silent running

Cool. I'll be on it tomorrow night as long as the sealant eater stuff turns up. Then I should be able to go and get it MOT'd then properly start running in.

silent running

Hmmm, slight delay! Anyway I just got the stuff yesterday, it gets through the silicone a little but not enough, so in the end I thought sod it and just rubbed off as much as I could off the head mating faces, cleaned the gaskets up properly, then put a load more fresh Threebond on them and fitted the rockers covers. At least this time with a whole new set of bolt seals I could feel I was getting good torque on the bolts nice and even - £35 for the set from Subaru! I reckon that was my problem the first time round, reusing dodgy compressed old seals. Anyway, it's impossible to get even my small torque wrench in there so I just went with hand tight and it feels and looks right.

Tomorrow I'll start putting everything back in place around the engine bay then hopefully fire it up again! If it doesn't leak then great, I can start running it in properly. If it does leak, I'll tackle it again. I will get there in the end. Actually after hearing that flat four rumble at the first start-up, I seriously can't wait to get it going again just to listen to it, even if it does start dripping oil!

silent running

OK everything's back in place now. Once the rocker covers were back on, it was probably another couple of hours getting everything else back in position. Now I need to take it for a quick warm up run to see if it leaks again (please, no!) and if all is well then do the final fitting of the last bits and pieces around the bumper area.

EDIT...It all looks good. It was still smoking after 5 minutes but that's gone now, it must have been just the oil that was still in the up-pipe wrap burning off. Gave it a good run and had the oil up to 75 degrees and got it back into the garage - an hour later, no smells, no smoke, no leaks. Topped up the water a little, checked oil level, checked the PS fluid - all good. Yay!

Now I need to get the front end sorted out properly so I can start running it around daily and put some miles on it.

silent running

Spent a couple of hours getting the bumper and lights all back on and lined up properly, as usual all the bolts and clips had snapped off so replaced everything just about. Anyway it's on now, at last, so I can finally look at the finished car - let the running in commence!

Atari Boy

Good work, now post up some pics.

silent running

Hmmm, not so fast! It's been fine driving it round for twenty minutes a couple of times but took it for a proper half hour run today and it's now sounding rattly, but only in gear. In neutral it sounds fine whatever the revs (up to 3500) but of course there's no load on the engine.

My first thought was that the bottom end's gone again. But last time that happened the rattling got gradually louder and louder. However it did start at around 2500rpm and eventually spread all round the rev range so even at idle it sounded like a bag of spanners. Mine's not like that yet.

Second thought was that forged engines are supposed to be bit rattly. But it's an inconsistent sound so I ruled that out.

My current idea is that it's a clutch or gearbox problem because it ONLY does it when in low gear, all sorts of scrapey, rattly noises when pulling away, but in higher gears you get a rattle at 2500rpm and nothing else really.

I'm hoping that if it's anything, it's a transmission problem. That I can deal with because I seriously do not want to pull this engine again and rebuild it!

Help! Any ideas welcome.

dunx

iTrader: (3)

Check all the exhaust bolts, I had one loosen and fall off, despite the attentions of my torque wrench... (turbo, up-pipe, and manifold are my favourites.

dunx

P.S. Superb thread, next year I'll be pulling mine out !

The Stitcher

iTrader: (12)

thing is did you have a noise in the gearbox or clutch before your engine went ?? seems strange for your gearbox to just start making noises when all you have done is rebuild your engine and you are only running it in and have not run big power through it yet

jonny_693

iTrader: (5)

Just a silly thought but check your transmission dipstick is not rattling around near anything, mine was last week and I shat myself lol! Good work.

jameswrx

iTrader: (4)

Not something silly like the clutch fork rattling is it? did you put the spring back on it?

Tim W

iTrader: (1)

Rather than go trawling back through the entire thread did you replace the clutch? If you didn't it could be the clutch release bearing

silent running

Changed the release bearing, that's brand new. At least all the answers you guys are giving me are non-engine problems...

Although the box and clutch were fine before the engine came out, maybe I did something to the clutch when I put it back in? I did drop it when it first came out and it took a little chip out of one edge. I guess what I need to do is the driving back and forth with the bonnet open and a helper looking/listening to see what's making the racket. Am I right in thinking that it can't be the bottom end if it doesn't rattle at all in neutral?

The Stitcher

iTrader: (12)

when my bottom end went it was fine on tick over but as you revved it up past a certain rpm it knocked and rattled ,same as when it first went and i was a few miles away from home only after i revved passed 2-4 thou it knocked and when ticking over and low revs sounded fine lets just hope it is the clutch or box as you done such a good job on your build

dj219957

im pretty sure if the bottom end were fooked then it would knock/rattle when reving on the drive (mine did), you say it only does it in gear so from what youve described it does sound transmission related. my guess would be something loose rather than a failure.

Tim W

iTrader: (1)

How about the clutch spigot bearing in the flywheel, did you replace that? It would have taken a hammering when the engine failed originally and ideally should have been replaced

hhh1234

iTrader: (17)

rev it slightly on the drive and if it rattles then its engine sounds like transmission.

silent running

****! Forgot the flywheel bearing. It seemed to be OK when I checked it before bolting it on. I'm guessing that would need the block splitting to get it out and replace it?

I'm going to have a look again this morning in the light, but I'm 99% certain I cannot get it to rattle at all at standstill, any revs up to 3500. I'll try again though. It also 'feels' funny through the pedals and steering when turning at low speed. Whether that's just cos I'm not used to driving it though...

Tim W

iTrader: (1)

You would need to remove the gearbox and clutch to get the the flywheel bolts so you can take it off, press out the old bearing and press in a new one.

But, it might not be that, exhaust other avenues first!

Matt578

The flywheel bearing is this part in the middle of the flywheel nick (blue Bit).



Replacement Bearing

silent running

Panic over! I think. Fixed a couple of niggling problems (indicators that weren't working because the plugs had corroded a little while the car had been off the road, and a non-functioning knock sensor which turned out to be because of the wrong setting on the Power FC) and had a look around the engine bay for causes of this rattle. Started up the car and it still idled and held at any revs without any weird noises.

I noticed that the first intercooler pipe (from the turbo) was almost touching on the turbo heatshield, so I undid the clip and twisted it around a little to give more clearance. Maybe when the pipe got a bit of heat into it, or the heatshield itself, they expanded a tiny bit, enough to touch and buzz together, especially with the engine moving around when taking up drive etc.

Well, half an hour's drive later, still no rattling! I've still got a weird scraping at low speed but I reckon that's probably just corrosion on the brake discs so I'm not too worried about it. It starts when I turn sharply so any other suggestions will be welcome...

Picture of the finished car here:

silent running

I've just been doing the final reckoning of what it's cost and I've totted it up, minus consumables, specialist equipment and most notably, ****-up costs i.e. where I did something totally wrong or didn't check it properly and ended up paying out twice. Throughout the build I was also wheeling and dealing, buying stuff I might need cheap or getting rid of parts I no longer needed, taking out what I wanted and selling on the surplus and this meant I clawed back a fair bit. So the upshot is I'm going to ignore the other costs and just look at the parts I bought.

Obviously there was a fairly decent spec before the bottom end failure and a lot of the ancillaries that you would need to make the most of an engine build like this were already in place and have been reused e.g. a Exedy clutch, 440 injectors, SARD FPR, Z32 MAF etc. etc. Also I did a major upgrade by switching to STi3/4 heads. But this is as close as I can get to how much a build like this might cost you if you do the same kind of job as I did.

BLOCK:

• STi2 RA closed deck block & machining (overbore & decks skimmed)
• ACL Race Series main & big end bearings
• Eagle forged con rods
• Wiseco 92.5mm forged pistons & rings
• Subaru bottom end seals/gaskets/o-rings etc.
• £1090

HEADS:

• V4 standard heads & hardware
• STi3/4 valvetrain
• Piper top hat shims & machining to size
• STi3/4 valves
• Subaru valve stem seals, rocker cover seals & cam seals
• Machining (ccing & skimming to spec)
• ARP head studs
• £840

ANCILLARIES:

• Sump & bolts
• Modine oil cooler
• Water pump (non-genuine)
• Oil pump service parts
• CDF lightweight pulley set (hard anodised)
• Cambelt & auxiliary belts
• Hybrid FMIC kit
• Clutch release bearing (non-genuine)
• Gearbox bolts & studs
• Fuel & oil filters
• £650

So the grand total is £2580. A big part of that cost was my decision to build up some STi3/4 heads which were the best heads I could use for an early block with my v4 inlet. Without the heads it would have been well under 2 grand. My originals (WRX v1/2 from the crooks who repaired it before) were wrecked though and I had to replace them with something.

It has been a great learning process and for two and a half grand I've got a forged bottom end and ported/polished STi3/4 heads that should be capable of a hell of a lot. Plan is to run it in then map it on 20% E85 bioethanol aiming for more than 350bhp on the TD05-16G that is still in place.

By being careful I could have done a complete 'standard' rebuild for £1000-£1500 depending on where costs were cut. If I ever need to do an EJ20 build again it will be much much simpler to avoid the pitfalls - for example, pulling the engine off clumsily in the first place cost me a £35 clutch release bearing because I cracked one of the 'ears' off it. Little things like that all add up when you don't know what you're doing! Another example is a set of copy valve stem seals that tore almost straight away. £20 down the drain and I ended up buying the genuine Subaru ones which are almost three times as much but they work.

Anyway, I will report back once running in and mapping are complete. Hope everyone's enjoyed the read and thanks for all the support along the way.

SleeperSy

Ive enjoyed the jouney - thanks for sharing the mistakes as well as the truimphs.


Hope it goes well now.

Sy

Mad Hammer

iTrader: (55)

Very impressive fella, well done !

trails

iTrader: (41)

a great thread, glad you are pleased with your hard work...I started to pull my block today and have only had to refer to this thread for info; cheers

silent running

Cool - good luck with it all, don't hesitate to PM me if you have any head-scratching moments!

dunx

iTrader: (3)

Great read, respect to you for having a go for yourself.

I think I'd box mine up and send it to Mr. Alan Jeffrey myself.



dunx

Keith Collings

iTrader: (3)

Yes - good read and waiting to hear how the mapping goes and results achieved

Matt578

Nick i find it impressive that your cost came within £8 of my rebuild!

silent running

No way!

Adam K

Glad for you Good luck with the rest.
Enjoying read, and journey!
Even though you mostly got me feeling like dunx (send it away!)