new quart of ATF to flush it out again later today.

I just suctioned out the power steering fluid from my 1998 Forester with one of those turkey baster type devices. I poured in some Prestone Power Steering fluid. After that I noticed the cap says to use ATF Dexron. I had always thought power steering fluid is power steering fluid. Anyway, is it alright to use the Prestone Power Steering Fluid? Or should I suction it out and replace with the ATF Dexron?

Turns out my 1998 Forester with 190,000 miles on it, had a slipped timing belt. My mechanic could see no reason for it to have slipped. So we just replaced the timing belt and belt tensioner. It has slipped at least 2 teeth. Previously we had done a compression test and leak down test. He found the compression about 200 psi for each of the two passenger side cylinders and 150 psi for the two driver's side cylinders. Then I found this post earlier in this thread: "I just had this same problem with an EJ25D (which is what your GT has unless it's been swapped to a 2.2). Turned out the intake cam pulley bolt was not tightened enough when the owner did the head gaskets (himself) and this resulted in the cam pulley bouncing on the cam nose and gougeing a nice L-shaped trench out of the keyway. The intake valve timing on the passenger side was advanced by about 3 belt teeth. Due to the nature of the failure the compression test showed high (but otherwise ok - was around 200 psi where it should have been about 185). The giveaway after many hours of diagnostics was that the two passenger side cylinders had compression that was too high and was *the same* higher number for both cylinders - thus leading me to the valve timing and leading me to pull off the belt and inspect." So I figured this had to be the problem as we had eliminated just about every other possibility. My mechanic seemed to have been embarrassed for missing this and gave me a $100 discount on the job. Anyway, the car is running fine again. Hopefully it will keep going 20,000 before the next problem.

I think my Subaru Forester also has a slipped belt. Compression is 200 on the passenger side cylinders and 150 on the driver's side. The OBD code reader says misfire on cylinders 1 and 3. Plugs and wires have been changed. Car has 190,000 miles. I changed pcv and fuel injectors.