Was driving along a twisty B road today having some fun, when the car started limiting itself to 4.5 thousand revs and the check engine light came on. The car is running fine appart from limiting itself, was running a little low on fuel at the time, so i've filled it up now. Was hoping after restarting the engine this would clear the fault but it hasn't. Do i need to reset the ECU? (its a standard MY93 WRX ECU) and if so how do I do this, disconnect the battery for a certain length of time? What could this fault be? Low fuel pressure? There are no leaks of any kind.
Speedo stopped workin as well yesterday, not my week! Stripped the dash and the cables not spinning, its not snapped either as theres resistance when u try and turn it, so it must be something the gear box end, any ideas on either problem anyone???

 

Take it easy until you find out for sure. Check light may be from just giving it a hammering and sensors playing up. Last car I had where this happened the speedo failing was a sure sight of the diff going as this is where the feed is taken from. It was not a Scoob though. Good luck.

 

when the car detects faults it automatic\lly goes in to safe mode and dops revs etc.

If the fault hasn't cleared it means the ecu is still detecting it - you could try disconnecting the battery but if it still comes back get it looked and don't give it the beans until all is sorted.

I think you can find out the fault code on classics by plugging in 2 connectors under the steering coloum which will then in turn casue a sequence of lights on the dash board. The total number of flashes relates to a specific problem/area. If you search on here will will find much better discriptions of what you need to do...


My engine light came on on my STI recently - cause was a loose connection in the kmh - to mph converter

 

Posted this Q in scoobynet general discussion, got this reply

"Its your speedo cable gone mate Probably at the gearbox if its fine the other end.When the ecu cant detect a signal from the speedo it sticks you in limp home mode. I think it was to stop those crazy jap barstewards disconnecting the speedo to get around the 112mph limit in japan"

Anyone shed any light on this? Agree/disagree?

 

i've got 04 jdm sti and like i say when i lost my speedo the check engine light came on. 30 seconds later the speedo came back and th light went off stright away. If all your clocks are working again and the light is still on then it could be anything.

Get it checked out

 

Cheers Pippyrips, hopefully its just the speedo cable, fingers crossed

 

bttt All opinions welcome

 

hey tay05
sorry to hear your having trouble hope you sort it out soon.
peter

 

Cheers Pete, luckily the cars running fine below 4.5 thousand rpm, so I can still use it. Hopefully when i replace the speedo cable (if thats whats knackered) the CEL will go off and the car will be back to normal. Until then Taylor.

 

is you speedo working at the mo?

 

Not yet, got a mate coming to have a look at it in about half an hour.

 

Sussed the speedo problem, the bottom part of the speedo cable has snapped. Does anyone know if this is a dealer only part or can i get it from a motor factor?

 

you may have found the CEL problem - although my car didn't go into safe mode when the speedo was playing up.. - hope it all works out

 

Yeah thats what i'm hoping, just having a nightmare trying to get the speedo cable! Hard to believe isn't it!

 

might be worth giving api a call

 

The speedo problem will usually bring up a CEL. Fix the speedo and I'd be fairly certain the CEL will go away.

David APi Impreza / APi Engines
www.apiengines.com

 

Cheers David, I'm hoping that is the case. Just having a nightmare getting the speedo cable as the car's a '93 JDM WRX. Surely I would have thought all cable driven speedo's on scoob's were the same.

 

Big thanks to Keith Price Subaru They've ordered the part for me and it'll be here Thursday hopefully and all for only £40 inc vat

So CVC if ur watching

 

Good result

 

taylor what was the problem with cvc.
chris.

 

Basically as soon as i said it was an import they didn't want to know. They just said they couldn't get the part. Why not??!! Wayne at Keith Price had no trouble, just said leave ur name and tel number with me and I'll contact Subaru Japan and see if i can get a part number, he wasn't funny about it at all. He then rung me back this morning (following day) and said he can order it and the price was £36 + vat. No hassle at all and i was treated as a valued customer. If I ever buy a brand new scoob, i know where my money will be going. Not to CVC thats for sure!

 

Just to close this subject, fitted a replacement lower speedo cable today and the speedo is working perfect again. The CEL has gone out also..praise to subaru for fitting self deleting ECU's
Thanks to everybody for your help and advice on this subject, cheers guys.
Taylor

 

Result

 

Think I may have this issue on my '98 Sport.
This afternoon the CEL came on for a few seconds (then turned off again) but now the speedo is all over the place, and under-reading when it reads at all.
Had a look at the back of the dials and it looks like it's an electrical speedo? (as opposed to the old spinny-wire type I've had on previous cars).
Are you guys talking about the same thing? (ie an electrical wire failing, as opposed to a moving cable breaking?)

Whereabouts is the sender on the gearbox?

 

My problem was a broken lower mechanical speedo cable not an electronic one as i have the older type fitted on mine. The cable screwed in on the top left of the gearbox (looking into the engine bay). Hope this helps?