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After having overheated an ea82t to the point of melting the inner belt covers at the cam housings without my temp gauge moving above 1/4 scale, I took a tip from El Freddo and installed an auxillary temp gauge. About 10.00 in brass fittings and a 50.00 gauge. I picked up a t-stat from a subaru dealer( worth all of 30.00 ) and teed it in the by pass side off the water pump. I run just about 220 before the stat opens and at 1/4 scale im running at 190.
A small investment and well worth it.

Good move. When I bought my EA82T sedan it came pre cooked to the same degree - melted timing belt covers. It was its second engine already by 188,000km and twenty years. My temp gauge does not move beyond quarter either and yet to test whether it is the sender unit or gauge at fault. It is fine from cold to quarter and never more. Figure that is what killed first engine before my time as well. My fix was to fit an engine watchdog that didgitally monitorsa engine block metal temp and sounds an alarm at a settable point. It did take me some time to realise its temp reading could increase but the water temp gauge never budge even in high heat with air cond on. I was wondering why all others were having hot issues in the heat as mine was fine!

How is your engine condition after the melting down? Is it still operable after new head gaskets etc?

steptoe wrote:Good move. When I bought my EA82T sedan it came pre cooked to the same degree - melted timing belt covers. It was its second engine already by 188,000km and twenty years. My temp gauge does not move beyond quarter either and yet to test whether it is the sender unit or gauge at fault. It is fine from cold to quarter and never more. Figure that is what killed first engine before my time as well. My fix was to fit an engine watchdog that didgitally monitorsa engine block metal temp and sounds an alarm at a settable point. It did take me some time to realise its temp reading could increase but the water temp gauge never budge even in high heat with air cond on. I was wondering why all others were having hot issues in the heat as mine was fine!

How is your engine condition after the melting down? Is it still operable after new head gaskets etc?

I have not pulled it apart yet but possibly tomorrow. I'd like to have the heads pressure tested and see if I have a spare to rebuild. My melted ea82t is out of my '90 wagon. I just finished heads and gaskets-seals on my rx motor..so far so good round tripping 200 miles for work after sitting for about a year.

Glad to hear its working well for you!

As for your block I'd recommend a rebuild. Seriously over heated EA's have a tendancy to warp the piston heads as well. The original motor that came in my L series had cracked heads, warped piston heads and a cracked cylinder. I threw that block away.

If you can afford the rebuild it'd be well worth the effort and give you the piece of mind that comes with a fresh motor. Also get the radiator checked/replaced.

Cheers

Bennie

El_Freddo wrote:Glad to hear its working well for you!

As for your block I'd recommend a rebuild. Seriously over heated EA's have a tendancy to warp the piston heads as well. The original motor that came in my L series had cracked heads, warped piston heads and a cracked cylinder. I threw that block away.

If you can afford the rebuild it'd be well worth the effort and give you the piece of mind that comes with a fresh motor. Also get the radiator checked/replaced.

Cheers

Bennie

yes sir, thats the plan unless a couple of donor cars turn up soon. My rx motor does not have a single leak now..sweet!, but it was not rebuilt..just heads and such.I will be eliminating the ea t's in both my cars when reasonable donor vehicles with awd drive train become available as I have an ej20t needing a good home:)
Cheers

I'm going to fit a new gauge sender in my RX tomorrow because I also have never seen the thing read over 1/4 - 1/3 .

Touch wood my rebuilt EA82T doesn't leak any water or oil though the old one tried to kill itself numerous times with water leaks .

More paranoid about the green blood than your average Vulcan .

Cheers Adrian .

Curious to know if sender for temp gauge whether it be carb, efi or turbo is the same acroos the L Series range. Most likely. I may have to rip out my carb sender and try it. I know it worked to red and back due to the jammed thermostat - that is how I became new owner.

Good luck Disco, I'm a bit suspect of my turbo. Both a bit sloppy.
Ever wonder what it is like to drive a time bomb ?

Look I know a lot of people like to bash yon poor old 82's but I think most of the problems with them are purely due to their age and mostly high mileage .
I remember reading with interest that in the US , USMB people tend to "reseal" EA82's (esp EA82T's) by changing all the hoses and seals before they fit these engines to their cars .

Rubber hoses don't have an easy time in a hot engine bay and if OE have been there for 20 to 25 years .
You will always get some coolant between the hose and whatever it's clamped to and if the engines run straight water at some stage the steel pipes rust at these points - and everywhere else as well .

What some manufacturers did later on was use stainless pipes or better plating on steel ones .

Really to be sure ALL water hoses need to be inspected and generally replaced because every one I came across had gone hard and brittle and was a failure waiting to happen .

The ones to be wary of IMO are the turbo water line hoses and the lower one is a major PITA to work on/the small diameter water bleed one from the top of the casing to the thermostat bowl area/the MPFI throttlebody ones .
I've always been suspicious of the right angle one above the water pump and if I had air con I'd replace it for piece of mind because its underneath things and impossible to get at . Right in your face on non AC cars .
Good new hoses you can trust for a while , twenty something year old ones are the time bombs as are rusted steel barbs if you don't know about them .

Long term the oil leaks are generally going to come from the front and rear crankshaft seals and same for the cam ones . Cam cover gaskets could make things messy if not too good .

Anyhow I hope that water temp gauge sender does something for my gauge because it would be good to have the whole range of it working .
ATM it works over about 1/4 of its range and I know if things get warmish because the Davis Craig bulb type fan switch I fitted gets the condenser fan going nice and early .

Let you know later , cheers A .

Always always always use good coolant and replace it yearly because it can go off and become corrosive .

Yeah, if the EA82 was all that bad in the first place Subies would not be as popular as they are now.I tend to figure genuine Japanese water hoses and radiators of plastic tank variety are good for 13 years, any longer the risk continues to be yours, or the next owner.... good coolant? Thought I was using it but it has started to eat the old head gasket. Might try the new red water wetter stuff.

I would rather an original 20 year old Japanese than an original 20 year old six cylinder Holcon for reliabuilty of components.

steptoe wrote:I would rather an original 20 year old Japanese than an original 20 year old six cylinder Holcon for reliabuilty of components.

That really depends on the era of vehicle you'd be talking about steptoe - the early jap cars in the oz market didn't do so well against the locally born and bred vehicles. Yes they had their issues but there are still quite a few 30+ holdens getting around that I know of - and they've not had a ground up rebuild either. There's nothing wrong with the old holden red six - a very reliable motor in my experience, same for the rest of the components around it!

As for the canning of the EA82, I'm one to have done this considerably... It only takes one weak link to kill these motors - I had a fresh motor, seals, hoses and all except the radiator. It went very well until one very hot day coming home from Adelaide where the side of the radiator blew out, killing the motor thru cooling down without any coolant to help it in the process. The other downfall of the EA/Japanese build is the use of plastic end tanks on the radiator and heater core - possibly showing an expectation of the life of the vehicle from the manufacturer through a short cut or cost cutting??

Either way I was sick of working on the EA - so many little nuts and bolts that could strip out - a PITA to fix while the motor was in. I also came to resent the cambox design after doing a few head gaskets. I think this was avoidable if subaru had've put in the extra bit of effort and the $$$$ to go with it. Other than those little things that pissed me off about them, they were a good capable little motor that was part of the foundations for the liberty, EJ series motors and other aspects of the subaru family that we have now, this foundation includes the MY's as well.

So now I have an all copper brass radiator/heater core to remove the plastic end tank issue, an after market temp guage to watch instead of just the factory guage and an EJ to remove the awkward work that's required on the EA82. The other thing I was after with the EJ was a cheap upgrade in power - something I didn't want to be spending on another EA rebuild/spec up, and I'm not in the market for a turbo.

I dunno why I've gone off with this tangent but its there for you to read now and hopefully understand why the EA82 gets canned from time to time. Plus I have a soft spot for the old holdens...

Cheers

Bennie

Well the breaking news is that a new temp gauge sender DID do something for my RX's EA82 .

The new one says made in Japan which I like - Senkei or Genkei from memory . I took a close look at the sender I removed and another I had from one of the collection of Spider manifolds and they were both ND , and by the looks of them original parts .

Anyhow I fitted the new one and started it up to see what the gauge wanted to do .
It rose up to almost 1/3 of the range which it never used to do , my EA82 has the oversized 76C/170F thermostat in it and used to read a bit over half of what it does now in the same circumstances .
About 1/3 of the scale is where the needle used to sit idling at running temp in summer - with the 82C thermostat in it .
It will be interesting to see what it reads in slow traffic on a hot day .

So it seems in my case at least that 24 year old gauge senders don't tell the truth .

Cheers A .

Agreed on hose replacement. While apart I replaced all hoses.I wanted silicone hoses but could not find any in the coastal area where I live. I like the idea of a metal temp system. If catastrophic waterloss occured I doubt my gauge would give me a heads up. Btw, a current project I have put on hold until spring is the restoration of a vw westfalia camper van. I rebuilt a 2.0 air cooled engine and it uses an engine temp sensor on the head. 12x1.5 threads( as I recall) and about 8mm deep that threads into a flange. Its a single lead and must ground a warning light on the dash. Ive got the factory servive manual and will have to look up the temp range...might be an option. Ive noticed my factory gauge does not start to move until about 110/120 degrees. Having an auxillary gauge to monitor is definately the way to go.
Cheers

Still all good driving around this evening though it was cool - well cooler and had a little rain as well .
I've also noticed that the temp gauge needle moves much faster between accessory and ignition on positions of the ignition switch .

If you have any doubts about your factory temp gauge I'd seriously consider changing its sender unit .

A .

it's a bit rich comparing the reliability of the holden to subaru.
I would drop a red motor into the subi tomorrow if I could.
easy to service, no real inherent weaknesses, cheap parts, long life.
however I suggest that we get nowhere rubbishing other makes. I have owned over 300 cars of most makes and models, they all have their problems.
my father used to wire a temp sender to the ignition circuit so that if it overheated the ignition would cut out.
one thing you find is that when a motor runs low on water or gets an air lock the water may not reach the sender so that the sender does not record the high temperature, the sender is not necessarily faulty. don't forget to test the after market gauge and sender also, they are not always functional.
I was interested to read that the pistons may distort if the motor is cooked, I have an ea82 with a hole burnt in one piston, would like to get another motor if someone has one in/near perth to experiment with

From what I've seen engines that get real hot distort the bores and the pistons wants to bind and pick up or scuff the cylinder walls .
Pistons run reasonably warm and their means of rejecting heat is via the rings and cylinder walls . Some turbo engines have oil squiirters aimed from underneath at the piston crowns but EA's don't have them .

The general feeling is that iron blocks and heads cope better with high temps and aluminium thats been fried is never the same afterwards .
Ask Coxy here what it was like machining aluminium heads that had been run dry/hot .
At least if you have an iron block and aluminium head you have a chance of salvaging the bottom end if the bores and pistons were not damaged .

I'm also highly suspicious of those composite end tanks on aluminium radiators which is why I replaced mine with a Japanese Koyo one . Still has them but they don't have 24 yrs worth of heat cycles yet , 2 and a bit yrs to date .

A .

changing brands of sender units can sometimes result in different readings, but you also compare old genuine with new after market so hard to know which is correct. If I can get around to it might measure the ohms coming from my sender before I swap it with another. First up would be cold then op temp.

There was an awful lot of red motors made and run or rebuilt and raced. We just had one that ran and ran for 270,000km from new then a 'lifter' noise came in or so the mechanic diagnosed. Five days and only 150 km later it threw No 5 leg outta bed, just missing the starter motor. I was also thinking of how many ball joints, tie rods, water pumps, shocks, and mufflers the old beast went through and was not often seen on dirt. When it came to playing with 20 year Japanese cars always finding original bits above with same kms.

It was ordered for my cars year and model .
I'm also beginning to wonder about the computers temp sender unit as well .

I'm with steptoe on the different readings regardless of wether or not it was ordered for your subi's year and model. Processes of manufacture may have changed in the time between the build of your subi and now - ultimately effecting how the sender responds to the engine's temp.

The best way to know whats going on with your engine's temp when your water temp guage misses the over heating due to lack of coolant is to use an oil temp guage. There's a lot the oil temp can tell you that the coolant temp can't. The only problem is that putting an oil temp guage in is harder to do than a coolant temp from what I've heard - you need to place the temp sender in the sump which means the sump needs to be modified... fun fun.

Cheers

Bennie