lilredwagon

Oh yeah? I didn't know that! I'll call a battery shop, thanks for that!

I had a Snap-on electric impact that could handle anything on any Subaru. Had it for roughly 10 years and now the batteries aren't holding their charge. Replacement batteries are in the $400 range. Yeah, that Harbor Freight Earthquake thing is looking pretty good for whenever I need one again. But realistically, the only thing I've used an impact on has been lug nuts and axle nuts. Otherwise, I'm fine with hand wrenches. Oh, and undoing top bolts on a strut/coilover. But how often are you doing those things?

P0420 = Downstream O2 sensor or cat VDC = wheel speed sensor on one of your wheels TPMS = tire pressures or TPMS sensor only Those are the basics. Since you threw the parts cannon at it, it can be a number of things at this point. For the P0420, a plug fowler will get rid of the light, but if you want to address the cause, you can get a new cat or a new downstream sensor. The car will probably run the same if you do any of these things. The plug fowler will cost around $10, a new cat will run you ~$500, and a new sensor will be in the ~$50 range. The plugs don't have anything to do with it, but be aware that NGK are recommended and E3 are not recommended. VDC light comes on when there is a major problem with the VDC system (TCU error code) or if one of the wheel speed sensors is acting up. On my car, if I heat up the front end a lot at a track day, then the heat from the front brakes probably freaks out the front wheel speed sensors in the knuckles, and they trigger the light. In my case, it the light shuts off when the car cools down. In your case, I would doubt that you're seeing the same thing. But since you had your rear bearings replaced, I would guess that they messed with the rear wheel speed sensors while doing the bearings. I would start by removing them out of the rear hub and seeing if the wires look alright, and if there is a ton of gunk or debris on the end that gets inserted. If the rears look fine, then look at the fronts. They're relatively cheap to replace if you need to. They are in the neighborhood of ~$50-75 if you need to get new ones. Or you could go to an ebay salvage yard listing and fine a takeoff set for cheap for diagnostic purposes and just change them out and see if that makes the light go away. TPMS sensors are really finicky, if I ever have any problems with them on my cars, I just deal with the light until I need new tires and get new ones. If you have a lot of tread on your tires, then just get new ones on the two that you didn't change. That one depends on how much the TPMS light bothers you. For TPMS sensors, buy new, reputable ones. Don't buy used or cheapies since it's such a hassle to go back to the tire shop to have them swapped out if you have any problems down the road.

I got an 08 OBXT MT after looking for a little while. The differences that mattered to me were top feed vs side feed injectors; slightly revised turbo (VF46 vs VF40); gearing (shorter gearing = slightly higher cruise rpm, but faster acceleration); stock fender flares = larger tire if you do some work under the flare; catless uppipe. I also preferred the revised front end and tail lights, even though it's a steel hood vs aluminum. If those things don't matter to you or you already know that you're going to be replacing certain things (like suspension), then find the latest model year, with the lowest miles and best service history. I ended up finding one a few states away in a non-road salt state, with 79K mi. I had to travel for it, and I still needed to put in some work to get it right. But it was worth it, and I intend to keep it for a long time.

I always did the assemble-many-extensions-as-as-you-insert method until I tried jacking the motor. It sounds intimidating, but you just do one side at a time. Undo the one motor mount bolt and one of the dogbone bolts, put a 2x4 under the oil pan, and raise that side of the motor 2". Since the other side motor mount is still bolted up, then the motor falls right back into place when you're done with that side, and you just bolt it back up and move on to the other side. With this method, you can do plugs in 20-30 mins and no scraped up knuckles!

Could you buy a set and return them? Find a seller that lists on Amazon and you should be ok.

Correct. The gearing is different because tire size is different. If you're running Outback sized tires, you'd want Outback gearing, and vice versa, to keep your speedo reading correctly. Other than the speedo reading differently, there's nothing wrong with mismatching those things. Just make sure you can fit the tires in the fenders, if you're going taller.

No need to do that. If you're getting tuned, the tuner will just rescale your tune for it. It will fit, and it will read consistently, but it may not be scaled to your exact car. Your tuner will just tune for it, as if you added an intake. It won't be a problem. And if you do have any problems with one, you have others already. No need to buy more.

When you ordered the Amazon one, did you reference the part number on the MAF that came off your car? I ask because different MAFs read differently, and most fit the same hole, so an online parts number search may not pull up the direct replacement. What happened to me was that I replaced my MAF on my 08 OBXT with one from my 02 WRX, just for diagnostic purposes. The WRX one fit and it worked, but read the opposite, just as you experienced. Online searches claimed they are interchangeable, but then read the part number on the actual part, and ordered that one, and it read the same as the last one. Just my experience, YMMV.

Agreed, is that LGT suspension?

I taught myself how to tune. Everybody has to start somewhere. One thing I would suggest is to start tuning on the motor you're planning to replace. First get a wideband and a tactrix cable. Then learn how to log and what to log. Once you have meaningful logs, you can ask questions, and you'll get answers. Oh, another thing. Make sure you have a pretty solid understanding of how an engine works. As well as understanding the specific features of the engine you're going to tune. Things like AVCS - how it works and what it does. I taught myself how to tune way back. I got an EJ207 and no tuners would touch that motor at the time, so I had to figure it out. It's doable. Read a lot, and search on the RomRaider forum. Chances are, if you have a question, it has been asked and answered over there. When you get to tuning, just make small changes and see what they do. And get started on the motor you're going to replace.

So how about this - I put an AEM 320 fuel pump in my car about 10K miles ago, and it already went bad! Still confirming, but I replaced the whole bucket (fuel pump/filter/sender) with a low mileage STi takeoff, and haven't had any problems whatsoever since. Prior to this, I was having a problem where the car would die only after running for a continuous couple hours on the highway. Which was a big problem as it would only die when I was over a hundred miles away from home... usually in the middle of nowhere and on a roadtrip. When I put the AEM pump in, I tuned it since there were a few other things changing at the time. Well, now with the stock STi pump in there, I'm rich across the board on the same tune and it's running like a champ. In hindsight, I think the AEM was slowly dying because it kept going slightly lean up top (inconsistently), and I kept revising the tune for it. Now with the STi pump, it's been dead consistent for about 500 miles so far. After changing out everything related to the fuel delivery, the new AEM fuel pump was the last thing I thought would have been the problem, but it's looking like it was. It's hard to confirm because I need to drive it for over 100 miles at highway speed to see if it dies, but so far it's been good! So here's a heads up - when fuel pumps start to die, they do weird things and don't show a CEL. Even if you recently put in a brand new aftermarket fuel pump, it could be the problem.

I guess your O2 sensor needed calibration when you went for the tune, and your MAF was going bad. The tuner was just going off your logs, so it's not his fault, but you should really have calibrated the O2 before the tune. I would get in touch with the tuner and ask for a retune given the recalibrated O2 sensor, and new MAF, he would probably give you a break on the price. But it sounds like your wideband is still off if there's a full point difference at idle compared to your upstream O2 readings. I'd double check your free-air calibration before getting in touch with the tuner.

This might help: I was going to try this on mine with a flickering screen, but I haven't had a problem with it in a long while, so I've just saved the bookmark for whenever I need it. It's basically just bending out the grounding tabs on back of the faceplate so they make contact again. If you try it, let us know if it works!

For an Outback, I've found you need a 1" spacer to level things out. Maybe with a TINY bit of rake depending on the evenness of the surface you're parked on. But I was originally on 3/4" spacers and then went to 1".

Ha! On my other car (WRX), I'm actually replacing a StopTech BBK with LGT brakes.

Ah, I see. Yeah, I'm a snowboarder and I just throw my stuff in the back with the "30" of the back seat folded down. It helps that I only ride a 155.

I'm amazed that none of the roof boxes have sliding mounts. I would expect some kind of a quick release for a pin on a track that slides forward. I can't be the first to think of that.

In one of my previous cars, I had an issue with the door seals leaking and the interior starting to get mold. So when I got this car (2008 Outback XT), I went around the factory door seals with expanding gray foam tape they sell at Home Depot. I did it for an extra layer of water resistance, and for that it seems to work well, even though I didn't have any evidence that there was a problem with it before. As far as it's effect on the noise, it didn't seem to do much at all. As mentioned, if you look at how the door is designed, they are half doors. I put the foam tape on the lower halves - where metal closes on metal, but as far as noise, there's a whole other half of the door for external noise to get in. And it doesn't help that the noisy half (the half with the glass) is closer to your ears also. On my WRX, I put roofing tar on the interior of the wheelwells, and that seemed to help a tiny bit. But I also used sound deadening material inside the doors of that car, and that seemed to help the most. But everything was incremental over the course of 18 years of owning it. By now, the whole car is mostly covered minus the roof. It sounds close to an older BMW. Say, a 2006 era 3 series in terms of interior noise.

Unless you have a proper boost gauge, the readings through the OBD2 will be different. I monitor my car with Dash Command, and the "boost gauge" is relatively close for boost, but for vacuum it's way off, when compared to my actual boost gauge. If I remember, I'll see what my OBD2 vacuum looks like at idle, but if I recall, it was somewhere around 13 like you're reading, while the boost gauge read 18.5 hg.

Should be fine - that's where the JDM twin scroll setups put their stock O2 sensor. IF I were you, I would put my upstream O2 sensor in the bellmouth behind the turbo, and the wideband on the other end of the downpipe, and then shut off the code for the downstream O2 sensor and just leave it unplugged.

I actually don't have the part numbers or link, but you can search the oem part numbers and you should also see a bunch of alternatives in the "What did customers buy after looking at this item" section on the listing.

Oh I totally understand that, I just made myself let that go when I saw how much they were charging for them at the dealer.

Get them on Amazon - way cheaper, and easier to buy a larger quantity.

Pic of the front calipers, and do you have the rotors? Can you PM me a price shipped to 91042 (CA), thanks!