RallyKeith

They are lying!!!! Take a look over here. http://www.legacygt.com/forums/showthread.php?t=12608 The subaru part number for the headunit that plays MP3s is 86201AG63A Since the Owners manual is misleading on the MP3 thing I would push to get this unit installed if you can. Keith

The turbo models all have the automatic dualzone climate control as far as I know, and the Head unit and climate control are all one physical electronic unit. No one has made a replacement for it yet. I've been looking for some time now. This issues and '05 being the first year for the 5EAT and the sport shift were the two determening factors for me buying an extened warranty on my '05 LGT. Keith

Bemidji

http://www.blackriverstages.com This is another one of NASA's Rally Moto Events! Come see Motocross bikes compete on the same stage roads as cars! The area is beautiful, and so are the roads. Flowing smooth roads with occasional yumps and even a few jumps. If you're in the area come on out and watch! Don't forget, you can also get up close to the action by volunteering to work! Keith

http://www.rallynewyork.com/intrny07-index.html New from the event Says that Joseph Burke rolled on the first stage. Everyone was ok but they were out. Nothing else yet.

I've got 20k on my 05 LGT, no issues. In fact, I'm quite surprised that I've got about half the tread remaining. Sounds like something to "chat" about with the dealer. Keith

Don't ground it, simply unplug it a shove a piece of wire between the two contacts. The plug should have the female ends making this easy.

Good point.... The stealership told my aunt she needed a new driver's side power window switch on her 91 Legacy, and of course wanted to charge her loads of money. I got one at a junk yard and did the swap. Turned out her switch was just fine, it was the wiring harness to the door. One of the was had broken internally and only made intermittant contact. Keith

Outback sport = Impreza use http://www.car-part.com You can get a used one as cheap as $35 + shipping. Keith

I think they also did it for noise issues. I've heard they get a lot of customer complaints once the cars get a few years old. I haven't heard those things about the Forester, but I was told that we should expect a "brighton" type model for the new impreza. Something closer to the mid 90's sticker price of $14k-$15K for a base model.

Well, I'm gonna chime in and state that this is the First Subaru "hatch back" I'd own since the 80's hatch. I'm a wagon/hatch person, and with my gen2 Legacy wagon on it's way out, and me not really caring for the automatic in my 05 Legacy sedan as I hoped I would, a used '08 impreza hatch may be in my future. The dual wishbone rear suspension setup makes for some serious room in the hatch area. The lines are now nice and flowing, like the car was designed from the ground up as a hatch/wagon, not like all the previous Impreza wagons. The only thing I'm not so sure about is the framed windows. For thos that haven't seen it in person, no more frameless windows on the doors. Don't forget that the Impreza's design is heavily influenced by Rally. For whatever reason the Hatch formula has been working for Ford and Puegot, so after some recent lack luster years, Subaru is following suit. I also think the framed door windows helps in the torional regidity of the car which translates to better cornering from less chassis flex. The sedan on the other hand is pure crap in my opinion. It looks like a Saturn or a Kia, and north america is the only market that gets a sedan. I'll be very curious to see what the STi looks like in this version, and for those that don't know it will be in the hatch body. Keith

Somebody over on our Rally Message board picked up a 99 Forester with a blown EJ25. I can't remember, or for some reason find, the details on which years you can swap the EJ22 directly into. So, will the 95 Automatic Legacy EJ22 swap right into a 99 Forester? Thanks, Keith

I'm just gonna chime in with owning a 95 Legacy brighton 5spd... 206,000 miles. Engine has only ever had seals and belts, runs like a champ, no oil usage or burning. Transmission had original fluid in it when I got the car at 150k miles. Finally at 180k I had to replace the main bearing on the input shaft of the tranny due to excessive noise, but I can gaurentee that was due to poor maintanence of the previous owner. Othen than that just normal things.

I pulled the pan on a 96 legacy last year and it had a big round magnet in it. I was very surprised to see it. In 96 they didn't have the external filter though. I'm not sure when they got the external filter, but one could speculate that they may have gotten rid of the magnet when they did that. Keith

Your car doesn't have cruise control... The black connector circled is used when you have cruise control. The brake pedal switch gets replaced with a dual switch for cruise control and uses that connector instead. The grey connector could very well be for the cruise control module, but I believe on an impreza that module hides up above the pedals on the drivers side.

Does your binding only happen when reversing? I believe it is normal to have torque bind in reverse. Keith

The battery light in a subaru actually comes on when the alternator is not charging. This seems to be reguardless of the voltage on the system. Crappy cars like the mid 90's neon on the other hand have a battery light that is nothing more than a low voltage indicator. My soon to be sis-in-laws Noen had an alternator that went bad. Her dad (I guess my soon to be pop-in-law) thought he had found a wire that had come loose. Fixed it and charged the battery. He started the car and drove it around the block and the light never came back on, so he told sis-in-law it was fine.... She gets in and 5 miles from home the light came on again. Stupid thing was mearly looking for voltage above 10 volts. Freshly charged battery was 13volts until a few miles of driving with no alternator!

I won't buy anything but KYB GR2s for street driving in my Roos. I've had them all the way around on two different gen1 Legacys, and I have them on the rear of my gen2 Wagon currently, and plan on putting them no the front in the next month or so. I have had no issues with ride stiffness. If you are used to driving a mid 80's GM, then yes KYBs are hard. If you are used to driving something that handles well, with a comfortable ride and good translation (Feeling of what the car is doing on your butt) then KYBs are the way to go... in my opinion. Keith

Well, I've done the old bounce test in the past, but I did it again last night. The car stops as soon as my 270lbs rump roast stops bouncing it. I think it's safe to say it's not struts. Time to start really checking over all the tie rods. I think my problem in the past was doing it with both wheels in the air. This week I'll do one in the air at a time. Keith

We had a ton of fun. I was taking my fiance on rides, and we had a little SNAFU where we forgot to change the numbers. In the end, on paper it didn't look like I did that well, but my fiance's arms blocking my view on my first run with her, causing me to wack a cone, and my brother getting the best run time between us when it should have been mine and in turn me getting my last run time duplicated, even though it was horribly slow because I was the last car to run and the corse was severly torn up.... So anyhow, I got hosed on some times and things that it if would have been correct I would have been faster than my brother and had been third overall. OH well, we had fun and that was all that mattered.

Even thought I said: I guess I didn't call out ball joints, even though I consider them part of the steering. Seriously though, I just did Ball joints last fall and everything was checked at inspection in April, and by me in June (after this all started) when I finally got around to putting my summer tires on. Also, please note that this has done the same thing with TWO different sets of compeltely different tires on, so we can rule out tires. I'll double check the ball joints, but at $40 a piece they better not be bad 8 months later, and I'll take another look at the tie rod ends. Here's a thought.... Could it be a bad steering rack bushing? One of the bushings that holds the rack in place?

Ok, so this is the oddest thing I've ever had happen to me in my 14 years of car driving and ownership. MY 95 Legacy Brighton gets oscilations in the steering wheel when I hit big bumps with one side or the other, but not both, and most defenitly when I hit big bumps on the left side of the car. The steering wheel wiggles back and forth and after 2-3 seconds of smooth pavement it fades away. The car has 206,000 miles on it, with me owning it the last 56k or so. I replaced the rear struts two summers ago, and the fronts appeared to have been replaced once before, but who knows when. Is it a safe bet that I've got some BAD struts in the front, or could I have a problem in the steering somewhere? No clunks or noises, nor any loose play anywhere in the steering that I can find. Thoughts? Keith

My 05 Legacy GT is that way, and I'm 90% certain that the '04 STi I had was that way too. The fun of modern cars and keyless entry! Keith

Good point.... CAN isn't required until 2008 models, and from what I've read as of the '05 models Subaru still wasn't using, but that could be the case.

Delta Dash has a regular code scanner built in. I use it all the time on other car. If you do some digging there are other people that have had these strage codes, but they never seem to find out exactly what they are. Some people claim it's a warning code that something was a bit out of whack, but not enough to cause harm. I may try stopping at a parts store to see what a generic code reader thinks it is.