slowbert

1 hour ago, '76mintgrün'02 said:

The EA81 engine doesn't have a timing chain (or belts), it has gears linking the cams and crank.

My 35+ year recollection has faded, but the misery caused by that Subaru has only intensified. 

Picture #3 appears to be perfectly fine. The machining marks are just when they cleaned up that casting and they are not bearing surfaces. Same with #6. 
 

Picture #4 appears to be a problem.

Exterior patina can be fixed with a rattle can. Interior not so much. 

57 minutes ago, walkinfool said:

Sorry to hear that your Subaru experience was less than ideal.

Here’s how the Subaru ended. 
 

On 2/13/2024 at 6:15 PM, walkinfool said:

clearly you've never owned a subaru, Mr. Bert 😉 

I had a Subaru in college.  The only car that left me stranded on the side of the highway at 2am when I lost the timing chain.  I had to hitchhike to a Howard Johnson's to use the phone to call AAA.  Didn't have *any* cash to pay for the cup of coffee, and had to fix the motor in my apartment parking lot.

Yeah, I had a Subaru.

On 2/10/2024 at 8:58 PM, JsnPpp said:

Specifically how attach the hoist to the car. It was mentioned to attach via the strut holes but I'm unsure how is best. Just looking for options.

I don’t recall exactly where I attached the strap. Could have been through the shock tower mounts. 

During install, I used a strap to the chassis and the engine hoist to put the car as high as I could, then put jack stands under it. 
 

Without suspension, it is hard to get a jacking point. 
 

Then I used the engine hoist from the side to lift the engine and suspension into place. 

1 minute ago, walkinfool said:

I really needed my Subaru

Said no one. Ever.  

Maybe it is more of a style question, but I would run a ground strap/cable to a location out of the way and kind of hidden. Yes, hard to install but you don’t have to look at it. 
 

I don’t have a picture handy, but I ran mine to a bolt on the bracket under the intake manifold. 
 

As opposed to the valve cover where you might forget to reattach it (and it is not as aesthetically pleasing). One big fat strap/cable with good ground connections on both sides and you are good. Use star washers for a good connection, too. 

The worst problem is that the car has the wrong taillights. Aren’t they supposed to be round? 

43 minutes ago, MauiBob said:

ground strap is one of three block to engine

Try to avoid this practice, as it could introduce ground loops. Best practice is to run everything to a single point and use one connection only between items. 

57 minutes ago, jimk said:

Remove the pin, open the crimp and fit a new wire.

I have a set of pin removal tools, and I fought with it for a while.  But never got the pin to release.  Also didn't have much grip on the wire end to pull it out.  Of course, I wasn't on the side of the road trying to get home, either.

For $30 (with shipping) I am pretty sure I ordered the right part numbers from Mouser.

Does anyone know a source for a new diagnostic connector, including the housing and pins?

The previous owner saw fit to snip the red power line on pin 1...kind of defeats the purpose.

11 minutes ago, AceAndrew said:

So apparently there are two people willing to pay over $4,000 for what are $900-$1200 wheels in current market.  More power to them.

But how many wheel sets come in brand new cardboard boxes?!

Based on $1200 for the wheels, those boxes seem to have a market value of $2800 or $700/ea.

It must be like vintage toy collectors, where the original box is worth more than the toy inside.  The wheel buyer might be more interested in displaying the wheels in their original boxes than - gasp - putting them on a car.

There are things in life you might consider buying used. And other things that you really should only buy new. 

Underwear and gas tanks fall in the latter category. 

Do you really want to be sitting at a stop light with a full tank of gas and nervously wonder if the whole car will go up in flames?

The $450 you spend on a brand new, squeaky clean gas tank is worth your piece of mind.

8 minutes ago, Lucky 7 said:

the ole’ hillbilly

I’m not sure that the hillbillies who used this method lived to be very old. 

12 hours ago, Son of Marty said:

Stock springs will require a spring compressor to safely disassemble, most auto parts stores will have them to rent for a few bucks a day.

Your post reminded me that I have 'rented' spring compressors from O'Reilly Auto several months ago and forgot to bring them back.  Their policy is to charge for the tool up front, then give you 100% back when you return it.

1 hour ago, Stevenc22 said:

For the dash, there are 2 screws that go in the back under the glass. HOWEVER almost no one reinstalls those 2 screws, so if you don't use those 2 screws you can install the dashboard after you install the glass.

+1.  Unless you really hate the person who buys the car after you, leave those screws out. 

The dash will be held very securely by the windshield gasket, so it will not rattle.  You will be taking the dash in and out as you finish up wiring, so you will curse those screws if you mistakenly put them in before the windshield.

On 11/17/2023 at 7:19 PM, Son of Marty said:

Start with the wiring harness

Agreed.  Wiring touches everywhere in the car, so as you do it, you will note what needs to be done in every area of the car.  Wiring is also behind everything else, like carpet, trunk panels, etc.  Wiring is also the last part that you will be debugging when everything is together and the car is running.

I reassembled by '72 over the last several months.  I did not have much of a plan, just start tackling projects one by one.  Inevitably, I would need to order a part or two, then start working on something else until the parts showed up.

Ultimately, these are very, very simple cars.

On 11/12/2023 at 1:01 PM, Dudeland said:

The windshield is pretty beaten as well. 

I think the biggest source of rust on my car was undoubtedly a leaky windshield seal. 
 

If I knew then what I know now, I would have replaced the seal (and windshield) 20+ years ago and saved my floorboards, rockers, and a pillars. 
 

An ounce of prevention…

19 minutes ago, Dudeland said:

After finding out that I need to remove the windshield to remove the dash,

You only need to remove the windshield if it is the first time ever removing the dash. 
 

There are two screws that are hidden by the windshield gasket, but nobody ever puts those screws back in if they have taken the dash out. In all likelihood, the screws are not in there and you can remove the dash without having to do the windshield. 

Electrically, it is good design to have reference locations for positive and negative voltage, and to home run all circuits back to those locations. At least wherever possible. 
 

This can avoid ground loops and should make debugging a bit simpler. 
 

Whether to do it at the battery terminal or a separate terminal is aesthetic. However, if you start using relays for horn, lights, fuel pump, fan, etc., it can get messy if each circuit routes back to the battery post. 
 

I did a multi post terminal like the one above to make it look cleaner. 

41 minutes ago, NYNick said:

There are other places to live than California.

Hard to tell if New York is better or worse than California.

On 10/12/2023 at 2:53 PM, OldRoller said:

You can leave the torque converter with the trans.

It makes sense to remove an automatic from a 2002, but I’m wondering why someone would want to put it back in…

On 9/12/2023 at 9:57 AM, TobyB said:

I would use loctite

I would not use Loctite. At least not yet. 
 

I just installed the same Momo wheel and have had it on and off several times. 
 

I ran into a problem with the spring loaded horn contact. I needed to wrap the brass contact with a couple wraps of electrical tape so that it did not wobble in the cylinder. 
 

I also needed to take it on and off a couple times to get it properly aligned. But with six screws, the wheel is not coming off without noticing that the screws are loose.