Knock, Knock... it's FIXED! (long)

[thumper_svx]

My saga finally ends. Well, OK an old chapter ends and a new (and hopefully better) one begins.

Almost three years ago now I posted the first message in this saga here, and the constant pursuit of this annoying error was one of the factors in my parking my car for 18 months. OK, I was having exhaust problems, wheel bearing problems and electrical problems as well... but it didn't help. When I parked her, I hoped I would either fix all the gremlins as time and money allowed and/or sell the car.

It's been a few weeks since I broke her out of storage, and I've been getting consistent and constant reports of cam and crank position sensors being bad. In pursuit of this, I have replaced both crank sensors and the cam sensor twice... once with a set of brand new sensors (at $170 each... ouch!) and once with a set of sensors from a known working car. Thanks to pearlm30 I have also been able to replace the entire wiring harness last Sunday afternoon... much cursing and skinned knuckles that day Still, the check engine light lit, and my problems continued.

Finally, Sunday evening I decide to drop by Autozone and get them to run the codes... just on the off chance something's wrong with my scanner. Lo and behold... knock sensor. Not just one... but both! I was actually happy that they got a different result, but I almost wanted to cry at the amount of money and time I've thrown at this the last few years. Anyway, just in case I ALSO took the car to Advance Auto Parts and got them to do the same thing... same result; knock sensors.

So, I get home and take out my frustrations on my code scanner (hammer on plastic... mmm, fun!), then jump online and order two knock sensors overnight from subaruparts.com.

Yesterday, DHL delivered both of my knock sensors and after work I get home, have dinner then go work on my car. Of course, looking at all the hoses going into the intake plenum I really don't feel like pulling all those out, so I decide to try to change out the sensors without removing the plenum.

Once the alternator was removed, the front sensor (passenger side) was easy. No problems, no issues. The rear sensor... well that took a little work. A small 12mm wrench did the trick to loosen it up, at least up to a point. There was a point at which the bolt was high enough that I could no longer get the wrench in there. Thankfully, I have thin hands so I was able to twist myself around and reach in there with my right hand and turn the bolt with my fingertips. Just. Took a while, but it finally came out.

Pulling the wire back... well that was fun, too. The plastic "mount" on the wire kept snagging on stuff... but given the sensor was dead anyway I ended up just getting my snips in from the back of the engine and cutting the wire off. When I looked at the new sensor, I just took those same snips and trimmed the plastic mounts off. Yup... that made it easier to get that wire through.

Getting the bolt back in and keeping the sensor upright on the mount also proved troublesome with just the fingertips of my right hand. Note that in order to get my hand in there I had to do it "palm up", so I was facing away from the car when I did this and had to do it all by feel. That took me a good 15 minutes on its own, just to get the bolt turned down enough that I could get my wrench back in there. Of course, I could only do a quarter turn at a time, but at least then I could see what I was doing

Finally, after 90 minutes I got everything tightened back up, alternator and belt reattached and went out for a test drive. After 30 minutes... NO CHECK ENGINE LIGHT! After 60 minutes... still nothing. I went home at that point and had a beer to celebrate

On my drive to work this morning... no check engine light!!! This is great. I had an appointment with a Subaru dealer today that I set up last week to look at this... and I kept it just in case it wasn't the knock sensors once I got that code on Sunday. This morning on the drive to work I was very happy to be able to call the dealership and tell them I wouldn't be coming.

Next up? Emissions test, then she's legal again. And no, I'm not selling her now!!!