I have posted some of the pictures I took during the whole conversion process so that everyone has an idea how easy the Subaru conversion is.
Here is the freshly extracted 2.2 motor from the 130k mile Legacy.
I knew the motor was good as I drove the Car back from Rotherham to London keeping to the speed speed limit officer, all the way non stop and the motor didn't miss a beat.
I couldn't really see in the car why the Air Con didn't work but once it was out it became obvious.
It didn't matter anyway as the Aircon compressor was scrap.
At the same time we also extracted the whole wiring loom, just to be safe that I had all the wiring needed.This was a long job getting it out whole and taking care not to damage probably the most important part of the conversion.
This is where all the fun starts.
The strip down of the engine was only minor as I only replaced serviceable items due to the engine still having good compression in all cylinders for the age of the motor.
All the idlers and cam sprockets were in excellent condition so only oil seals, belts and gaskets needed to be replaced along with a good clean up.
Always remember to mark alignment positions before removing the belt.
Subaru make this really easy as they already mark everything including the new belt so its just a question of lining everything up.
The early EJ22 engine is a non interference type engine so if the cam shaft does rotate without the timing belt being on the valves will not hit the pistons.
Once the motor was all cleaned up I then started the rebuild process fitting the oil seals and gaskets.
I had a minor setback when I over torqued the automatic cambelt tesioner and stripped the thread.
This apperantly is quite a common problem and Subaru modified all later belt tesioners to overcome this problem, but as I was trying to keep the whole conversion budget to £2000 I helicoiled the unit and then reinstalled it.
Once the belt was fitted and all bolts torqued to the correct poundage's,I fitted the new belt covers from Subaru.
Next it was on to fitting the adaptor plate from Kennedy Engineering to the Engine block and Flex plate adaptor to the torque convertor in the gearbox.
Due to the higher revving of the Subaru Motor I removed the standard transmission oil cooler and fitted a larger external Transmission oil cooler from Small Car in the states.
Whilst I was doing all that I took time out to modify the wiring loom just to add a bit of variation.
Once I had mated the transmission with the motor it was time to fit the exhaust header and fabricate a silencer solution !!!!
So its almost there and ready for fitment I just needed to finish the loom.
Its time to remove the 2.1 wasserboxer from its long term home.
When Its removed you should be left with an engine bay that's looks something like this.
Once I had cleaned and tidied all the wiring and removed oil and dirt from the engine bay it was time to start the motor install.
And ready for bolt up on new engine bar from Kennedy Engineering.
I also replaced all the hosing with new silicon items from Think Automotive and cleaned all the water pipes from rubbish to help the cooling system ready for the big bleed.
After fitting the loom and filling with coolant, Transmission oil and engine oil the finished product looks like this.
After building up some oil pressure and checking all was good it was time to start.
It could have all ended on the turn of a key if the wiring was wrong, but luckily it fired up first time.
After it bled all the hydralic lifters it settled down to a lovely steady tick over @600 rpm.
I have now done over 500 miles on the conversion and love it, should have done it when I got the van.
Next on the list is to hook up the cruise control to the existing VW cruise control vaccume pump.
T.B.C
Edited by flightpath