Toph6888

cylinders 1 and 3 missfiring. Haven't gotten the full story from him (hes not a car person so doesn't really know how to convey what the shop that looked at it told him) but from what I got apparently it somehow leaked oil, lost pressure, and rod knock on 1 and 3 from no oil. So yah, pretty much shot. The subaru engines apparently are made of gold cause cheapest I can find with around 100k on it is around $1500-1600 before shipping. Trying to get a quote on that one. Only other option seems to be to find a decent condition shortblock (apparently the EJ251/252/253 all share the same shortblock) and then get the stock heads cleaned up, full gasket set, new oil pump/pickup, and then just rebuild it from there. Still looking like that option would be around $1500-2000 though. THe car is a 2005 black on black outback. Brakes are still new, cv axles all the way around are new and never really had any issues. Car has around 180k on it, and I hate to see it go to waste since it is a really nice car even though KBB says its only worth $4k in private sale. Not to mention it has two sets of new tires (bridgestone all seasons and a blizzak set on steelies that were new last year). I still think it would be worth fixing but hes in a bind so will have to see what happens in terms of timing/price.

Brother's outback's engine took a crap this weekend, so trying to help him find a spare engine so that we can swap it out. Its a 2005, so looking preferably for a longblock ej253 engine, but if we can't find that then we would like to get a shortblock and will rebuild it. Wondering if anyone knows any place in columbus that has subaru engines for sale, so far ebay and picknpull/pullapart haven't had much to go on. Any thoughts on places to pick up an engine for around 1000-1500 or less would be great.

Got the last miscellaneous bits done on the mustang tonight and back out of the garage/test drive around the neighborhood. Here are pics of how I clearanced the front bumper so that it didn't block the top 1/3 of the intercooler. It is at about a 45* angle on the bottom, so still structural, just with a sweeping angle so air can still get into the cooler. Got the car back together and worked on clearancing the front bumper for the tow strap. Decided the best way was to just F'it and just cut a small hole into the bumper. Easiest way to access it. Might go ahead and find or make some kind of cover for the hole, but for now its fine. Can just tuck it in for daily driving then pull it out (woot) when at the track. Everything back together: Finally, picked up a set of new motive 3.90 gears for the rear end. Now, I know a lot of people are going to say don't go 3.90s, that I need more load for the turbo, blah blah blah. The fact is, my turbo isn't huge. It spools just fine, and I get over 150% load on my engine already, so getting load into the engine isn't the issue. Looking at overall gear ratios compared to my WRX it will be almost identical to the mustang with the 3.90s and the t5 trans. Also, my turbo size to my engine size is about the same as the wrx engine to the wrx turbo, so I don't have any concern about the turbo being able to spool up. Its honestly a smaller size turbo as I'm not trying for high end hp, I want mid range for autox/trackdays, and also being more street friendly would be a lot nicer. Anyone who has driven a wrx will know their 1st and 2nd gear is where the money is, but then the stock ecu starts pulling boost out of the engine at higher loads and makes 3 and 4 not quite as fun. Anyways, long way of saying its worth the gamble to me for how my car is set up/what I want it to do.

got all the necessary bits buttoned up on the mustang and got it running after putting in some new coolant. "]V6 turbo first start after 2" aluminum radiator - YouTube?rel=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen> "]V6 turbo first start after 2" aluminum radiator - YouTube I also noted that the front bumper has a very minimal contact to the intercooler, so I started notching that part out. I cut out part of the steel box and bent it to form a triangle instead, this way it won't contact the intercooler or block any of the vents, it should allow plenty of air to pass through the intercooler instead of blocking about 1/3 of it. I will post pictures of this tonight.

Got the bumper support welded on this weekend (with the addition of an awesome burn on my arm from the welding torch, doh). Not the prettiest welding, but should hold for what I need it to do. Painted that black as well as some miscellaneous brackets and some spots I missed when I originally sprayed the engine bay black. Pushed the car outside and used a 1 gallon spray bottle to clean up the engine bay from any coolant residue (wish I had a house with a hose, but this worked out pretty well for a $15 spray bottle and cleaned it up enough). spraying engine bay (damn you white balance!) Spraying down other parts/piping Started getting parts back onto the car. Turbo and pre turbo exhaust is in that I wrapped up with some DEI heat wrap, ac condenser and the powersteering cooler are in, radiator, shroud and lower coolant line are in minus the top brackets, and the intercooler bracket is back in. Gonna get the rest back on tonight, which includes the fan, turbo dump, air filter, upper coolant pipe, intercooler piping, vacuum line for the BOV, connect up my o2 sensors, wideband, and front bumper/headlight panel. Hopefully get to the point where I can start it again tonight.

Stared working on replacing the bumper support in the car since I have everything out of the way that needs to be removed anyways. The bumper support has been bent since I have owned the car by the previous owner, and one of those things I always wanted to replace but was always just buried in the car to get to. Here is a picture showing before how they were slightly bent (passenger side is not as bad, top is good, only need to pull the bottom out a little bit with a slide hammer). I had to notch the stock bumper in order to get the intercooler to fit because of the bends in the support, so I decided it was time that I go ahead and replace this mess. Ordered parts off of AM, about $20 a side. The only issue with them is that the holes do not come tapped for bolts, so you will either need to tap the threads like I did or just get a slightly smaller bolt to run through it and then put a nut on the back end. The load will get transferred to the bumper and bumper support, so a typical bolt should be fine. I looked online a lot to try to find out how to replace these and couldn't find anything. Was a little nervous about doing it, but then I just said F*** it, its not like I can make it worse. There are a lot of spot welds holding this bad boy together. 6 on the front face, and then 4 inside that connect the frame, rad support and bumper support/absorber. You gotta pick and choose your spot welds because there are some others in there that are only for the frame to bumper support. Fast forward 2hrs of battling with my 2lb sledge, sawzall, spot weld cutter, and grinder and I end up with the mess below: The "Void" New Fitment: I am debating on how I want to put it in. I could go for rewelding part of it, but I am thinking I might just bolt it in to the frame with some 3/8" bolts since I can get a wrench in there, and then weld the face. That should be more than strong enough since I am probably also going to be putting in a tow strap on the bumper beam bolts. Now that everything is apart and reworked I am finally almost done with this ordeal. I have some new exhaust heat wrap, so I will pull that off real quick and wash the engine bay from the coolant residue, wrap the exhaust, and then finally everything goes into reassembly. Should be running by tomorrow.

still have the 390 gears? Would you be able to do $125?

PM'd

Got most of the radiator stuff done last night. Got the brackets finished up for the fan shroud: Just used some 16gauge aluminum, my hammer, vice, drill and rivnuts to make it all fit. Puts a nice compression on the shroud so that the rubber is loaded, but not so tight as to crush anything. Should keep it in place pretty easily. I used 1/8" rivets to mount the brackets to the radiator (on the mounting plates that the radiator comes with) and then put rivnuts on the brackets for easy attachement/removal. Then I decided to see how it all finally fit in there (I had fit before, but it was mostly holding by hand, so it was nice to see it all in there by itself. Sorry for the bad photos, lighting is an issue in my garage lol). Exhaust is a bit closer than I wanted, adn I could maybe shift it over a bit, but I like where the fan motor is in relation to all the piping, so I might go ahead and run it like this. With all the air running by the plastic it should be OK, and I also have a bunch of heat wrap to put on the exhaust so before I run it that dump pipe will be wrapped. Minimum spacing is about half inch between the flex joint and the very edge of the fan support. And finally I started looking at the coolant lines. Mine are stainless pipes with reinforced chemically resistant couplers on either end, and I was worried I was going to have to cut down some sections due to the decreased width of this radiator compared to stock. Luckily I was able to get everything to fit by just trimming off some excess silicone from the coupler, so everything "technically" fits. Its getting pretty tight in there lol. Gonna pull the exhaust off so that I can clean it and the engine bay (coolant residue still on a lot of the engine) and wrap the exhaust pipes, then I should be all done with this fiasco.

Got most of the radiator stuff done last night. Got the brackets finished up for the fan shroud: Just used some 16gauge aluminum, my hammer, vice, drill and rivnuts to make it all fit. Puts a nice compression on the shroud so that the rubber is loaded, but not so tight as to crush anything. Should keep it in place pretty easily. I used 1/8" rivets to mount the brackets to the radiator (on the mounting plates that the radiator comes with) and then put rivnuts on the brackets for easy attachement/removal. Then I decided to see how it all finally fit in there (I had fit before, but it was mostly holding by hand, so it was nice to see it all in there by itself. Sorry for the bad photos, lighting is an issue in my garage lol). Exhaust is a bit closer than I wanted, adn I could maybe shift it over a bit, but I like where the fan motor is in relation to all the piping, so I might go ahead and run it like this. With all the air running by the plastic it should be OK, and I also have a bunch of heat wrap to put on the exhaust so before I run it that dump pipe will be wrapped. Minimum spacing is about half inch between the flex joint and the very edge of the fan support. And finally I started looking at the coolant lines. Mine are stainless pipes with reinforced chemically resistant couplers on either end, and I was worried I was going to have to cut down some sections due to the decreased width of this radiator compared to stock. Luckily I was able to get everything to fit by just trimming off some excess silicone from the coupler, so everything "technically" fits. Its getting pretty tight in there lol. Gonna pull the exhaust off so that I can clean it and the engine bay (coolant residue still on a lot of the engine) and wrap the exhaust pipes, then I should be all done with this fiasco.

Getting further with my fan shroud, hopefully will finish it up after some family stuff tonight. Cut the hole out with a jig saw (woo new tool) and a metal blade, then smoothed it out with some dremmel tools. Also bent up the edge of it to add some 3d shape as well as help direct air flow to the fan blades. Added vacuum hose over the end of the double bend edges to add a little insulation. Finally, mounted up the fan using my rivnuts (god I love that tool). Here you can see the bent edge for the fan blades and directing the airflow: Gonna hopefully get all the brackets done tonight that way the system will be ready to bolt into the car. Gonna have to slightly rework the metal coolant lines, have about 1/2" to cut out and reweld on each one since the radiator isn't quite as wide as the stock radiator.

I'll have to take some external measurements. My core size alone is 24" x 15", but that is without the end tanks/mounts. all together it is probably closer to 28"x17" total size. Started work on my fan shroud last night for my new slim radiator fan. Total thickness will be between 1/2" and 3/4". I bent up the edges to be 1/2" with a bead roll, and then I will also put some vacuum line down all the edges to protect it from hurting the radiator. its only 20 gauge aluminum, but it still has a lot of rigidity with the bends at all the corners. I knew it would stiffen up, but I didn't realize this much lol. Still need to cut the center hole out for the fan, and then I will probably flare that edge as well to give a little bit more 3d support and help direct the air towards the fan. The shroud measures 20" x 16". My core size is 24"x15". The fan is a "16inch" fan, but the blades are only 15". Total core size area = 360sqin. The fan area is 176.6sqin, roughly 49% of the total core size. With the shroud, I now cover roughly 85% of the radiator area, so a big improvement. For those wondering, I couldn't do the full radiator because my cold side intercooler piping runs right up against the now thicker radiator, so I had to miss that part of the area due to clearance. It still has enough room between the piping and the radiator for air to flow and no contact, but not enough room for the 3/4" total thickness shroud. 20gauge aluminumm - $20 off of amazon for a 24"x36" piece (only needed about half of it for the shroud). Hit it till it fits! I just marked out all my lines, clamped it to some wood I had, and then just kept hitting the edge till I got the bend I wanted. All edges done: Figured out my placement of the fan on the car, marked it up and I will cut this out tonight/tomorrow What it will look like on the car:

Ya, Ive been meaning to get AAA, now that it hits home I will probably set it up before I take the mustang out again lol. For the radiator, link below. If you want to stop by sometime to measure it before hand to see if it will fit what you want, let me know, I'm over in dublin off of sawmill. Will be out this weekend, but could show it next week/weekend if you want to see it. Americanmuscle.com is a big mustang parts site, and from when I ordered it Monday it was here Wednesday night. Not too bad for free shipping. http://www.americanmuscle.com/sr-radiator-9495manual.html They also have a couple other styles if you flip through the different years. 96-04 mustangs didn't have the fill neck/pressure cap on the radiator, it was on the overflow bottle, but still used pegs as the mounting structure. The 94-95 had the peg set up and also has the fill neck/pressure cap on the radiator, but is 1" less wide and 1.5" shorter, but still 2" thick. The 79-93 mustang radiators use a different mounting structure, and have the fill neck/pressure cap on the radiator.

For those who don't know it, my radiator blew out at the plastic crimps during an autocross. Funny thing is, nothing was hot, and it wasn't during a run, it was about 5-10mins after it had been idling just cooling down. The damage: crimp side: It wasn't a big deal that I knew I needed a new radiator, and was planning on putting one in over the winter, however the not so cool part was it blowing 45 mins from home. Luckily someone who was there had a contact for a truck/trailer that offered to tow it home for $100, so lucked out there. So I set about looking into getting a new radiator. The only performance ones for the 99-04 years are for the GT's, which don't have the pressure cap on the radiator. I didn't have room for the coolant overflow tank designed for the GT's because of the turbo kit, but I found that the 94-95 5.0L had a very similar size and attachment structure as the 99-04, so I purchased one from american muscle. It is a 2" thick all aluminum triple core, with a core size 24" x 15", where the old was 25"x16.5"x1" thick. Comparison of old vs new: So I went ahead and got everything torn down. When I went to drain the radiator there was nothing in there, nothing in the block. When we first saw the radiator go (luckily hood was up so it was really obvious) the car ran for about 15-20 seconds afterwards. Gauge at the time was all OK at 180-190*F. Pretty sure the engine will be fine, fingers crossed. Ended up having to take off a lot more than I thought I would to get everything out: Next I tried mounting the radiator. DAMN. The mounts were 1.5" closer together on the 94/95 then the 2000. So hacked off the old mount with a grinder and then mocked up a new one out of 16 gauge stainless I had sitting around. Was deciding how I wanted it to go in, and decided to use my new rivnut gun that I got for christmas. Got two in on the top, gonna put two in on either ear of the mount. Pretty strong already and would probably be fine, but with the last two it will make it beyond strong enough to hold up that radiator. Bent up the top mounts and got it so the radiator is in pretty solid. However, I have about 1" of travel up and down that I can move the radiator. So I might go ahread and just make some new top mounts that angle down a bit to hold the radiator better with some grommets around the tabs. Lastly, there is no way my stock radiator fan is going to fit, which is a shame because its supposed to flow something like 3500cfm and is a dual speed. Because of the increased cooling capacity of the radiator I am hoping that a 16" flexalite slim fan that I will be getting from summit this weekend that flows 2500cfm will be able to cut it, and if not I will get some sheet aluminum and make a shroud. Only $20 on amazon for a piece of aluminum big enough, so wouldn't be a big deal. Might go ahead and do it right away, but will need to get the fan first so I can see what kind of clearance I have. From the bottom there is more room, but right now I only have a little over 2" between the top of the radiator and the dump pipe, and about 5" from the center of the radiator to the merge pipe. The fan I am looking at is 3-3/8" thick at the motor, and should be plenty thin at the outside rim, even with a 1/2"-1" shroud if I made one. Top of the dump pipe pretty close to the very top of the radiator, but room underneath it available pretty easy: Gonna try to get that all figured out during the next couple days and back together, hoping to be back driving it at the end of next weekend (gonna work on cleaning up some of the radiator support that got bent by the previous owner as well, so new crash absorbers, bumper, and headlight panel going in as well).

Mine was the other one. Stock radiator plastic end tanks don't seem to appreciate the turbo. Funny thing is it was sitting there cooling off for 5-10 mins, and wasn't hot or anything, just decided to blow. Blew open the section shown below and all of the crimps on the other side of the plastic where it mates to the radiator fins. New all aluminum 2" thick radiator already in the mail...At least it happened there instead of midohio or on track. At least nothing got onto the autocross course.

Got the tank finished up early last week and been driving the mustang around all weekend and got a couple datalogs and just beat on it since I have been fixing minor things for the past two months and havent driven it in a while. With the old fuel pump I was at 100% fuel duty cycle at ~4500rpms in 3rd and ~4000rpms in 4th running 10psi. With the new twin 340lph pumps I am now at ~62% duty cycle at 6000rpms in 3rd, haven't gotten a chance to see 4th because iwth my gearing top of 3rd is 90mph. Had some issues when I initially put the tune on with adjusted fuel pump voltage table and transfer function constants adjusted. I put the tune on I had originally with the stock values and it pretty much ran perfect. For some reason it didn't like any of those adjustments. Idle would surge up and down 100-200rpms, and then it would act like there was a vacuum leak whenever I opened the throttle by blipping up, then down, then up again. With the original tune all my fuel pressures are 40psi +/- 2psi the whole way through the graph, so tune is looking pretty solid. Started running 14psi and runs solid the whole way through. Excited to get back to a drag strip to see what kind of times it can put down now that it has the fuel the whole way through the rpm band.

Damn I wish I had the money right now... GLWS

$700 for boring and piston assembly sounds a bit high for him. I had my block (6 cylinder) bored, decked on both sides, both heads decked, my crank balanced to the rotating assembly (which required moly due to heavier pistons) as well as cleaning everything, balancing all the pistons and rods, and installing new freeze plugs and cam bearings for $750. Everything that I got back was in good shape and bagged up. I can understand if people don't want to take things to him. In terms of the subaru stuff, I can say if he doesn't tag it right away it could be easily lost in all the other subaru parts bc he does a lot of them. Not saying he was right to mix them up though.

From my history with them they have gone out of the way for me. Part storage can be somewhat of an issue. But parts being picked up after machining were always in heavy duty plastic bags and exceptionally clean. Never had any issue with any of my parts there. Sometimes have issues getting a hold of Mike but going in usually is the best way to get a good idea on timing for being able to get work done. Usually always called me back within a day.

Got the car fired up last night with the new fuel tank in it. Everything seemed to work out nice and the fuel pump duty cycle is way down, but still seems kinda high at 30-33% at idle. I changed the fuel filter again, so I'm not sure why its still so high (i've been told it should in theory be around 20% at idle) but its a lot better then what the other one I had was at with 50-55% duty cycle at idle lol. It was searching for spark and bouncing around on the spark source table so it was idling not super awesome but overall well. I probably knocked a sparkplug connector loose when I was fitting all my ac lines, so I will check all those tonight bc by the time I went to check them the engine was too hot for me to get my hand in there.

yah. about $200-300. On the low side if they are 4 lug, worth more if they are 5 lug. They should fit pretty much all mustangs 79-04. The 99-04 guys sometimes will buy them, but the axle tubes are shorter on the pre-99 ones. Usually I have seen 99-04 going for 300-400, where the pre 99 go 200-300.

For some future info for anyone wanting to know, it turns out they are just sound resonators/mufflers (info from some guys on another forum). They are just there to quiet down the AC lines for NVH. I cut it off and it literally is just a hollow bulb, so out it goes. Not too worried about a little extra sound from this car lol. With that out of the way that gives me a good 4-5" of clearance to the exhaust, so a little heat wrap around it and it should be right as rain.

I am working on fitting my lines around my turbo kit since when I first had the turbo kit on it blew the rubber lines bc they were too close to the header. At the time I just took it all off and ran ac delete. Hot summer later, I am working on putting it back together. I am re fitting the lines and having the rubber hoses recrimped on once I have everything in place. The issue I am running into is the hard lines on the compressor. On the high pressure side of the compressor coming out it still basically runs directly into the passenger header. I can get it gently bent mostly out of the way to where I have about 1" clearance, but this area is going to get hot, and I have room above that part of the line that I would like to get it as high up as I can. There is this bulb on the high side line before a sensor that is on the line that is in the way though. Can I just cut this out and be fine or is it desperate for the AC system to work? Is it a pressure control valve of some sort? A stock photo of an extremely similar line, but this one has two of those bulbs on it. IF I needed to, could I just cut it off from where it is and put it at the inlet of the condenser side of the high pressure line? http://images.cjponyparts.com/media/catalog/product/cache/1/image/9df78eab33525d08d6e5fb8d27136e95/a/c/ach56383.jpg

Yah. When I got the IRS I also dropped the spare tire/jack bc it wouldn't fit the rear bc of the irs or the front bc of the 13" brakes, so the spare tire/jack also dropped another roughly 30lbs. So its still not light, but at least there is some savings. But still nothing compared to all the weight I added up front with the turbo exhaust tubing/turbo/merge pipe/downpipe/intercooler/intercooler piping, 13" brakes and cobra wheels. I probably have an extra 100-200lbs on the front end. the maximum motorsports K member kit helped a bit, but not anywhere as much as a UPR set up. Maybe 30-40lbs lighter with the MM stuff compared to stock. Shes still pretty heavy compared to stock form. Battery in the back helps to even some weight out, every bit helps.

The reason I did the seat delete was mainly I didn't like the cobra front seats with how tall I am, so I wanted to get something that would sit a lot lower so I had room for my helmet. Originally I was only going to sell the fronts and get some seats that matched the rear seats, but the only seat I found in my price range that fit me didn't have the same pattern, so I ended up selling the rear seats with the fronts. I looked at other rear seat delete options, but a cheap OSB wood with carpet was $150, and aluminum was $300! So I looked online and found some gauge aluminum sheet for everything I needed for $100-120, and I got thicker stuff so it would have some strength to it (16 gauge, some people have done it with as little as 20-22 gauge). Also, for some racing tracks, you have to have a metal barrier between the driver and the trunk. I had a brake at work to bend it, so I spent an evening making up the templates, cut it out, bought some fasteners and got it all in. I also have some alcantara to wrap it with whenever I get around to putting that in. In terms of weight: Cobra Stuff: Front Driver: 62lbs Front Passenger: 43lbs Rear seat bottom (foam): 11lbs Rear Seat back (steel frame with foam): 25.5lbs Rear Seat Belts: 5lbs Rear Head Rest: 5lbs I added: Front Seat/Track: 25lbs/9lbs = 34lbs total Passenger Seat/Track: 25lbs/9lbs = 34lbs total Rear Aluminum Seat: 10lbs 3point harness: 5lbs So I dropped about 70lbs, not a ton, but every bit counts on this car lol.