jpicheva

I had the same issue at ~64K miles on our 2006 OBXT Ltd. Burnt valves on 2 and 4 - attributed to bad gasoline (the SOA field engineer singled out Exxon - which we used in the car very often (93 Octane)). Thankfully after some conversation - SOA covered the repair (which entailed removing both heads and cleaning/resurfacing the exhaust valve seats). It's been running beautifully ever since (now at 75K).

Funny thing - ours never threw a code until well after the idle issues started. Not until it threw codes P0302, P0304 did the shop really do anything. We had fouled injectors and burnt valves on cylinders 2 and 4.

Well -- we got the car back on Friday. Final diagnosis: Burnt exhaust valves - attributed to bad gasoline. The Subaru engineer told us to avoid Exxon in the future. Unfortunately - we used Exxon premium (93) for a good portion of the car's life as we have an Exxon rewards card. I'm not sure that only "bad gas" is to blame -- but I'm sticking with Shell premium gas from here on out. The master tech at Jim Keras Subaru (Mike) resurfaced all the valve seats on both heads -- and put in new head gaskets on both sides. We also have new injectors. Car is running better than ever (knock wood). Thanks very much to SOA and Jim Keras Subaru here in Memphis (they were absolutely great to work with amd I will be going back there for all my maintenance on both the OBXT and my Saabaru).

Interesting -- ours also has been idling a bit rough for a few weeks. No CEL until the day we took it in to the dealer and discovered the injector problems and burned valves. It's been 2 weeks today - and still waiting to see what the final word will be.

That's good to hear. I am having #4 misfire issues as well. Injector replaced -- but now low compression (50 PSI). The tech suspects burned piston or rings in #4. They are taking head off 2 and 4 today to inspect the pistons. Bummer. SOA had already agreed to at least 1/2 reimbursement for injector replacement -- hopefully they will give us goodwill on this powertrain issue -- as we are only 500 miles out of powertrain coverage.

2006 USDM OBXT Limited - 5MT.