KettleOfShittyFish Posted January 17, 2021 Share Posted January 17, 2021 Hello everyone, I'm new here! There's a few things going on with my GL, but I went ahead and titled this with my current highest priority for my car. I have a 1981 Subaru GL 4WD Wagon, about 200,000 original miles, been in my family for decades. Love the car, as I'm sure most of you love your old gen Subies. Mine however, was unfortunately involved in a front end accident recently. The engine appears to be okay, no new leaks, still cranks fine, but it won't start. Damage luckily appears limited to my hood, front left headlight lenses, AC condenser, radiator, and crankshaft pulley, but with the no start symptom and no blown fuses (that I can find) I fear something expensive or perhaps even fatal has happened in my engine. The crankshaft itself feels solid, it doesn't shift back and forth or wobble so I'm crossing my fingers that internally most everything is still okay, but obviously won't know until I dive a little bit deeper I'm already planning on performing a compression test on the engine, and this next week I'm going to find a moment to drop the oil pan and examine the bearing lands. Any other tests or diagnostics I haven't thought of to run on my engine are more than appreciated I went ahead and attached an image of my pulley, as you can see my crankshaft bolt appears to have survived somehow, so I think I'm just in need of a replacement pulley. EA81 engine, I think this is what's known as the "3-pulley design" but I'm not sure Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tylertrend Posted January 17, 2021 Share Posted January 17, 2021 Had a similar situation happen to me but my pulley wasn't broken in the back like yours. Engine ran fine afterward, I didn't perform any in depth inspections. I would be checking everything electrical at this point. Check Car-Part.com for the pulley, plenty of listings last I looked. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
el_freddo Posted January 17, 2021 Share Posted January 17, 2021 Geez that second pic of the pulley is pretty full on! I hope you find one, I’m sure someone will have one of you can’t find it on a parts site. It might come with a whole engine... Cheers Bennie 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
idosubaru Posted January 18, 2021 Share Posted January 18, 2021 I’ve repaired a ton of front impact subarus. Never seen a cracked crank so maybe yours was worse than I’ve seen. Otherwise it’s not hard to get one back on the road. replace those parts and go. On some I’ve even just twisted and banged the top radiator support back into place - it’s thin and not significantly structural. So if I need a quick repair or it’s a rusty old Subaru not long for this world I just twist and bang them into place. You might be able to do that to do a minimal repair to get it running/driving before you decide to get into all the body work. hoods too can sometimes be banged And pulled back into usable submission too. But this impact sounds too big for that - usually something like a deer hit can be bent back to shape until you find a replacement 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KettleOfShittyFish Posted January 18, 2021 Author Share Posted January 18, 2021 Pulley is ordered. Thanks for that tip about car-part! Although my account is new to the forum, I've been a lurker on here for a few years and I think I remember seeing that site dropped on a few other threads. I just never ordered anything for myself until now because the site looks like it hasn't been updated since 2004 so it kinda sketched me out. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Step-a-toe Posted January 26, 2021 Share Posted January 26, 2021 And follow up ? Get the pulley yet? Compression test, always number one thing to do and start from there, then follow the fuel and spark trail Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
UnorganizedMechanic Posted February 12, 2021 Share Posted February 12, 2021 If it doesn't pan out, I may have a pulley that I could send you for the price of shipping. It's still firmly stuck on the crankshaft at this moment so it might take some persuasion to remove. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ionstorm66 Posted February 15, 2021 Share Posted February 15, 2021 On 2/12/2021 at 6:43 PM, UnorganizedMechanic said: If it doesn't pan out, I may have a pulley that I could send you for the price of shipping. It's still firmly stuck on the crankshaft at this moment so it might take some persuasion to remove. Probably not recommended, but when I need to remove a pulley in the car. I just loosen the bolt a turn or two, then run the engine for a minute. Usually breaks it free. Out of the car a couple of mallet taps frees it up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
idosubaru Posted February 15, 2021 Share Posted February 15, 2021 13 hours ago, Ionstorm66 said: Probably not recommended, but when I need to remove a pulley in the car. I just loosen the bolt a turn or two, then run the engine for a minute. Usually breaks it free. Out of the car a couple of mallet taps frees it up. Yep just have to be mindful of what you’re doing, not flippant about it. Ive done the same with stuck wheels. Loosen lugs and drive 100 feet. Done. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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