Wlavs87

I'm in New England, more specifically central Mass.

He found an engine with about 126K miles on it for $1800. I'll probably take a trip up to his shop on Tuesday and check things out/discuss options.

The words my mechanic used were "valves punched holes right through the top of the piston"

Mechanic pulled the spark plug and stuck a camera down inside, the valves thrashed the piston head.

I'm actually surprised the engine didn't quit out right, the shop I brought it to is a good 30 miles from my house, it did 80 mph on the highway the whole way there, effectively on three cylinders, although it had NO power

So a few weeks ago I bought another Subaru, having previously owned an '01 legacy wagon whose life was cut much too short after getting T-boned 6 months after I bought it. I found an '05 Forester with 99k miles on Craigslist, and bought my buddy (a former Subaru Master tech) with me to check it out. He crawled underneath it and saw the head gaskets had already been done, the steering rack was leaking, and the rear diff. Was leaking a little bit. We popped the hood and started it up, one of the pulleys let out a little whine, so I knew the bearings were going on one of the pulleys. Aside from needing a new car, it was an older Subaru with low-ish miles on it, and it was a forester, I had to have it. So I bought it. After putting roughly 1800 miles on it in three weeks, I start it up the other day and it's making the worst noise I've ever heard. I actually thought the fan blades were running against the radiator. It's loud as hell. I pop the hood and don't SEE anything wrong with it, proceed to drive to night school, and then give my buddy a ride home after that. Two days later I call my mechanic and tell him about it. I brought it to him yesterday, we check the pulleys, they seem alright.....He takes a cover off the motor and checks the timing belt (it's new!). Mechanic calls me today. About 130 pounds of compression on the driver's side rear cylinder and only about 23 pounds of compressionThe on the driver's side front cylinder. The bearings on one of the timing idlers seized, causing a piston to smack the valves pretty hard,the motor is junk. Is this a common problem with these cars? I knew the timing belt usually needs to get done around 120k, and the head gaskets by around 150k. The heads on mine had already been done (according to mechanic, not recently, but they had been replaced, and I saw the timing belt myself, it looked brand new)

Just bought my second Subaru, an '05 Forester, and I'm trying to figure out how the hell it just got as broken as it did, I'll see you in the forums.....