musubk

It just so happens I have a 3rd gen parts car, maybe this is what I should do. How do you 'break' the torsion bar so you don't have the EA82 springs adding to the torsion bar rather than replacing it?

I have an 86 BRAT and it seems to sit much higher in the rear end. I put a 2 inch lift in the front and that basically leveled it out. It also seems very stiff in the rear, as if it's oversprung. Is there a way to tell if a previous owner has clocked the torsion bar up? I've never tried adjusting it, but if I could determine it was adjusted up, I'd clock it back down and add some lift blocks to regain the ride height.

So if EA81 axles are so hard to find, what would it take to use EA82 rear axles? If it's as simple as changing to EA82 hubs then that seems like the way to go. I'm in the process of putting an EA82 crossmember and front axles/suspension into my BRAT, partly because of the greater availability of replacement parts. I have a whole EA82 parts car sitting here...

I took apart a set of EA82 front calipers today, to replace the seals inside the cylinders. One of them I'm having trouble getting back together. On the 'inside' of the piston, there's a female threaded hole that should screw onto a threaded rod inside the caliper. My problem is that female threaded hole in the piston spins freely within the piston. That bit, which seems to be set into a thin rectangular plate that connects to the outer piston body, doesn't seem to be retained in that rectangular plate at all. I can't screw it onto the rod in the caliper because, after a couple of threads engage and I get some resistance, the outer body of the piston just spins forever without turning the hole about the threaded rod in the center. I hope this description is making sense. The threaded hole inside the piston just spins freely when turned clockwise to install, but is retained when spinning counterclockwise - which allowed me to unscrew the piston from the caliper but not reinstall it. Is it supposed to do this, or is the retention of that part somehow broken and I need a new piston? I feel like I may be missing something simple. The piston on the other caliper screwed back in with no trouble other than being very difficult to turn.

"Mainly, i'm trying to decide if im gonna redrill to 6x140, 5x100 or 4x100" There's a reason people redrill to 6x139.7 - you can use two of the bolts from the 4x140 pattern as part of the 6x139.7 pattern, which locates the wheel so the new holes you drill are centered. If you're going to drill for any other pattern you need a plan for how to center the pattern on the hub. I've done the 6x139.7 redrill, an EJ22 swap, a homemade lift, and I'm about to tackle a transmission swap, rear disc brake conversion, and EA82 suspension swap, but trying to drill a 5x100 or 4x100 pattern is not something I'd want to try; that sounds way sketch.

I found an 87 GL-10 in the local junkyard for the parts to do a rear disc conversion on my BRAT; I took the proportioning valve, rear hubs, backing plates, and hardware from it. I left the old rusty calipers and rotors with the plan to just buy good new stuff. I want to use the blank Brembo rotors but I can't find them for rears, only fronts. Where can you get the rear Brembo rotors?

I swapped the engine from a 1990 automatic legacy into my 86 BRAT, with the original 4 speed D/R. In the process of thinning out the wiring harness, I came across a part which I believe is the 'transmission control module' for the automatic in the Legacy, it's a decent sized box with three wiring plugs going into it. I left it in place at the time, but now that I'm trying to clean up and pack all the wiring away in the BRAT it would be nice to get rid of this bulky thing. Do I need this? Obviously I no longer have the transmission it's supposed to be controlling, I'm just worried that it'll cause trouble with the ECU if it isn't there.

Okay, will do.

For the record (because I hate when I search and find a thread and there was never any posted resolution), I finally got an IR thermometer and confirmed the fan was not kicking on when it should. Rather than try to track the problem down, I just bought a $15 adjustable aftermarket thermoswitch, let the engine heat to 200F degrees, then set the thermoswitch adjustment for that temp. My dash gauge reads about half range at 200F degrees.

Thanks all, I'll look for a 4wd EA81 (not hatch) tank.

My 86 BRAT has some rust holes in the fuel tank. I took it to a shop to have it welded up, but the holes are right next to the seam between the two tank halves and the guy thinks the tank will pop apart from the heat of welding. There are no BRATs in the local salvage yards, does the tank fit from any of the other models?

They are 4x140mm, which are almost impossible to find in anything but 80s Subarus. For that reason, a lot of people either swap to 5x100mm hubs, or redrill to 6x139.7mm and use truck wheels.

For my N/A EJ22 86 BRAT swap, I used the 1st gen legacy radiator that came with the engine. It fits without needing to cut anything, you just need to fab a couple of simple brackets to mount it. I used four little rectangles of 1/4" aluminum, with one end of the rectangle bolted to the car and the other end bolted to the radiator, on all 4 corners of the radiator. The stock EJ22 hoses worked with a little length cut off the ends, and I used a 10" Flex-a-lite fan in a 'pusher' configuration. It's a pretty simple setup and seems to provide plenty of cooling. This photo is a mock-fit using zip-ties (you can see one near the bottom) before I made the brackets.

I know the fan is getting power because I can jump a ground wire onto pin 86 on the relay and the fan kicks on, it just seems to never get that ground signal from the ECU. Getting one of the laser thermometer guns is a good idea, then I'll know what my actual temperature is for when the gauge is reading high.

Yeah, that's it. My setup is redrilled EA81 flywheel, EA81 clutch disc, XT6 pressure plate, 720 throwout bearing, and the 4 speed DR. It shifts and drives just fine. By the way, thank you so much for your EA2EJ.pdf document! This was my first engine swap, and my BRAT runs beautifully now on it's new EJ22

I have a phase 1 EJ22 swapped in my 86 BRAT, and I'm not sure my electric fan is working. I used the radiator from my donor Legacy, with a Flex-a-lite electric fan mounted as a pusher configuration, on a Bosch style relay. To switch the relay I used the 'radiator fan' wire coming out of the ECU (F47-17), which should get 0V when the fan is supposed to be on and 12V when the fan is supposed to be off, so I fed an ignition switched power wire into the relay pin 85, and the relay pin 86 goes to F47-17, which the ECU should ground when the fan is supposed to come on. For the temp gauge on my dash, I used a 255Ohm resistor in parallel to the thermometer wire to recalibrate the EJ22 thermometer to work with the EA81 gauge, as suggested by reading on this forum. The gauge now reads just under half during normal driving with airflow through the radiator, and will climb to near the top after 10-15 minutes of idling. But my fan never switches on, and I'm not sure if I'm just chickening out before it gets hot enough or if it really isn't working. So, how high above the normal driving temperature should the car get before the fan switches on?

For the record, the Nissan 720 throwout bearing works fine even though it's not snug on the 4 speed clutch fork / input shaft. I'm going to stop talking to myself now.

Last night I ordered some Hella H4 housings to replace the low beams. My high beams are still pretty good so I'll leave them alone for a while. They were pretty pricey at $150 for the pair, but they're aluminum housings and glass lenses, unlike most of the generic H4 conversion lights (all plastic), and they had good reviews. I was REALLY tempted to just get new sealed beams since they're pretty cheap, but I decided 'what the hell, let's try it'. It's about to be dark for a lot of hours every day here in Alaska so good lights are a good thing.

My first head gasket job, I put one of the gaskets in upside down, and got a fountain of oil squirting several feet above the car when I started it. That ruined the bearings on my 2002 Subaru (this was around 2004-2005, so not some old beater I could afford to trash) and I had to pull the motor again and now learn how to do crank bearings. I'm pretty conscious about being certain things fit together properly now. My best, not really mistake but lucky streak, was with my current BRAT project. I needed an EJ donor and picked a $200 Legacy off Craigslist that the guy said 'ran well but needed a new transmission'. I figured at $200 it was worth a gamble on getting a good engine. The Legacy turned out to have an awesome engine that turns over instantly and purrs, a brand new radiator, and a nearly new set of winter tires. I pulled the engine, ECU, wiring harness, and radiator for my BRAT, sold the winter wheels/tires for $250, rented a U-Haul trailer ($55) to cart the remaining shell away to salvage and they gave me $50 in credit for it which I used for some rear disc conversion parts from a GL-10 they had on the lot. In the final tally, I got a good engine, ECU, harness, new radiator, and some of the parts for my rear disc conversion, all for $5.

I already rewired the headlights to be positive switched, so that's no problem. I may try a set of the cheaper generics to see how they look. I'm willing to pay more for nicer units but I'm just not sure if the more expensive ones are actually better.

I'd love to see an update when you get them in.

My 86 BRAT is in need of new headlights. It has the quad light sealed beams. I've rewired them on relays to get more voltage at the lights, but the housings themselves are old and fogged up, so I plan to just replace them. What kind of options do I have? I've been looking at generic 4x6 housings on Amazon that fit replaceable bulbs, like H4s, but it's hard to guess what kind of quality the housings are, or how the beam pattern looks. I've also considered the 4x6 housings that just have a bright LED panel for high beams. And sometimes in photos on here I see people using yellow colored units - what are those? I live in an area with lots of snow and low-glare yellow bulbs might be a good thing.

Heyyy that first one on imgur with the blue BRAT in the water is mine

I think I understand this now... the vent line I'm looking for comes out of that canister in the fender. I was confused because I only saw two lines coming out in the engine bay. The third - the factory return line - comes out near the transmission tunnel instead. So I will hook up the vent line (smaller of the two coming out near the driver's strut tower) to my EJ22 canister. Feed and return lines I'm just running new hose.

I'm near wrapping up my EJ swap, EJ22 from a 1990 Legacy into a 1986 BRAT. I was plumbing the fuel system today. I know what to do with the fuel delivery and return, but I'm confused about the vent from the tank that goes to the charcoal canister and the purge control solenoid. The EA81 didn't have this line, so I'm not sure where on the fuel tank I should take this out of. The tank has: 2 lines on the forward, lower part of the tank. These are fuel feed and return. 1 big hose on the passenger side for the filler neck, and around a half inch hose next to that for the filler vent. 2 small nipples on the rear passenger side that loop through some kind of device inside the fender near the taillight. I assume this is the vent system for the EA81. So I figure I want to use one of those two small lines that were used for the ?vent? on the EA81 into the rear fender. To which of those two nipples should I attach my vent line and run to the engine bay? Does it matter which one I use? Then just cap off the other one? Or maybe use a 'T' fitting to feed both of them into the vent line? I know the car will run without this at all but I'd rather have it hooked up.