fastenova

If you put a different carb on there I think you can run without the computer. Someone can verify this, but I believe the Hitachi carbs interface with the ECU a bit since they're feedback carbs. I've got a weber on mine and things are strictly vacuum controlled (EGR, vac. advance, brake booster and HVAC are the only vac. lines I've got hooked up). The rest of the electrical is purely for sensors (coolant temp, oil pressure). Since ignition timing is controlled by the disty & vac. advance, is there anything the ECU does with the coil / ignition system that makes it necessary?

I'm having a friend nab some parts for me tomorrow and I'll be getting them Thursday or this weekend. Anyone need me to have him grab anything? I'm hoping to get: rear window wiper arm; center cap plastic spacers; rear bumper protectors; AC fan; and a couple of random brake parts.

The split in a 4eat is 90/10 in D or 3rd. In 1st and 2nd it's 50/50. 2nd is great because as mentioned previously you have the torque converter working (slipping) for you to NOT break traction and you have the 50/50 distribution. I used 2nd in my 4eat to start up icy hills in the winter where I went to school. -Aaron

Try disconnecting the 12V line to the choke and see if it works. Easy diagnosis

How does the car act after it stalls? Do you have to crank it over a bunch to get it to start back up, with no throttle? Or maybe give it full throttle to start it up? I'm wondering if it's flooding or running out of fuel. Is it a carbureted or FI motor? If it's carb, do you have the choke hooked up? Did you keep carb from old motor or new carb with new motor? If carb is the same, is choke electric? Can you verify correct operation of the choke with it off the carb? Also, (I am not sure about the Hitachi, but...) my Weber has a little screen in the fuel inlet of the carb. Perhaps that's limiting fuel flow? Is your coil getting severly warm? Aaron

Any idea what the size and tp are that these knobs use?

So I have kinda been getting tired of the excessively long shift lever on my ea81 4spd d/r transmission. I got some new bushings from the dealer to firm things up a bit and also cut about 2.5" off the lever. I rethreaded with a 1/2"-20 die (lots of work, had to use visegrips to keep it from turning, lots of cutting oil and elbow grease!) but got it rethreaded and basically just forced the old knob on the slightly larger threads. I didn't have a metric die big enough to cut the right threads, but looking at the knob, it's nylon inside (or something similar) so for forcing it on it basically cut new threads for me. I also could have retapped it if I had felt like it. Results: Much better! I didn't want to take too much off since this is an offroad rig and it doesn't make sense to put it super low for the application, but it's much more fun to drive with smoother, shorter shifts. Aaron

Wow, high power. That's all of 3.045 watts. Definitely couldn't do much of anything with that. Most trickle chargers are 2 amp or 6 amp. You could run a car stereo with no digital display and maybe one little tiny speaker! I think that signal booster they gave you may amplify certain frequencies, whatever freq. cable comes in on. Does the box have any model number on it or anything? As such, I wouldn't suggest using it just as an AC-DC converter, as it would probably put out some funky signal. But I don't know much about signal amps, really. EDIT: If you end up going with a computer power supply, take all of the 12V lines (Red I believe, Yellow should be 5V and black is obviously ground.) and solder/crimp them together on one end, then use an 8ga or so cableout of them to run to an amp, if you want to run an amp directly off it. If you're going right into a deck, you can use smaller (14ga or 16ga) wire as the amp's internal to the deck. If you want a power supply, let me know, I'm getting rid of a bunch of equipment at work and you could have one for the cost of shipping. I have converted a few of these to bench power supplies to test components (fans and the like).

No need to do the starter deal, I'd not risk it myself. But I'm overly cautious sometimes I've always just stuck a screwdriver in the flexplate or used a strap wrench. Lisle makes a nice one for $17 I think, plastic with a beefy yet soft plastic strap so you don't mess up your pulleys. I've used it for stuck oil filters, among other things =)

That is a cool pic

Sounds risky to me. I agree that 20V is very high for a car battery. You want amperage, not voltage. I'm guessing you're probably not going to be pushing many amps with that thing, and it would be the equivalent of a trickle charger. Those are CHEAP to buy, say $25 or less, and they've got the regulating circuit built in. Exploding batteries are bad. As far as running a stereo, get an old computer power supply and short the soft power line, mount a switch on the case, and you've got all the 12V you need, if you get a decent one they're ~300-350 watts. Or you can look around for a benchtop 12V power supply, they're usually pretty cheap. I think most 12V devices will take 10-14V and be able to adjust for it but much more/less than that and you start having problems. Just my 2 cents.

OK, I'm in need of some advice on my '97 2.5GT... I've got a EJ25 with what I am assuming is a blown HG again. I replaced the HG 30k ago at 135k on the ticker, and the car run wonderfully until this winter. Started having overheating issues again, and found oil in my coolant. I've done a ton of research on this issue BOTH times, and am confident it's a bad HG. So, here are my options... what should I do? 1. Pull motor, reseal with new head gaskets, and hope for another 30k+ 2. Pull motor, tear off heads, take block in to be check for flatness, and if necessary, mill block... This means I have to take block apart, and if I have to do that I might as well do an overhaul on the bottom end. Or, go the performance route with oversize pistons, mill the heads, grind the crank + cams a bit... more money than I want to spend in either case, really. 3. Motor swap. Options are 2.2L with the possibility of a turbo later, SOHC 2.5 (More reliable Phase 2), or 3.3L SVX motor (Fun, torquey, and FAST! but a lot of cash and work to fit it in there...). WRX motor is a possibility but pretty spendy too. 4. Scrap/part out the car. I just lowered it and have some cash into the car, and honestly LOVE it, but I might be better off getting something else. Any thoughts? Have have others dealt with the EJ25's recurring HG issues? I don't want this to be a routine maintenance thing. I can do the work myself and even have a hoist and stand, but I need something more reliable.

Do not get a cheap come-along. I was able to use it to pull my sube sideways on flat ground no problem to get out of a bind, but I had to try to pull my buddy's bronco out of a mud pit and the thing just bound up. It was one of the 'nicer' cheap models, but I ended up using my hi-lift and mostly my subaru to get him out. I still need to see if I can return it and get my money back. If you have a hi-lift, that's the way to go, it's better than a cheap come along and super versatile. Just don't winch all the way to the top or it could pull itself outta the straps (had a buddy smash his foot that way) I've got two 15' tow hooks and a 20' recovery strap that have served me very well so far, but I think I want to get another 20 footer just to be safe. Aaron

Four screws and square? Where is this located? The first thing that popped into my head is the MAF sensor located in the intake ducting (I assume this is standard since it's MPFI). -Aaron

They might not ship, but I'll bet you can find a board member who would... *raises hand* Who has it? Foster? Let me know and depending on where it is, I might be able to arrange something. Aaron

In my experience, Bosch plugs have run great on all my domestic cars (Running +2s in my Ford truck), but they cause problems on several imports. I had bad luck with them in my Legacy. Now all I run are NGK V-Power copper plugs. They're $8 for a set and changing them is easy. Supposedly copper allows for a slightly better spark although it brings decreased longevity over platinum. In fact, platinum's only real advantage is that the electrodes last ~3x as long. Copper is better, IMHO. I had stumbling and misses after installing Bosch plugs in my 2.5, checked wires, all fine, installed NGKs and runs smoother than ever. I'm running OE wires and they're great. With an upgraded ignition system I could see the need for bigger wires but with a stock one OEM is fine. Just my 2 cents=) Aaron EDIT: OE is NGK plats on 2.5s, not sure on the 2.2...

I made it out Saturday around noon. We started heading up towards St. Johns and then drove over Cornelius pass Rd. Ended up taking 26 out to 47 and finding some great trails around Vernonia. My friend's bronco got stuck BAD in some mud and we spent almost two hours getting him out. My subie ended up pulling him out in the end . I will post some pics later. I definitely want to check out the OHV park sometime. So I just need a class II ATV permit right? The only thing special I need is a fire extinguisher, I think, which I've been meaning to get anyway. Aaron

In my experience the only way to tell is to rip off the crank pulley and the outer timing belt covers. I've seen motors leak like crazy out the crank seal & oil pump and the timing belt is perfect. I've seen ones that don't leak all that bad and the timing belt was somewhat sticky. Depends on driving style somewhat as well. The bottom line is that to replace that crank seal and the oil pump o-ring that is probably leaking, you have to remove the timing belt anyway. With the amount of work required to get to that point you might as well do the T-belt. It should be ~$70 from the dealer (USE a dealer belt. Aftermarket belts are much more difficult to time correctly!). So for less than $100 you'll get new front seals (I'd suggest doing your cam seals as well since you're in there) and a new t-belt that should be good for ~60K or so. I know on the 2.5L the belt had a 90K service interval but I am not positive on the 2.2L. The real question is whether you're mechanically inclined. If you can do this yourself, and have the tools, snatch that wagon up. If you can't, you're looking at about $400 for the dealer to do t-belt, crank seal, and reseal the oil pump... Good luck!

Hi y'all. So I've been running a Weber for a couple of months and had issues with the choke from the get-go. I just disconnected it and had to sit there and play with the gas each time I started it up until it got the courage to run on its own. Well, I finally got around to looking at the problem, and realized that the choke was slowly closing with 12V instead of opening. I was seriously confused, then talking to my dad, he said, "Well, why don't you just flip the bimetal spring around?" I didn't know it was possible, but I tend to trust him. So I jammed a screwdriver in there and pried, and POP! out came the spring. I reversed it and it works flawlessly now after adjusting the fast idle cam. How it got that way in the first place is beyond me, but whatever. So, I guess the moral of this story is... if things seem to be working backwards, jam a screwdriver in and pry

This is one of the reasons you'd be considering a Weber, as well as being easy to tune, easy to troubleshoot (No, really!) and simple. The fact that they give you more usable power is just a side benefit. The best thing is that I can, and have, fixed problems with my Weber on the side of the road on two occasions with a slotted screwdriver and a pair of duckbill pliers. As far as I'm concerned, that's all I'll ever need as far as the carb goes. And that makes me go The muffler, like NorthWet and GD said, is a generic cheap high-flow muffler. You can spend what you want on it, but I laid out $35 and am totally happy with mine. I think the brand on mine is IPC? products or something. If you go to any speed shop worth their salt and ask for a turbo muffler and tell them you need [2", 2.25", whatever] inlet/outlet they will hook you up with the right part. Same with an exhaust shop who makes your exhaust, except they'll already know what pipe size you're using... As far as the factory air cleaner assembly, has anyone just taken the snout off completely and made a bigger hole in the casing? I need to look at mine again as I forget exactly what they look like but that would seem like the way to give that Hitachi all the air it wants. -A

Rick, I dunno if you saw my old ones, but they're 'there'. There's some rubber left. I just put new ones in and you're welcome to the old ones if you want them and they can get you by until you get the new ones in. I'll be heading up to Portland Friday evening and can drop them by if you want. Give me a call if you want them! Oh, and I snagged a high-lift jack so next time I get high centered I can do something about it =) Aaron

Hi guys... Wanting to head out towards the coast from Portland this Saturday AM for some four byin' fun. Anyone game? Not sure exactly where I want to go but somewhere between beaverton and the beach. Aaron

I'm really heavily considering it. I'm going to pick up a hi-lift jack this evening and some chain or more tow straps to help get me unstuck since I'm not lifted:headbang: I was wanting to go out towards the beach on Saturday, so if I don't break anything I'll probably make it Sunday. I am still working on a few little things though that I gotta have fixed first so we'll see.

I am not sure if it's the same setup or not, but... In my ea81, the alternator has an internal voltage regulator. That line is a 12v from the battery, as you mentioned, and is called the 'exciter wire'. Basically it tells the alternator what voltage it needs to produce. Check out this article for more info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternator Definitely hook that line up.

Skip, that looks great! Do you have a shot from the rear of the car? Aaron