We Post Our Grievances Here

[Subasaurus]

Just a fun little thread i thought of, ill start, this applies to any Old Generation Subaru Vehicle.

 

> i hate how Subaru didn't put more thought into the EA82 oil pan, if your ever going to replace the oil pan gasket, you gotta lift the engine up about 4" inches to have access to the rear bolts and you have to remove 1 motor mount in order for the oil pan to come out.

 

> i hate how the mirrors begin to "rust" even the interior rear view mirror thats not out in the elements.

 

> i hate that were all stuck with the 4x140 bolt pattern, unless you adapt something or upgrade.

 

> i hate that the small gauges are inaccurate (oil psi especially)

Edited September 26, 2015 by Subasaurus

[DaveT]

My biggest would be the too close to just big enough radiator, and there isn't enough elevation to make the air get out quickly.

 

Timing belt idlers made with non replaceable bearings.  I remade 2 sets, and now just replace the bearings.

 

I used to complain about replacing the belts every 50K, until I did the belts on our Forester.  Yes, you only do them half as often, but the cost is around FIVE times higher.

 

Another big one for me, is how since the EA82 era cars, Subaru in general has continued to drift further and further away from basic reliable cars toward luxury froo froo frills and cost.

[golucky66]

Honestly, my biggest annoyance with subaru is that the newer subies headlights don't shut off with the ignition like EVERY OTHER SUBIE EVER!

I don't own a new subie so some may, or it may be an option, but the few customer cars that I've worked on don't shut off automatically.

[DaveT]

Honestly, my biggest annoyance with subaru is that the newer subies headlights don't shut off with the ignition like EVERY OTHER SUBIE EVER!

I don't own a new subie so some may, or it may be an option, but the few customer cars that I've worked on don't shut off automatically.

OH, that SUCKS!

 

That will be modded if I ever find myself owning one like that.

[ihscout54]

Im not too fond of how rare these cars are becoming. Parts have never been real easy to find for the EA81s and its only getting worse. It used to be fun to buy an old EA car for 200 bux, and make it road worthy with junk yard parts. Those days are over.

[nipper]

Dear Subaru,

  As a justy owner, please do share ho in bloody hell do you manage to bolt the carb on a justy manifold, or was it all assembled by Asian female children with the tinyest of fingers? 

[golucky66]

Dear Subaru,

  As a justy owner, please do share ho in bloody hell do you manage to bolt the carb on a justy manifold, or was it all assembled by Asian female children with the tinyest of fingers? 

 

Funniest post all month... I was laughing so hard.

[tweety]

Many cars over the decades have been designed without the mechanic or home mechanic in mind. Odd that. I mean ask anyone that has owned a early mini or Morris 1500, Austin 1800, very British how they expect you to get to the lower radiator hose, radiator bolts etc. It is obvious that the radiator was installed before the engine/trans unit.

 

There are countless other examples. But for the ea81 owner there is one positive no matter what your problems are with the engine. Longitivity. The engine lives so long it makes a rebuild really viable. Considering you can get 200-250,000 miles from a well service engine is remarkable. That's a lot of years of running. Hence my rebuild recently because at 59yo a brand new engine cammed for torque new oil pump etc and larger pistons all assembled well means it will outlast me.

 

Isnt that the ultimate?

 

I've worked on several Lotus engines and of their day they were high tech. Bucket valve operation means shims, chain driven cams and talk about leak oil. So I'm happy with the ea81. But seeing this thread is for gripes, I guess the manifold sucks.

[DaveT]

Unfortunately, aside from the main function /purpose, most things are designed for these items: sale price, lowest cost to initially assemble, speed (as in get the design done) Some add in life time / reliability.

[Loyale 2.7 Turbo]

The things that I really Dislike the most from the Old School Subarus, is that the Subaru Engineers were Lazy enough to design a real better Heads for the EA82 engine, which was a 2.0L engine on its prototype stages; but they wanted to use the Turbo MPFi setup that they already had on the EA81T; so they had to destroke the EA82 from its original 2.0L form, to a 1.8L like the EA81, which doesn't make sense, except for preventing heads cracking easily from the Turbo... However, the EA82 retains the same Bore than the EJ20 engine.

 

That, along the Lousy timing belt setup, are the Worse flaws on the late Old-Gens, however, the 4X140 lug pattern and the front e-brake are on my list, as far second places...

 

The older old gens are good like they are, for that era, in my own humble opinion.

 

What I don't like from the Newer subies, is that they're following the design tendences and are looking pretty similar to other brands of cars on the Road, like Subaru becoming a Pop Star... I miss the era when Subaru was the Rebel Heavy Metal from the crowd... you know...

 

...  As a justy owner, please do share ho in bloody hell do you manage to bolt the carb on a justy manifold, or was it all assembled by Asian female children with the tinyest of fingers? 

 

As far as I know, the intake manifold is Not Bolted to the engine, when the carburetor is installed on them; then they install the whole assembly. 

 

Kind Regards.

► Edited to add the Carburetor idea.

Edited September 26, 2015 by Loyale 2.7 Turbo

[bratman2]

Wife's 2011 Forester headlights cut off with the ignition. I don't have many gripes about my 87 Brat. I guess FI would have been nice since by 87 almost everything had it. Factory 14" rims would have been awesome, I think they were about 6 sets that came to the US???

[Subasaurus]

just thought of another..

 

gas tank was on the drivers side (left side) in the 70's but then moved it over to the passenger in the 80's?? makes no sense to me.

[wagonist]

What do you mean driver's side first & then passenger side. It's the other way around Don't forget these were designed as a RHD car first

 

I'm surprised no one from over there has complained about the hard A/C line across the firewall. Meaning you have to be super careful removing the engine/trans. Not a problem we have on RHD cars, although having the A/C line come back across the front of the condenser makes it hard to fit any extra external coolers.

 

Although my RHD complaint comes from having the uni joint on the steering shaft right next to the turbo...

Hill holder on diagonal wheels when trying to do serious 4wding. Usually the first thing that gets disconnected.

 

I've had some newer subies as company cars, and my parents own an 09 Outback. I've never own any subie after 2000. They just haven't kept up with the technology of others. The 4EAT transmission used from the Loyale all the way through to 09 (when others had gone to 5 & 6 speed autos much earlier), poor fuel economy vs power for the engine size, poor torque at lower revs compared with the engines of others of the same size (eg Subie needing a 2.5L turbo engine to keep up with the 2.0L turbos of Mitsubishi & Toyota)

[dfoyl]

For the EA81, it has to be the ancillary systems that bolted on. The AC bracket is just crazy heavy for what it does. The power steering on the other side is almost as bad with the boomerang shaped bracket. The AC is a pain to bolt up too, I believe all AC's were dealer-fit (at least in Australia) which explains the mix-and-match combinations found during the model run (80-93 here).

 

The lack of power in the EA81 limited how Subaru could sell the MY platform - if they had actually used the twin port option in the upper-range and sports (coupe) models instead of just using the basic engine in all versions they could have had a sales winner AND been successful in areas other than AWD.

 

The short life of the EA81T. They got on board the turbo revolution quite early, then gave it away with the migration to the EA82.

 

I blame the EA82 for effectively limiting the EA81 to an economy engine, and at the same time not being a better engine in any way than the engine it replaced. It also started Subaru down the path of needing to make the car wider, which made it heavier, which means it needed a bigger engine, which made the car wider again, which made it heavier, which means it needed a bigger engine.

 

I don't have any issues with the body, beyond the obvious rust issues. The design of the MY, while not outstanding, were clean and simple throughout (and the dash layout in particular was great for the era). The L-series started down the angular and plain path, which became just plain for the Legacy/Liberty.

[coxy]

Only one gripe really they should have made the EA81T multi point injection engine as the standard non turbo late variant normally aspirated EA 81 and then punched it ourt with a stroker crank to 2 litres with MPFI for fitment into the Loyal and the Evil EA 82 should never have escaped the Lab.

 

Imagine how good a flat six EA81 type engine with MPFI would have been and then to add some spice for the XT6 they could have been an XT8 with a flat 8 MPFI torque monster, So I guess the biggest complaint is Subaru went mainstream and started making Cookie Cutter specials like all the rest of them.

[l75eya]

What are cupholders?

[Sapper 157]

And lets not even get started on the hicrappys vacuum system

[MR_Loyale]

A screw to hold the rotor???? REALLY??

[Miatadude]

Lack of replacement body parts. Come on, its only 33 years old.

[Subasaurus]

Lack of replacement body parts. Come on, its only 33 years old.

lack of replacement anything, whats up with that anyways.. does anybody know why?

[Leeroy]

lack of replacement anything, whats up with that anyways.. does anybody know why?

Simple really, Subaru has always been a relatively small company that does not produce many cars. It is only comparatively recently that Subaru has sold more than 500 000 cars per year and I think they may have finally cracked 850 000 thanks to recent US demand.

 

For most of the 1970s and 1980s they struggled to produce 200 000 per year. These production numbers mean there isn't a huge amount of spare parts manufactured in the first place and not many are left after 10 years or so.

 

Plus unlike Toyota and Mazda (in the past, no so much now) that used to maintain the production of parts for older models Subaru have never done so, again a reflection of their small size in terms of automobile production.

Edited September 29, 2015 by Leeroy

[Loyale 2.7 Turbo]

A screw to hold the rotor???? REALLY??

 

You mean the Rotor for the Hitachi Distributor, isn't it?

 

I'm glad of having the Nippon-Denso one on my "BumbleBeast"   

 

Kind Regards.