MajorWood

Power steering seals i2.5. Local Subie Dealer parts guy gave me the output U shaped gasket and not the input O-ring that I asked for. He couldn't even produce a complete diagram of the pump at the counter. So will attempt to find the correct 34488B O-ring at a parts store and not waste time at dealer, unless with 16 years it would be prudent to replace the other gasket since I already have it in hand. I like to support locals, but it is hard when the counter guy can't locate and identify the correct part, and I can find it on Amazon in a minute, just sayin. Replaced rear exterior door handles with amazon specials and the driver side broke, even with gentle use, in two weeks. To the U-pull it I go. :-(

Our phrase is that alcoholics don't date, they take hostages.

There is a lot of similarity in the tool sets and approaches. I was actually looking around for suggestions on better sources for rear door handles, since the last ones lasted about 3 months, and as soon as I hit this thread I started to think bout how I would get in there to pop the lock with the least damage. I recently had a root canal done, through an existing crown using an operating microscope; and a couple of pacemaker procedures. The history of how those two techniques evolved was fascinating. I spent 40 years in academic medicine solving difficult problems and I always appreciate any new knowledge from different fields, because in some way it can usually be adapted for a different purpose. I say this as a guy whose fuel pump currently runs off the accessory lights from the trailer hitch harness, because that was a much easier fix than tracing and replacing the bad wire from the fuel pump relay. And not too different than how my pacemaker bypasses the faulty AV node using wires threaded through a large vein in my shoulder.

The only difference between brain surgery and car repair is the amount of force involved, with cars requiring a lot less.

My gas mileage has been in the crapper recently, so I did the front sensor and got an addtional mpg. Granted, I only do short in town trips of under 3 miles max at a time. A few weeks ago i got a short P2309 code, which I believe is throttle (body) actuator, but it clreared quickly. It was cold humid icey morning and perhaps something damp was temporarily frozen. Wondering if perhaps plugs is the next thing to check. No codes have been thrown so kind of baffling.

My tailgate lock has been flakey recently, but as we are in rainy season (Oct to June) in Portland I will live with it. The above repair resembles mine (5/31/2017)to the point where I thought that it was mine.

Have you replaced the wiring harness? That took care of my missfires at higher rpm. Mechanic told me it should be a 10 year maintenance item even if not an overt problem.

Installed new piece, used of course, of rear driver side door glass that a Portland feral human decided o knock out a couple of weeks ago. Cost was $60. Used the A1 Auto youtube vid as a guide. Also did both rear door handles that had broken while I was in there. Got them from Amazon awhile back and they were ever so slightly out of whack, needed a little sanding of the lower edge seal to open up the gap in the clips, and the rear screw hole was about a mm too high so I had to bend that tab up just a smidge. #2 went way faster than #1

Spend about an hour trying to disassemble the driver-side side panel in the back to look for the fuel pump controller module. Found 2 phillips screws in back, and removed (2) 12mm bolts in the front (one under seat holding seat belt trim column, and another said column piece holding the main panel in place),but the panel was still tight and I couldn't locate any other screws or clips to remove it. Any hints as to what I missed? Are there bolts down low where the floor mats lie,and then it lifts up like a door panel. My Haynes manual gives me nothing. Having free time, and seeing the hidden rear bumper skin bolt behind the storage panel in the back,I decided to pop out a caved in corner of the skin. I had done the other side before, but this one was worse, and I ended up having to slice it to get a prybar in. I will let the plastic relax back to the pre-cave state,and then epoxy. Oh, and yesterday I replaced the spark plug wires and an infrequent intermittent "miss" disappeared. Slowly getting it back in shape. Out of the blue in the summer of 2020 I had two minor heart attacks and ended up getting a pacemaker after showing up at the ER with a pulse hovering around 30. This made them very nervous. Apparently I "walked off" the heart attacks and they were only discovered as small damaged areas in a recent nuclear stress test. End result was me not being able to work on car for a bit. Even now I can sense that I don't have the stamina for extended wrenching since not being able to swim has also stiffened me up, A LOT. Getting old sucks,but it is still better than the DRT (dead right there) I came close to experiencing a year ago. And I get to look forward to a turbo pacemaker upgrade in December. Fun Fun Joy Joy TIA Bob

Got a confusing problem here in a non-turbo 2007 legacy wagon. Had a car running problem which was traced down to the fuel pump not getting power. Got it running on a temp basis by running a 12V line from the running lights wire on the trailer hitch harness to the pump. Figured that the problem was a bad fuel pump control unit as relay was swapped and the pulled relay was good. Fuel pump obviously works. But when trying to locate a module I was told that it isn't a part of the non-turbo system. It has been on-off rain for 48 hrs so I haven't pulled the molding in the back to look for it, but I wanted to have part in hand when I did, until used parts guy told me it was a turbo-only module (22648AA081). Everything on the forum seems to talk about modding it or replacing it for higher fuel flow. My Haynes manual doesn't show it for the regular model but I need to double check to see if it is a part of the turbo section description. Trying to get something in hand before weekend when it is clear and i can tear into car. TIA Bob

Yeah, has happened to me twice on a 2007 wagon, ignored driver side rear as easy to open with open driver door, but now the rear passenger door went too. So I found this video and at the 5:25 mark one can see the inner side of the exterior handle. The round silver piece is what falls and makes the noise, and I am guessing that the part (dark blue) which holds it in place by the orange plastic piece is what breaks off. I have not located that piece in the bottom part of the door, yet. So the options are 1) ignore or 2) replace the entire unit. I am not above trying an epoxy repair if I can find the broken tab piece. It also didn't look like anything was broken off which was confusing. Everything else on door is fine, just nothing happens when the external latch is lifted.

Had misfire issues on cyl 1 which improved dramatically when 6.5 gal of gas was added to the 6-7 gal in tank. I am thinking this was related to parking on a steep hill and that I have accumulated water in the gas tank. Has anyone siphoned theirs out to get rid of the water or is it best done with many cans of drygas? Also wondering if filter dirty. How does one do specific searches here. When I did fuel tank I got the huge "what did you do thread" but no pointers to individual posts. Is there a more specific search filter. TIA

The first issue is to determine how many wires are broken. You are aware of one thing not working, but there is also the cyclops light, back-up lights, gate latch, gate closed sensor, etc. Have you popped the boot yet to look at them. Most here found several broken and several damaged. At one point, my rear wiper and backup lights were both broken, and the wiper cycled when I put the car in reverse as the loose ends contacted each other. In my mind, the labor to unclip and replace the harness is about the same as fixing (note, different than repairing here) the necessary wires. I used 16 gauge trailer wire bought at a local store in the auto department. If necessary, borrow a garage for a few hours. Some here report that the replacement harness comes with the boot in place in the middle. Just make sure that it can be reinserted once repaired, which is why I decided to fix mine in place. And welcome to the club (growing with each passing day).

Is this just a 4th gen problem? I am mentioning it to wagon owners when I see them (which is pretty much an hourly event here in Portland), and one guy who'd bought the car used was told by the first owner that the wiring harness had already been replaced.