GeneralDisorder

For rubber o-rings, etc the best stuff by far is Dow Corning 111. It's got a lot of uses in a shop - it also doubles as the BEST dielectric grease you can easily get. As for RTV and the oil pump gasket. Generally not advisable. Anaerobic is a better choice and should still be used sparingly and only to fill imperfections in the mating surfaces as noted. GD

I've drilled and tapped quite a few of these. First you drill through to the exhaust port with a 1/4" bit. Then you measure the depth of an existing port (another head or a manifold port) and mark this depth on a 9/16" bit (IIRC) and drill to that depth. This is the critical operation that must be done to the right depth to avoid the water jacket. Then you tap the hole with an M16 x 1.5 tap. It's not that hard to do if you take your time. One of my engine suppliers will do it prior to shipping if you need EGR on one of their JDM engines. GD

Copper RTV will help to seal exhaust gaskets or flanges that have imperfections in the surfaces. It is used quite often for that and works quite well. Exhaust temps drop off dramatically once you are away from the heads a foot or two. Downstream of the header gaskets it's not hot enough to damage the copper RTV. GD

Chain wrench and an old belt..... Hysteresis is your friend. It's quite easy to loosen things if you understand some of Newton's laws. GD

It's a very expensive proposition typically. I rebuild transmissions quite a bit and parts costs can often kill the viability of it. Used transmissions are almost always cheaper. Most of the parts have to be ordered through Subaru as they are not generic. The prices will astound you I'm sure. The last EJ 5MT I did a full bearing/synchro job on was something like $800 in parts. For a turbo race transmission with a front LSD this isn't an issue. For an EA dual range its way out of the price range of viability. You'll need a press, bearing splitters, and pullers/drivers, etc at a minimum to do a rebuild on a transmission. GD

Impact for the pulley nut. Cordless works fine usually. They aren't that tight. File/grind spacer down to ~8-9mm thick for the maxima alt. Testing an alt in the junk yard is not possible without spinning it and an excitation voltage source. With a jump pack, a bit of wire, and a drill motor you could do it but in practice you assess the viability based on the appearance of the alt and the car it came from. GD

A urethane replacement "split bushing" would be an option if you can find one that would fit. One of the first control arms we pushed the bushing out of... Well the driver tool was a few thou too big and it swedged the bushing tube out so that a new bushing would fall right through. :-p. I really wanted to save the control arm because we had already reamed the ball joint taper to accept a legacy BJ. We ended up cutting off the bushing receiver tube and welding on a new one. I believe it turned out to be a common nominal size so it wasn't actually a big deal at all. I'll try to find out what size tube we used. At any rate you can probably find a split bushing of proper size. GD

It's probably the transfer case/center diff support bearings. You can pull the transfer case and repair it as needed with the transmission in the car. The front VC/diff support bearing is a common failure item - so much so that it's stocked by most dealers. Rear diff failure is exceptionally unlikely. GD

Nope. You need a press and you'll likely have to make a special press driver to push them out and the new one's back in. They are VERY tight - it's typically about 5 to 6 tons on my press before they move. I had a friend turn out a driver on his lathe so I could press these in/out on the race Brat. GD

Wheel bearings - they used ball bearings on the Forester and Impreza and the fix is to install the Legacy roller bearings. If you let them go too long you will also likely have to replace the hub. GD

If you change the bearing order one for a '94 Legacy Turbo 5MT. It's about the same price but is a 10-ball bearing instead of the stock 6-ball. It's usually not that hard to get the bearing off - a bearing seperator and a press or an H puller and some all-thread will do the trick without much fuss. Installation only requires a hammer and a piece of pipe to engage the inner race. The Redline is *ok*. But not as good as the Subaru Extra-S. You can get Extra-S through some dealers that will fill a gallon jug if you bring your own. Others you have to buy the 20L drum. There are also web sites that offer it in Liters though the cost is much higher. When bought in the 20L drum the cost per liter is typically less than Redline but you have to buy 5 transmissions worth at about $140 for the drum. You can split it with some friends, etc if you go that route. GD

If they do a visual it will fail. Sniff test.... Put a cat in it and run two gallons of denatured alcohol to 1/4 tank of gas. It will pass - I guarantee it. GD

That's not been my experience. Here's one informative source: http://www.aa1car.com/library/exhaust_backpressure.htm From the above linked article on exhaust back-pressure testing: GD

Newer stuff the fans remove easier but I like having the extra room and I can blow out the fins of the radiator and inspect it for tank leaks easier with it out. GD

My experience with Toyota's is that they use a flanged O2 sensor and the stock one's don't have threads as the flange is swedged to the sensor body. That makes it impossible to use non-foulers unless it has aftermarket sensors with threaded flanges - I've had to buy new sensors in order to get threaded flanges or order the threaded flanges separately to complete a bung-pipe install on a number of Toyota's. Check the pictures of the sensors on Rockauto for that specific model. GD

Right - with no jiggle pin there's no way for the coolant to flow from the radiator into the engine except through the upper radiator hose. The thermostat effectively caps off the lower hose which turns the radiator into a dead-end. At that point the only way it's going to get into the engine is by flowing down the upper radiator hose and that's at the opposite end of the radiator as the filler neck on the EA81's. Very slow process for air to get back through the radiator and out the filler neck and for coolant to run back in and take it's place. GD

The O2 port you want to do the pressure test on is the one before the cat - should be up near the engine if the cat is right after the header. Don't use a non-fouler - get some of these: http://www.ebay.com/itm/251151741085?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1497.l2649 They work with more certainty. I've had non-foulers not do the trick on some severe cases. These 90 degree units have the benefit of being able to orient the sensor in any direction that's convenient and then lock down the threaded lock ring. For the price, no need to drill them out, greater effectiveness, etc they are a no brainer. I stock half a dozen of them at all times. These will work with NO cat. Many aftermarket "racing" exhausts come with a similar welded-on 90 degree "bung pipe" for this purpose. GD

I remove the radiator 100% of the time when doing timing belts and there is plenty of room to get a feeler gauge in there. GD

The way to check this is to plumb into the O2 sensor port with a pressure guage and check for a build-up of pressure before the cat - there should be almost none. Maybe 1 to 2 psi. Any higher and the cat is likely clogged. Temps are not always a reliable way to check for a clogged cat. Though in every case of a clogged cat I've seen the car would barely drag itself down the road and fuel consumption was heavily impacted. Last one I did was a late model Chrysler van and it struggled to get up to 45 MPH. GD

I can't find anything about them outside of Australia and the part numbers don't seem to cross over to anything on the US side. GD

I've never seen that happen. But then I always follow the specs on fitment of that guide plate as well as the ones on the DOHC rear belt covers (if equipped). I have never had any trouble at all running a feeler gauge into the gap to check clearance. I always check at the middle and at either end. Same with the corner guides on the belt covers. Neat tool though.... I guess us Americans don't get them? :cool: GD

'99 to about '03 or so have progressively smaller issues with coolant weepage. After that it's usually oil and it gets on the exhaust where it causes smoking and smelly vapors. If you can put up with that it's not absolutely critical that the HG's be replaced but usually people give in eventually and have the HG's done to correct the annoyance. The conditioner (stop leak) is pretty successful with the coolant weepage issue. I've seen them so bad it loses a 6" puddle of coolant while you are shopping for groceries. And I've seen the Holts Radweld fix it for YEARS even when that bad. GD

I've seen this on lifted EJ swaps before - the radiator being a lot higher than the engine causes problems with getting the fluid in them. It takes some effort to get all the air out. If you don't have one of these they are really useful: http://www.amazon.com/Lisle-24610-Spill-Free-Funnel/dp/B001A4EAV0 It allows you to create a reservoir of coolant above the filler neck and then massage the air out by pumping the hoses. Works quite well for Subaru's in general. Also make sure you have an OEM thermostat with a proper jiggle pin in it. Otherwise air will be trapped till the thermostat opens and since EJ's use cold-side control that never happens as the engine heat rises and the thermostat stays cold even when the engine is overheating. GD

I've seen a bad connection at a coil pack tower cause the coil to be damaged internally and not fire on a single cylinder. This was on a '99 Impreza. I changed the plugs and wires (wire was burned on the coil pack end and might as well do $2 plugs while in there) and installed a used coil pack and it's been fine ever since. One thing you can do to check this if you have an inline spark checker (cheap) put it on the #2 plug tower and use that tower to fire the #1 cylinder (remember - wasted spark fires both cylinders anyway). If the misfire moves from #1 to #2 then you have found the culprit. GD

I've seen a lot of Subaru HG failures and not a single one has mixed fluids. This has been said MANY times: EJ22's and EJ25D's blow HG's from the fire ring to a coolant passage. Always. This results in exhaust gasses in the coolant. No oil/coolant mixing is ever seen. EJ251/2/3/4 (SOHC 2.5's) leak coolant and oil externally on the ground. They might mix once outside the engine but they don't mix inside it. The fix is to replace the HG's with the 2.5 turbo HG. The compression change is slight and insignificant and they NEVER leak again. GD