tbolt1003

Car is a 1995, 123,000 miles. I had the front right hub replaced about 9 months ago, new brakes around that time, as well. The tires are due to be replaced. I was going to put my winter wheel/tires on and see if that took care of the wobble, proving the tires on the car now are the culprit. The wobble does feel like an out of balance tire, now that I think of it. I did not look at the driveshaft joints while I was under there, but will this afternoon.

A few weeks ago, I noticed a slight humming sound coming from what appears to be the right rear of my Impreza, but only on deceleration. When I give the car gas, the hum would go away. In more recent days, the hum has gotten louder and now I sometimes hear a clanking sound when I let off the gas. The car still drives fine, however. This past Friday, I noticed the steering wheel wobbles back and forth from 0-20mph, then stops wobbling above 20mph. For "giggles", I put a fuse in the FWD holder under the hood to try and start tracking down this noise and issue. With the fuse in, the noise is gone. Completely disappeared. The wobbly steering wheel is still there from 0-20mph, however. I've asked some Subaru guys I know and I've gotten answers from a bad wheel bearing up to a rear differential. I crawled under the car last night to look at things and, while everything appears to be fine, when I grabbed the rear CV shafts, there was some play, especially at the inner joint boot. The shafts moved in and out of the differential maybe 1/4 inch. I know it's hard to diagnose issues like this without actually experiencing them, but can someone perhaps guide me in a direction of what may be wrong or what's happening? Thanks!!

Driving home Friday evening, the car overheated, had to have it towed. I called the guy who did the work and, while he's willing to tear it apart again, he thinks the engine is done. Still, taking him up on his offer to take it apart.

Sorry for the delayed reply. For some reason, I can't post pics here. I borrowed a scope and looked down into the cylinder. It is covered in a black, oily substance. Cylinder #2 looks really clean, can see the metal surface of the piston very clearly. The plug for #4 is coated in carbon and a crusty black material. Plug from cylinder #2 looks brand new. I confirmed cylinder #4 is firing and has spark. Is it time to take the car back to the guy who did the work and have him take the head off again?

Thanks for all the replies!!

My '95 Impreza is completely stock, 2.2, auto, 132,000 miles. She's my daily driver and love it. While I can hear that distinct Boxer rumble from about 2500-3500rpm, I'm kinda craving a little more without breaking the bank. The sound produced by the WRX and STi puts a smile on my face. I'm not expecting to get that much sound from my 2.2, but are there any simple mods I can do? I found a shop that makes UEL headers for the 93-96 Impreza. Just curious what's available. If there's not much I can do, I can live with that, no worries. Thanks!

I'll pull the plug later and post a picture. I put the car back together for the time being. I am getting spark at the plug, so guessing your theory on the compression being to low to ignite the mixture is spot on.

Ok, finally got around to pulling the plugs. Cylinders 1, 2 and 3 looked identical, almost brand new. Cylinder 4, however, looked like it had been through a war. Carbon build-up, flaky grey matter. I put a new NGK plug in and drove the car about 5 miles. The rough idle is still there and the CEL is flashing for the misfire and eventually came back on steady. I pulled the new plug and it looked horrible. Worse than the plugs which have been in there for 3 months. A friend came over with his compression test kit and what we found is not promising. Cylinders 1-3 had a solid 170 across the board. Cylinder 4 had 60. Another friend who has Subarus came over and he thinks a burned valve, as he had the same thing happen on his 2000 Legacy GT. When the heads were sent out to be surfaced for the head gasket job 3 months ago, shouldn't they have checked the valvetrain for any issues? I would think they would. My friend who did the compression test said it could be a burned valve or a build-up of carbon not letting the valve close fully. He suggested running some B-12 through the gas tank and see if that breaks up the carbon/cleans out the intake & exhaust valves before resorting to pulling the head again. Any thoughts on this? The Forester is in great shape with only 124,000 miles on her. We want to keep it, so willing to put some more money into it, if necessary.

Peter, yes, reset the CEL. It comes back on a day or two later.

Haven't pulled the plugs yet, going to do that tonight. Hoping that's all it is...

I am still chasing an intermittent misfire on our 99 Forester. Head gaskets were done about (2) months ago, along with new plugs, wires, timing belt, etc. Shortly afterwards, CEL came on, code reader said Misfire Cylinder 4. I've changed plugs, wires, coil pack and the code still reappears. I tried switching the wires around, thinking it was a bad wire, but still no change. I put the V-Power NGK plugs in, BKR5E-11, as that's what the auto parts store showed as OEM. I've read that the V-Power plugs may cause an irregular spark in the cylinder. Any truth to that? I went to NGK's website and they show the BKR5ES-11 is the standard plug. Would having the groove cause a misfire? Last week, the CEL came on for the knock sensor, and I have changed that out, as well. Thoughts on the plugs? Thanks!

That's good news. Thanks!

I have a dedicated winter set for my Impreza. However, a really nice and inexpensive tire my wife has on her Forester is the Kelly Explorer Plus. She didn't want snows last year despite my insisting. The Kelly's got her through the multiple northeast snowstorms we had last year and she does a lot of driving each day. She never complained once.

Thanks. I'll do the knock sensor and see where things are after that. I did the knock sensor on the wife's 1999 Forester not (3) weeks ago, as well.

My daughter called me up and says her check engine light is on and can "dad look at it for her". Of course, I said yes. 2001 Forester, 5-speed manual, 138,000 miles. Car runs fine, according to her, and it seemed to be running fine when I looked at it. P0328 - Knock Sensor 1 Circuit High Bank or Single Sensor P0451 - Evaporative Emissions System Pressure Sensor P0442 - Evaporative Emissions System Leak Detected The research I've done shows the P0328 is probably a bad knock sensor. Where do I start looking for the other (2) items? Her car is due for State Inspection & Emissions testing this month and they will not pass the car here in PA with the check engine light on. Thoughts? Thanks!!

I had the same issue on my Impreza. Fuse was blown.

I tried the dollar bill trick today and it does not get sucked back in at all - it's always being pushed away from the tailpipe. Odd thing, however, is the engine has smoothed out, still a slight shake to it, but nothing like before. It did throw a code for the same P0304, misfire on cylinder 4. It's driving better for her, but I'm still pulling my hair out over this intermittent idle issue. I'm about to go get a set of Subaru plug wires and try them. The plugs were new a month ago and appear fine. Any other thoughts?

It developed later. About a week after we got the car back it started idling rough. You can hear the exhaust at the back of the car doing that put put put put put put sound.

I'm not sure about the valve adjustment. A friend of the family who is very good with Subaru's engines did the work for us. He said he sent the heads out to be surfaced and cleaned up. I can confirm with him this weekend exactly what was done.

So I have multiple issues going on then, correct? Is there an easy way to test for a burnt valve without taking the engine apart again?

Plugs were done after the gaskets, wires before. A coworker has a 2000 Legacy GT and he offered to let me swap parts out to try and diagnose. I tried his wires and coil pack; no change in the idle on my Forester. One new thing, however, is the CEL only flashes now intermittently and hasn't stayed on steadily. The idle is still rough, but once the RPMs are over ~1000, the engine seems to smooth out. Merging onto a highway this evening on my way home from work, I had to get on the gas, and it got up and went strongly. Another new thing I noticed this morning when I initially started driving the car, there was some blue colored smoke from the exhaust. Is that unburnt fuel?

Plugs and wires were done roughly a month ago. NGK plugs, Standard Motor Products wires. I've heard Subaru's are picky about the wires, but these were listed as high quality

Good morning all! I need some help confirming an issue we are having with our 1999 Forester, 2.5 automatic, 128,000 miles. We had the head gaskets done 2 weeks ago and everything turned out fine. Yesterday, however, the check engine light began flashing then went to steady-on. I pulled the codes and one was P1325 and the other was P0304. The P0304 showed up just prior to us doing the head gaskets, too. With the gasket job, we did complete timing belt kit (the one highly recommended Gates kit from Amazon), new gaskets all around. Research last night shows the P1325 indicates a faulty knock sensor, which can possibly cause a misfire, rough idle and poor fuel mileage. The car idles horrible at idle, but smooths out at cruising speed. The fuel mileage seems bad, as well. Any thoughts? Thanks in advance.

That was a really excellent write-up. The Legacy dash does look similar to my Impreza. Doesn't seem that hard to do...just very time consuming. Probably why the dealer is charging what they are.

I've already bypassed the core temporarily. I had coolant dripping out onto my passenger side floor. I called the dealer and they quoted me a hair under $1400 for everything. Apparently, there were multiple bulletins on the core over the years and they're on revision #4. There is a new heater box to adapt to the revised core that I'll need in addition to the core itself.Not what I was expecting to hear numbers wise