Finally finishing up the Outback - up soon - back to the diesel

Well, it's been a longer road than I would have originally thought, but I'm just about done with the Outback now. Although the car ran well when I bought it, I needed to catch it up on a lot of maintenance and tune-up items, most of which I detailed in this blog.

Recently, I finally installed the new steering rack boot. As the passenger side boot was still intact, and it's still cold here, I opted to only replace the torn boot.

I also finally replaced the missing exhaust manifold stud. I was going to replace 2, but one hole had apparently been drilled and tapped to a larger size. So, that bolt had to stay in place, for at least the time being.

Next, I replaced the cooling system hoses, which looked original to the car, and then washed the car and cleaned the engine compartment.

Then, yesterday, I got the fog lights working. The factory ones didn't work. I put a new bulb in the driver's side, and it worked for a few minutes, but the passenger side light was corroded on the inside past the point of no repair. Given how hard these lights are to find, I opted to install a pair of aftermarket lights which also use H3 bulbs. I'm pleased with the new lights. They work well and don't look too out of place.

So the next time you drop in for a read... I'll try and have some Mercedes stuff for you. I'm glad to be getting back to that project, and that the Outback is now solid.

Learning when to call it quits...

Well, it looks like this may be the beginning of the end. If you've been following along, you know that I replaced the cylinder head in my 1995 Subaru Legacy daily driver earlier this year, which supposedly cured a misfire issue I;d been having.

As of this past week, the misfire is back, unfortunately. The car threw the same P0302 code again. I did a compression test and verified that I have low compression in cylinder 2. This is the same test I did back in April. I had meant to re-test the car after replacing the cylinder head, but never got around to it. Earlier this year, cylinder 2 clocked in at around 70 PSI. This time, it's showing around 100 psi, which is still bad compared to the other three cylinders, which are showing 165, 165, and 160.

I'm not 100% sure why the misfire took so long to return, but it may be because I cleaned the carbon buildup off the cylinder 2 piston when I replaced the cylinder head. To buy myself some more time, I ran a can of Seafoam through the car this past weekend and replaced the spark plugs. As it is, I think I'll get through the winter (most likely with the check engine light coming on at times). But, come springtime, I'm hoping to be driving the Mercedes project, and hopefully can start looking for a "new" daily driver.

I was hoping for more miles out of this car (I've put around 45,000 very well maintained miles on the car as of now). But, the car has never run quite right for me. I'm guessing that cylinder 2 has been problematic for as long as I've owned the car, most likely due to mistreatment by a previous owner.

Because of the car's overall poor cosmetic condition, including rust, a rear suspension crossmember that's suspect, an aging transmission, an already-patched gas tank, a leaky cooling system, and numerous other issues, it's probably not worth it for me to try and replace the engine, and rebuilding it is out of the question. So, I'm most likely going to end up replacing the car. With what? Time will tell.