GeneralDisorder

What tools do you have to diagnose with? Meter, test light, etc? GD

I was told yesterday about it. Hard to say though if that's true or not. I would have to call the dealer. GD

You can use all the sensors and harness but the manifold itself will not bolt up to the EJ22 heads. GD

SPFI pistons with a Weber is the biggest and easiest performance increase that is viable on an EA81. GD

I recently was told the EA81 pump is also out on stock - at least at the moment. It's made by Hitachi now so they may continue to make them and restock the USDM but no one knows for sure. They order half a dozen and maybe they get them, maybe they dont. Can't get the valves anymore. Our dealer routinely calls Japan on our behalf..... they gave us the EA81 parts book on permanent loan because we are the only shop in town that ever orders parts for them. GD

Do what you like. But you'll be "doing" it while the rest of us are out having fun and actually driving our cars. That's the problem with doing your own thing - you have to figure it out yourself and 99 times out of 100 you end up doing what everyone else has already done and just being late to the party. If there was room in the engine bay I would be telling you to LS it, not EJ it. Because the LS is SOOOOO freakin cheap, and SOOOOO freakin awesome. We just want you to have fun actually driving the car. You seem to want this as well because you say you don't want to spend lots of "TIME AND MONEY" on it. But you have already spent inordinate amounts of time telling us how stupid we all are. My prediction: my response to your rant gets more likes than your rant. Flame on. GD

Go and do it then. Put N2O on it and stop shouting at us. You WILL end up with an EJ in it because you will melt the EA81 and be unable to find a replacement. You do realize you can't buy exhaust valves or pistons for that engine right? Or crankshafts, or even oil pumps at this point. It WILL NOT cost less than an EJ. Not and stay together. Go price out a decent wide-band, EGT gauge, the fuel enrichment system, and the N2O.... just the parts will cost more. Obviously you don't realize this as evidenced by the fact that you have never done it and are here asking how. I have plenty of experience with N2O - we built a supercharged Z06 with N2O.... it made over 1000 HP..... I just got back from a dyno run on an EVO engine that cost over $12,000 to build. Do you really think I am telling you lies about what this will cost? If you slap an N2O kit on there without proper gauges, knowing how to read them, and proper enrichment you will melt the engine. And that's almost certainly what you will do because you don't believe me and others telling you the truth. You will hit that button and cause irreparable damage to an EA81 when it goes crazy lean and cylinder temps shoot up above 2000 F. Hey kid - check out out the post counts of the people responding to your questions and consider that you might want our help with reasonable and intelligent questions at some point.... EA engines = dead platform. GD

The best way to check the cat is to thread an adapter into the O2 sensor bung and use a low vacuum/low pressure gauge like this one: http://www.matcotools.com/catalog/product/TU29P/back-pressure-tester/ A good reading will be less than 3 psi at 2500 RPM, and usually less than 1 psi at idle. If you hate your neighbors then driving it with the header loose can also give you a good idea but it's not direct proof. Mufflers also can clog. Especially on stuff that's 25 years old with low mileage - rust tends to cause failure before miles do. GD

Use a small "ignition points file" to clean up the gouge, optionally fill the damaged area with a little metal fill epoxy (JB weld, etc) and file/sand it smooth. I would do this with the cam in the engine still but depending on your skill level maybe you should remove it. It's just a seal surface and it just needs to be smooth. GD

Check for exhaust back pressure. Clogged cats happen and this fits the symptoms. You will have no end of chasing your tail looking for a solution if you don't check exhaust pressure. GD

Yes you need the harness - really it would be best to get the complete manifold with all sensors and throttle body, harness, etc since sometimes the sensor wiring can change year to year. If you get a 97/98 you will also need the plug wires. I wouldn't drill and tap the head unless you have the engine out. We don't - it's too risky. Plus you will need to buy some fairly expensive 16mm plug and bottoming taps, and a matching drill bit, etc. Just plumb it to the idle control hose coming off the intake tube. GD

About 200 F GD

Try the dealership. Seriously they still have a lot of that stuff. We just bought rear mud flaps for an 81 Hatch. GD

It is the only option. Or put a 2.5 engine back in I guess. Which is more work. Intake swap.... well myself and an employee of mine had to pull one on an engine startup to correct a gasket deficiency and we were in a real huff go get it done and go home. Took about 12 minutes to pull it, swap the gasket and have it running again. So yeah - it's actually VERY easy. The hardest part will be finding an EGR manifold and opening your wallet to own it. GD

That engine has no EGR. You will have to swap the entire intake manifold to remove the EGR code. That is the correct ECU for a 99 Legacy GT. You have a 95 or 96 EJ22 from a manual transmission car. You need a 95 to 98 EJ22 automatic intake manifold and EGR pipe. You can drill and tap the head or you can route the EGR tube to a T spliced into the idle control hose. You can't get around swapping the intake that I am aware of due to how the ECU performs heuristic detection of EGR operation. GD

That pretty much leaves the head gaskets. It's not at all unusual though it's usually not from the pressure gallery like that. If it's really from the gallery I would highly suspect a botched head gasket job in the past. The bolts can be tricky. We see a lot of them galled or stripped and insufficiently torqued due to creaking, etc. GD

Pry it out. With a prybar. It may be tight. GD

Seen that many times. As a Subaru specialist I would have found that in 20 minutes or less. GD

Typical. All you can do is complain. If they don't fix it then you will have to replace the short block or try a new set of rings. Both are very, very expensive jobs. GD

Could be a faulty AVLS pressure switch or some of it could be from the power steering pump. GD

No difference on the auto's really. We see the occasional random front differential pinion bearing failure - seen that anywhere from 90k on up. The filter was added in 99 and removed again in 07-ish. We like them because when you remove the filter you get like 2-3 more quarts out for doing fluid changes. The filter from the dealer is expensive but I sell Amsoil and we found that Amsoil specs their engine oil filter for the trans as well so we just use those - they are synthetic media Champion Labs filters and only cost about $15 retail. If you change the fluids they seem to last indefinitely. If you don't either the front diff pinion will take it out or the trans will quit at about 200k. The EJ22 isn't anymore reliable than the EJ25 if both are run with synthetic and the proper head gaskets and 10mm oil pumps are used going forward (for engines equipped with 7's). The EJ22 was setup for longer head gasket life and came with the 10mm pump but now they are so old you can probably do better by upgrading a 2.5 that is newer with fewer miles on it. The EJ25 has a #5 thrust which is better, and has the same 52mm rod journals on the SOHC variants as well as the 99 DOHC. GD

Get the Outack with the 3.6 H6. They are still having problems with oil consumption on the FB from what we hear at the parts counter. GD

It has some kind of issue. You shouldn't be overheating it like that. Spend the $50 on a scan tool so you can know what you are doing and shut it off before meltdown. Remember the lessons from Three Mile Island. Not having a sensor to tell you the water level in the reactor = melted fuel rods and panic in the streets. GD

That's a heater circuit failure. The sensor is bad. Get a new one. Happens all the time. Heating element burns out in it. GD

No