If it is in fact coming out of the actual exhaust port as you claim, the head is either cracked or the valve seals are leaking.

 

Yes the mechanic showed me on the lift, I should have grabbed a picture.

 

valve issue - valve stem seal or dropped a valve. leak down test would confirm that.

swap in a used head.

when you do:
1. resurface the head
2. use the EJ25 turbo headgaskets

consider it an upgrade, might help the nausea from doing this all over again so soon.

 

Does the head need to be decked again if it was done at the last headgasket swap? What are some considerations with buying a used head? How to prevent this from happening again/any idea of the cause? What about rebuilding my current head?

 

I don't know, that's a toss up. You could rebuild it yes - just an odd failure.


That's a weird issue - which to me means 1 of 2 things:
1. you're really unlucky, outlier issue
2. something caused it.

By swapping parts you essentially rule out #2 which maybe could come back to haunt you later. Not without other potential pitfalls (if the used head is unknown).

Ideally get a good used head from someone on here or USMB that knows the head is good or a parts yard where you know why the car went to the crusher (wrecked) thereby giving you high probabilities the head is fine.

Since every EJ/EZ head I've ever done has high and low spots I consider it routine to resurface the heads and probably would again. It's easy to do yourself, find the DIY thread on it. Source a piece of glass (any glass shop) and you won't believe how easy it is.

 

So I just spoke with my wife and she is interested in having me fix it... So I guess for someone who has done all the maintenance and repairs on all my vehicles except #1 headgaskets and #2 pistons and rings can you please start to point me in the direction of repairing my car.

I am guessing I will need to source a cherry picker (engine hoist) and a piece of glass.

I am pretty sure have all the necessary sockets 12pt and 6pt metric sockets in a wide array of sizes, an impact gun, 2x torque wrench and a garage. Please advise what rebuilt heads are worth buying and how much I should pay? Also for the head gasket should I use the six star, fel pro, subaru? Should I do the bad head side or both sides? As a reminder the head gaskets were recently done by a shop which included decking the heads so I don't know if its worth doing both sides?

 

At this point of you are still willing to stick it out (I loved my '00 Limited) I'd just get a reman longblock. This one is obviously cursed. Sorry man.

 

Nonsense man, throwing money where it is not needed makes things much more expensive than they need to be.

So I just spoke with my wife and she is interested in having me fix it... So I guess for someone who has done all the maintenance and repairs on all my vehicles except #1 headgaskets and #2 pistons and rings can you please start to point me in the direction of repairing my car.

I am guessing I will need to source a cherry picker (engine hoist) and a piece of glass.

I am pretty sure have all the necessary sockets 12pt and 6pt metric sockets in a wide array of sizes, an impact gun, 2x torque wrench and a garage. Please advise what rebuilt heads are worth buying and how much I should pay? Also for the head gasket should I use the six star, fel pro, subaru? Should I do the bad head side or both sides? As a reminder the head gaskets were recently done by a shop which included decking the heads so I don't know if its worth doing both sides?

You can just do the side that is needed, but I'd make sure to match the head gaskets to what the other side has, don't go with one that is a different thickness.

Here's how to do it with the engine still in the car if you're interested in going that route:
How to replace EJ25 head gaskets without removing engine - Subaru Forester Owners Forum

You can do the glass resurfacing, but it might be pretty cheap to do it at a machine shop too. I know there is a shop near me that will do decking of Subaru heads for $30/head, I just take it to them.

I think this could be pretty cheap.
$35 head gasket
$50 head machining
$150-200 good used head
$20 valve cover/spark plug seals

The wild card is if the head you get needs to have a valve job. The machine shop should be able to pressure test the head to let you know.

 

Probably a fairly good chance the other head is fine if it was resurfaced and a quality headgasket was used in the fall. That's more than Subaru dealers do - they don't even resurface the heads usually.

1. what brand head gaskets were used?

I prefer the Turbo EJ25 gaskets myself, they're better....so with the engine out it's only $60 more and a little labor to just do both sides...but then you loose your warranty on that side.

You're fine either way - the turbo gaskets done right would probably decrease the probability of future issues by a very small margin like 0.5%. Not the kind of percentages most people make decisions on.

Cracked NA EJ heads are extremely rare and basically "don't happen" - it's so rare I'm not inclined to believe it on one that's never been overheated unless I see it myself.

That being the case - I would guess that maybe the valve guide dropped or valve had some kind of other issue and *it* cracked the head. I've never heard of a dropped valve or guide issues cracking the head but it seems like it could be possible. A google search may yield some other experiences.

To prevent it I think you'd want a reasonably maintained head - one from a wrecked car or vehicle where it's demise is known (in other words you don't want a head from a car that went to the junk yard due to engine issues).

***You don't need an engine lift. By removing 2 nuts and a bolt you can easily do it in the vehicle. Remove the top pitch stopped bolt and 2 14mm engine mount nuts. Then jack the engine up on the side you're working on.

I don't recommend this if you have a bad back as yo'ull be leaning over the fender rail - but it's easy to do it in the car this way and saves engine hoist buying, set up, space, and even time. It's particularly nice if you have air tools or an electric impact you can just zip the bolts right out with.

 

I can handle leaning over the car, and do have a powerful electric impact. The Fel Pro gasket I am planning on buying is the exact gasket in their right now on both sides.

Unless the car was overheated by the first owner (doubtful) since he provided all dealer oil and service records then the car has never been overheated.

The mechanic thinks the EGTs in the mtns combined with fast burning 85 octane (again high elevation/mtn passes) caused the head to crack near the valve guide, or the valve guide on that cylinder is severely worn. He ruled out the rings since they were replaced at about 70,000 at a stealer ship and I have no leak down or compression test problems. I do not think the valve has dropped or descended as this would likely cause poor/not running issues.

Tonight I will do more inspecting myself now that I have the car back, and pull the spark plug on that cylinder.

The long term plan is to pull the head and tear it down myself just to see whats going on or what really happened. Then probably replace it, unless it is just the valve seals or something worth saving (doubtful but possible) in which case it can be rebuilt.

Either way the car is limited to short trips at the moment with the oil consumption. I do not want to run it low/out of oil and completely kill it when thanks to everyone's help and ideas it is looking very salvageable for ~$400-500 or so DIY.

Also wanted to add I called a friend last night and he said I can borrow his cherry picker for a week or two if need be. For free.

 

post a WTB add up here, on NASIOC and on RS25 looking for an EJ25 SOHC head. Make sure you don't get one that is from an 05+, they had AVLS.

If you want to be totally matching look at your heads, you should see a stamp that says Q25, L25 or something like that and try to get the same head.

 

If you don't already have it, get a Factory Service Manual pdf. That will be a great resource for doing this job.

Don't forget to check and adjust your valves after bolting the head on. They can change when torquing the head down.

It sounds like you've got the tools lined up, now you just need to gather the parts and you're set.

If you pull the engine there are a lot of "while you're in there" things that can be done to, so if you go that route we can suggest low-cost preventative maintenance items that are accessible at that time. I take it that you are not near the timing belt change interval right?

 

I did /had the shop do some of that stuff when my HG were last done in the fall. This included, gates timing belt and water pump kit (with new pulleys and belt tensioner) also did oil pan gasket recently. I don't really think anything really needs serviced other than this oil leak which is a very recent development.

Need to figure out how to adjust the valves but I do have a factory service manual.

 

SO I got into the tear down just a little this weekend. I got my borescope out and scope all four cylinders from the spark plug holes and the exhaust manifold. Looks like its actually my number 2 cylinder definitely getting some extra oil from the intake valve. Guessing a valve seal of valve guide. I can't rule out a cracked head because this cylinder is substantially worse, I mean vastly worse than the other three cylinders. I also talked to a few mechanics I am acquainted with locally and they all said they have seen cracked N/A heads here in the mountains however they all said it was EXTREMELY rare as in 1 case each. They all thought that the last shop dropped the ball.

The additional bad is that my new water pump the last shop installed is leaking quite a lot, finally found where my external coolant leak is. Figure since the pump is new I will re-seal it or replace the seal as appropriate.

Also they must have tightened the crank pulley to 1000 ft. lbs. cause I could not get that sucker off. Hope nothing else is damaged from this reckless overuse of torque. I was using a 2 ft. breaker bar and a makeshift crank holder and that thing was not moving even just 1 mm.

The current plan is to pull the block, separate the heads which I would like to reuse and take them to a local machine shop for to have new valve guides, valve seals installed and mating surfaces decked. Both mechanics recommended the same machine shop so I think that is a good thing.

The good news is my cylinders do not have scoring or other major/serious wear that would be visible on the bore scope and none of the exhaust valves are dropped or descended. I haven't pulled the intake to examine those yet.

 

Also wanted to add my brand spark plug tube seals are leaking as well all installed at the last shop...