Cougar

Glad you got it fixed. The warning lights are in series with the alternators' field circuit and that is why you see this kind of thing happen. If some of the diodes go out that will cause this kind of thing to happen. Since your voltage was a little low I would guess that is what your problem was in the alternator.

I would try placing some strips of duct tape around suspected areas that may be causing this problem. Since the mirror is suspect, tape over the joints of that. I would also tape over the door and window seals to see if that helps. Once you find the area that is causing this then you can try shimming the gasket, with some tape possibly under the gasket area to block the leak, or try a new seal. The door panel should have a sealed dust shield barrier under it and there may be a leak there so you should check that also.

Welcome to the club. I hope you enjoy the new car and it gives you a lot of trouble free service. I guess you won't feel the real advantage of these vehicles have in the snow down in Florida but back in New York you should. You should let the dealer look things over before just deciding to replace the CV joints though they may need it. They should be able to determine what is needed.

When you say it doesn't crank I assume you mean the engine is not starting but the starter is turning the engine. No crank, usually means the starter is not working for some reason. You may have blown a fuse or a fueable link in the ignition circuit so I would recommend you check for power getting to the coil first. Use a test light or meter to this. If you have power then check the CAS in the distributor for a problem.

It's the simple things in life that make it so nice. Glad you got the problem solved without much trouble and expense.

If you have a seperate CD player you may be able to bridge onto the line out leads with the ipod output leads. Welcome to the Soob family. May this be the first of other ones later on. My first new car was a '83 GL-10 wagon and had it for 11 years. My current model is a '01 LL Bean. The prices of the cars have sure changed since then but they a lot more car also. Happy drive'n.

I have had to replace the intake manifold gaskets on these models. Check for leaks using some WD-40 around suspected areas while running.

If you are sure that you don't have any hoses that leak under pressure then you either have a intake manifold or headgasket leak.

Have you checked for any vacuum leaks?

Subie Gal brings up some good points. You should consider them Brian. I have purchased some things through her and would definately buy again from her when the need arises. The prices I got were way better than the local dealer prices and service was great. Thanks again Jamie. There may be room out there for another site like you want to do but it could require more of your time than you want to deal with, and how much is that worth to you. I don't mean to discourage you but just wanted give another viewpoint. If you have'nt checked out the real competition like the site Subie Gal gave, you should. It just seems to me that most of these good places have a lot of money backing them and it would be hard for a little guy to make it without a lot of volume. I could be wrong though.

I think the air comes through the ducting above the firewall, under the hood.

You should check the fuel pressure as it very well could be a weak pump. If you have a throttle position sensor it could be bad at that spot on the pot.

I purchased my first new car from Carter Subaru in 1983. Here is a link to them. Jamie Thomas ( Subiegal) is one of the regulars on this board and works there. She races also. She can get you parts at a discount if you need something. http://www.cartersubaru.com/en_US/ As far as tires go I would shop at Costco and see if you could get some Michliens or Bridgestones. They have good prices and a great warranty.

I wouldn't be real concerned about the location of relays until you prove you have a problem to the solenoid connection. You don't have to remove the connection to check it either. Just place your voltage probes on the solenoid connection and a good ground point to check for voltage. If you wanted to, you could build your own testlight out of a tailight bulb and socket. By adding an extension wire and alligator clips to the end you could just attach the setup under the hood so you could view it with the hood up or run it into the passenger compartment. This will make it easier for you catch. If the light works when the problem is occuring then you would just have to move the gator probe to the main lead to check it and your done. I'm not sure how the newer models are wired but I seem to recall my '88 Loyale doing this same kind of thing. It turned out to be a loose fuseable link connection that was the problem. You may want to check yours just for good measure.

I also welcome you to the board Oldeman. Your cars wiring should have some colored plugs near the ECU that you can use to troubleshoot with. They may be green and also black. When you plug one of the sets together it will do certain test proceeds. Your ECU may also have a LED you can read the stored codes from. Your manual should cover the operation of the way the proceedures work. One thing that can happen to kill the FP operation is if you loose the CAS signal. If the ECU or FP control box (depending on the model) does not see that signal it will turn power off to the pump. Hopefully you will have no more problems now that the relay has been changed out. You can also swap relays if they are the same color, to do some future testing.

This problem should be easy to track down. One thing you should have to work on this if you don't have one already, is a voltmeter. With this you won't have to guess at what is wrong and using it correctly will lead you to problem. You can use a testlight also but I prefer a meter since it is more versatile and precise. The small lead to the solenoid is the lead from the ignition switch to turn on the solenoid. You should measure the voltage at the connection when this problem is happening. If things are ok to there you should have 12 volts with the key in the START position. You may have an intermitant solenoid causing this but if the click you are hearing is from the solenoid working then it is ok (the windings anyways), but you may have some other trouble inside the starter possibly. To confirm the trouble is inside the starter you also need to verify that there is 12 volts getting to the main lead on the starter while the key is set to the START position. A bad connection to the battery or a internally corrodid battery cable can cause a problem like this. If you have good voltage at both spots then you know the problem is internal to the starter. Along with the solenoid contacts as a possible problem you may have bad brushes or intermitant windings on the armature. Since you have already worked on the starter you may be better off just replacing it with a remanufactured one if you pin the trouble down to it.

The knock sensor on my '88 Loyale is on top of the engine close to middle. I would think yours may be around there also. Mine looked similar to a oil pressure sensor. It just screwed into the top of the engine and had a single wire connected to it.They can, and do go bad, like mine did. The sensor is a piezoelectric device that generates a signal when vibrated at certain rate. When the cylinder backfires or pings the sensor sends a signal to the ECU and it triggers the CEL (check engine light). If you can't clear the code for a bad sensor and the wiring to it is ok then you may have to replace it.

Your welcome. Let us know what you find out.

My first check would be to look for spark. If you have a spare spark plug you could put that in one of the wires and check it so you would not have to remove a plug. If you don't see spark then you will need to check a number of things. I would use a testlight to check the fuse power. A bad CAS will cause this problem to happen along with other things. If the spark is there then try a small shot of starter fluid into the intake (a 1 second shot) and try to start it. If you have spark and compression it will try to run on the fluid. You will have to check for a fuel delivery problem if it likes the starter fluid. One thing that works well is to listen for the fuel pump while you turn the key to the ON position. It should turn on briefly when you do this. You may have to cycle the engine by cranking it first, then to OFF, and then to ON.

I believe these lights are in the alternator field circuit and will turn on if the alternator has a charging problem. I would have the people that worked on it look things over. You may need another one since it should not work like that. The charging should happen immediately after starting with no delay.

The controls I refer to would be in or near the vents and not the heating control panel. I like your user name. I call my nieces' gray cat that.

It sounds to me the meshy wire you are talking about is a ground strap. These are very flexable and are low resistance to RF signals. There are some of these on the car and I seem to remember one behind the battery. You are going to have to trace the wires back that smoked and see what they are tied to. Whatever is tied to them, is shorted out. This may be a ground for the alternator but I'm not sure. After you find out what is causing this you should hook up a light like Skip suggested or do an ohmmeter check of the power cables before connecting to the battery again. You want to be sure there will be no more sparks. I doubt you damaged the ECU on this.

Do your vents have a control on them to run between AC or vent?

I think you may have to remove the door panel to get at the switch. This is not hard to do but you need to be careful while pulling on the retainers so you don't pull them out of the panel.

Your problem may be due to a dirty lock switch. I would try cleaning it before replacing it.