New Sound After Head Gasket Job

So I just drove 650 miles to pick up my car this weekend that my friend did the head gaskets on. He is OCD and the engine is sparkly clean. There are two issues we are trying to diagnose before I drive back up to Chicago, but I have to drive back up today so hopefully they aren't serious.

 

1. Transmission seems lethargic now. Sometimes I can have the pedal pinned to the floor but the transmission still won't shift. Either way not a huge deal just something I have to work out.

 

2. Tapping from driver's side of engine. This side is the one where the cam and head were replaced with one from a Junkyard. I don't know much about this stuff but it sounds like a valve/lifter issue. It's a pretty noticeable clicking-style sound that you can easily hear from inside the car. It actually didn't make noise when we first started the car but once it warmed up it got pretty loud.

 

Any ideas what that could be, and is it something that would keep you from driving the car 650 miles? I NEED to be back in Chicago tomorrow, so it's either take this car there or take a rental for another week...

I've never been inside an boxer but you shouldn't hear any noises like that from a fresh top end job. I wouldn't make that drive without knowing exactly what the issue is. A rental for another week will be cheaper than breaking down on the road and getting towed to a shop your not familiar with.

It's not just a rental for another week. It's a rental for another week, and driving the 650 miles back to work and then doing the same 1300 mile round trip again next weekend. I can't keep doing this and there is a point at which I just have to bite the bullet and try. I've seen lots of videos of people pointing out lifter sounds, and it seems like it's just "a problem" that some people live with. I just don't want to have to go through all this if it's just a problem that can be dealt with later.

 

I realize it's silly to ask this on the forum when you guys can't hear it, but that's the only reason why I am asking.

Here is a short video I just took.

 

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WtvALQ_MCpw]Lifters? - YouTube[/ame]

Definitely sounds like lifters. If it's not the bucket and shim style, pop the cover off and give those guys an adjustment.

 

Did he take the engine out for the job?

Yes he did. My question is, is this something (assuming lifters) that I can do the drive with and deal with later? That's all I'm worried about right now. It might not be ideal but I need to get the damned car up to Chicago where I live and work!

You could probably get away with it, but why? If they are the adjustable type, it will only take about twenty minutes.

 

If they are the bucket and shim, I don't know how long that would take, but I assume it is a much longer job, and you'd probably want to to do that later.

 

As far as the trans, if he took the motor out, it might be something as simple as the shift cable not being in the same place and needing an adjustment.

Try running a thicker oil. Mine is noisey if I run 5W30. I run 10w30 with no issues. Nice and quiet

10W30 is what is in the car right now.

 

I made it, by the way, but boy are those lifters loud...

You could probably get away with it, but why? If they are the adjustable type, it will only take about twenty minutes.

 

If they are the bucket and shim, I don't know how long that would take, but I assume it is a much longer job, and you'd probably want to to do that later.

 

As far as the trans, if he took the motor out, it might be something as simple as the shift cable not being in the same place and needing an adjustment.

 

They are shim over bucket.

 

No thicker oil will not help.

 

Pop the valve cover and check lash. Can't help on the trans. IIRC there is no TV cable. All electronic.

Yeah.... The 97-99 25D has non-adjustable shim-over-buckets...

 

I had a clicking sound pretty much exactly like that after doing a head gasket swap on my old '98 LGT a year a a half ago. I drove that thing hard for over 10k miles after that and never had a problem. I also never figured out what the issue was. The only thing that didn't go back together very well was one cam cap.. I stripped the bolt and had to re-thread the hole and use a different bolt. Other than that, the top end went back on just the way it came apart.

is it possible he got the shims mixed up when he removed the cam shafts?

was this his first ej25 head gasket.?

 

could the noise be the tensioner?

they can get noisy when old.

 

what all was replaced, timing wise?

what year was the head that was installed?

 

the lash is adjusted by replacing the shims.

except the 96 ej25D, it apparently has hydraulic adjusters.???????

I think we have a 96 head upstairs. I'll check later

Ok, a little more info now that I'm off work and better rested.

 

He did a head gasket job on a similar era Forester, so he is not unfamiliar with Subarus, but it might have been a 2.2. The noise isn't the tensioner. It's clearly and distinctly coming from the driver's side head. Nothing was replaced, timing wise, because an entire timing job was by the dealership only 10-15k ago, at which point everything was replaced. He did replace one camshaft sprocket as he discovered a crack in my existing one.

 

The receipt for the head from the dealership is for a 97-99 2.5L head. It even has the VIN #. He says he used the shims that came with the head, but he added that the junk yard guy had to take the cams out to get the head off and that it's always possible THEY mixed something up.

 

As for the transmission issue, it's a very strange one. Basically anything under 30% throttle doesn't seem out of the ordinary, but above 30%, the transmission doesn't seem to want to downshift. It's almost as if it's shifting based on speed alone. So for normal cruising it seems fine. Highway cruising specifically. In fact, even on cruise control, going up a hill where it needs to downshift in order to maintain speed it will do that without issue. It even responds as it always did to the more aggressive "sport mode" where it will hold the gears longer. The ONLY problem becomes when I personally try to accelerate more aggressively, it just doesn't seem to want to downshift at all. Sometimes I can put the pedal to the floor and it will happily trudge along, bogged down, in 4th gear. It seemed to be a perfect case of the throttle position sensor doing something stupid (like only reading up to 15 or 20%) given the problem, but the TPS is working just fine when I look at the output with Torque on my phone. So we aren't sure what the issue is.

 

So, in a nutshell, the CAR seems to have no problem telling the transmission what gear it wants it to be in, be it cruising, or maintaining speed up a hill. It just literally ignores ME any time I ask for a bit more speed!

 

In a smaller nutshell: It's as if the car is shifting based on its pre-programmed engine map, but ignoring input from the TPS.

trouble codes?

is the tps adjusted correctly?

if he removed it and did not mark it before hand it may need adjusting.

it is nor hard to do.

you just have to know the procedure.

the lash is adjusted by replacing the shims.

except the 96 ej25D, it apparently has hydraulic adjusters.???????

 

I think we have a 96 head upstairs. I'll check later

 

Yep, 1996 25D's have HLA's

No trouble codes.

TPS seems appropriately calibrated. I don't know what else could cause the problem. It's really odd.

Those shims can be a pita. I would bet the salvage yard mixed them up when they took off the cams. Especially the exhaust, the buckets slide out and then you're done. Only way to fix that is pull the valve cover and get a feeler gauge in there and see which ones are off. Can't remember the acceptable range...

Dagnabbit. I'm tired of fixing things on this car! I'll keep that in mind as something to do (or pay to have done) in a month or two when things get more sorted out for me, financially.

 

I just noticed the blower fan for the HVAC isn't working either. Fuses are good, and hear the relay click under the dash, so poo. I know that part is a huge PITA to get to in most cars.

Blower motor is super easy, just have to take to glove box off. It's looking right at you, just three screws and it's out. The bummer part is, I haven't found any at the pick a part that last very long, all the brushes are just as worn out! I haven't found a source for replacement brushes yet either. Sucks that a set of $2 brushes could fix the problem, but they are nowhere to be found.