mountaingoatgruff Posted January 6, 2008 Share Posted January 6, 2008 hello all, i just joined and this'll be my first thread... i'm kinda new to subarus, been mostly a mopar guy for years. i had a white 83 d/r 4wd 4speed gl wagon when i was 19. now that i'm replacing my v8 ram pickup with a commuter, it had to be the closest subaru i could find to my first! i posted this first under the ea81 engine year sticky, but it doesn't seem folks are looking there. i'm hoping maybe someone could help me figure out what year my engine and carb are likely to be. the engine is stamped 625893, has no gold stickers on valve covers, has the two 10mm bolts on bottoms of heads, has late electric hitachi dist, has 3 belt crank pulley and factory a/c - no p/s. also, i'm used to the valve covers being the same blue as the air cleaner and mine are black, its obviously possible they were painted but it doesn't look like it - the paint is perfect (minus the effects here and there of heat and oil over 23 years!) and looks original. how often did they come black? my carb is a hitachi dcp306-12 104. the reason i'm requesting this info is the fact that my carb needs to be replaced (upon dissasembly for rebuild i discovered parts missing inside and stripped threads throughout - damn the monkey that's responsible! ) anyhow, i ordered a replacement for my year/options application and got a different (later model?) hitachi with no numbers but drasticly different vacuum fittings (no vac port on the secondary diaphragm, 2 vac ports on choke pull off diaphragm, etc.). near as i can tell, i've got an earlier model engine in my 84 car. i saw a pic of a carb on evil-bay that looked exactly like my dcp306-12 104 but it says it's for an 80 auto wagon! also, i was told that with a 5 as the 6th digit of my vin i should have a 1bbl carb. somebody please show me where my steering wheel rolled off to!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GeneralDisorder Posted January 6, 2008 Share Posted January 6, 2008 hello all, i just joined and this'll be my first thread... Welcome! And a fine first thread it is too... i'm kinda new to subarus, been mostly a mopar guy for years. i had a white 83 d/r 4wd 4speed gl wagon when i was 19. now that i'm replacing my v8 ram pickup with a commuter, it had to be the closest subaru i could find to my first! i posted this first under the ea81 engine year sticky, but it doesn't seem folks are looking there. i'm hoping maybe someone could help me figure out what year my engine and carb are likely to be. the engine is stamped 625893, has no gold stickers on valve covers, has the two 10mm bolts on bottoms of heads, has late electric hitachi dist, has 3 belt crank pulley and factory a/c - no p/s. also, i'm used to the valve covers being the same blue as the air cleaner and mine are black, its obviously possible they were painted but it doesn't look like it - the paint is perfect (minus the effects here and there of heat and oil over 23 years!) and looks original. how often did they come black? my carb is a hitachi dcp306-12 104. Never in black. They were certainly painted. According to that number it looks like your engine is original. That would put it at the later part of 1984 production. the reason i'm requesting this info is the fact that my carb needs to be replaced (upon dissasembly for rebuild i discovered parts missing inside and stripped threads throughout - damn the monkey that's responsible! ) anyhow, i ordered a replacement for my year/options application and got a different (later model?) hitachi with no numbers but drasticly different vacuum fittings (no vac port on the secondary diaphragm, 2 vac ports on choke pull off diaphragm, etc.). near as i can tell, i've got an earlier model engine in my 84 car. i saw a pic of a carb on evil-bay that looked exactly like my dcp306-12 104 but it says it's for an 80 auto wagon! also, i was told that with a 5 as the 6th digit of my vin i should have a 1bbl carb. Well - I think you may have run into the culprit right there. Your car probably was originally equipped with the Carter/Weber single barrel. Most people don't like them, and worse the parts for them are difficult to find. They had an almost unstoppable tendancy for the bolts holding them to the manifold to work loose and fall out. Worse than that those bolts were put in from UNDER the manifold and you basically had to remove the manifold to get the carb off, or to fix those pesky critters.... Anyway I digress - most likely someone repaced it with the Hitachi and it's associated manifold (they are different). So there's really no telling what your's came from although I can tell you that it's probably an 82 or 83 carb from the numbers off it. 84 would have been a DCP-306-25 or something. Might even be earlier than that. BUT the good news is that almost any Hitachi will work. Most have very similar connections and all of them (except the EA82 versions) will bolt right on. Although you would have an easier time, and a lot more fun with the car if you put on a Weber DGV series. You can get a kit with the proper manifold adaptor for the Hitachi manifold for around $350 or so with a brand new carb. They run infinitely better, and with the progressive linkage they have a lot better throttle response, and the larger barrels give more low end grunt. If you want the ultimate mileage machine, then you could swap over to the EA82 throttle body fuel injection. You can see my write up here: http://home.comcast.net/~trilinear/EA81_SPFI.html GD Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GeneralDisorder Posted January 6, 2008 Share Posted January 6, 2008 Double Post. Again.... GD Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jonas Posted January 6, 2008 Share Posted January 6, 2008 welcome to the board! one thing GD missed, actually i suspect he really doesn't give a ************,but he knows his ************, is PICS! we love our subaru porn here! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mountaingoatgruff Posted January 7, 2008 Author Share Posted January 7, 2008 i'd like to formally place the blame for all these mis-posts on my crappy isp. i can provide there email address for hatemail...lol Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mountaingoatgruff Posted January 7, 2008 Author Share Posted January 7, 2008 thanks for the info, general. i'd love to do the spfi conversion, maybe i can slowly collect the parts. if anybody has/sees them around let me know! anyhow, i said the engine is an obvious replacement cuz its obviously been pulled and i found one of those dime-like heat sensitive warrant tags guys put on jdm/replacement engines in the muck on my skidplate (and subsequntly craped my pants and cursed my purchase! ). i later found by matching the adhesive remnant that it came off the dist. i always see those tags glued to the head(s) and most longblocks don't include dist's, so that's confusing. would anyone put one of those tags on a reman'd dist? besides, my dist has a bad upper bushing and the tag may just have come off as the screaming banshee trapped in there vibrated the dist, which in turn would suggest the dist isn't reman'd. then there's the valve covers, too. should be interesting to see if this mystery is ever solved! for jonas: i'm doing some rust abatement (looks like some dip@*%# had a battery in the back seat - upsidedown!:-\ ). once i get it back together i'll post some pics. i'll put some up of the replacement carb, too. hopefully someone will be able to tell by looking about what model it is, i just know its not the dcp306-12 i ordered/need! if someone can tell me how to add pics to these thread replies that probably be easier, but i'm not as good with a mouse as i am with a wrench... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mountaingoatgruff Posted January 7, 2008 Author Share Posted January 7, 2008 oops... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GeneralDisorder Posted January 8, 2008 Share Posted January 8, 2008 I would say your engine is original. The tag is probably just the distributor (for which bushing failure isn't uncommon), and the reason it was pulled was for the clutch - that's common as well. It's a lot easier than the tranny. The chances of the engine having just the right serial number to be correct for your year is almost non-existant. And JDM engines have the same color for the valve covers.... black was never used on any of them. Likely they were painted due to rust when the (cork) valve cover gasket inevitably started leaking, or when the last valve adjust was done (required every 15,000 on solid lifters). GD Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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