Mr B

If it was smoking as much as you say from my experience you would see evidence of a leak easily either in plug and piston crown colour, coolant loss, gas analyser sniff test or combination of these. easy enough do a relative compression check and takes 5 minutes, good comp test with transducer pressure sensor can tell you a lot but not quickest to do on a subaru. Wouldn't worry about rest of engine if passes few basic tests but as always it can be bit of gamble. Shame trader made a mess of diagnosis :-/ really not that hard to of drawn some better conclusion than he did ! . Don't buy a Citroen lol, that just total stupidity .

you normally would split BJ at arm so prety normal for it come without. You will HAve BJ's on car which may be good enough reuse (inverted design like subaru use see's BJ's can last well over 130K . If need replacing then Moog and 555Japan about the best from my experience and not expensive over the monkey metal crap in pattern part market these days .

Put an offer in on these for £70 http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/SUBARU-IMPREZA-WRX-STI-NEWAGE-PAIR-OF-ALLOY-FRONT-WISHBONES-/292239538021?hash=item440ad57765:g:dCkAAOSwpkFY8h66 Get a proper alignment from a good shop after fitting . job jobbed

A better alternative for rear is these AC delco flat blades. http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/15-High-Quality-Flat-Blade-Aero-Upgrade-Rubber-Wiper-Blades/261233017215 Just started using these as quality better and price superb. The 15" Fit perfect on SG or SF Forester rear .

what model forester SF SG SH ... ...

wheel bearing I expect, diff normally changes noise pitch as load/unload via throttle and normally very easy pinpoint noise . Best way with bearings is run it in gear on lift and use stethoscope on hubs, normally easy distinguish noisy ones out of the 4 this way . If do bearings only use japan bearing kits as not much more cost but 10 times the quality .

road drive it on clear road and rock steering left to right and see if noise stops when loaded , if does should be wheel bearing . Rear dif is very distinguishable noise and generally very easy tell it rear . Diff noise normally worsens at speed in corners . If noise can be produced on ramp running in gear should find likely area in 10 minutes with screwdriver and funnel or stethoscope .

^ you get MLS gaskets coated that can be stopper or non stopper constructed stopper refers to internal metal layer that either folded around cylinder or die press ridged so it creates more clamp force around cylinder bore. The coating is purely a micro sealing aid and differing metal barrier to corrosion issues .

making a forester look like weak sauce lol . skid plate fits well with trimmed bumper .

Cosworth is what I normally use as priced far better, half price of RCM for same die cut stopper type gasket available in 0.78 and 1.1, RCM headgaskets are proper decent but bit over priced . Used cosworth for years on sr20's and ej's and they been superb and pricing superb too .

No it not hacked, they just gone dirty, I never used them, was advised years ago best didn't rely on service hostings. Best way is buying your own domain and hosting on it yourself, very cheap (less £20 a year) other way is using free pic hosting such as postimage.org . other option is googledrive although can't do images embedded that way but best for files and docs. Any decent forum wants be promoting images to site hosting so got control as lot of threads thus forum content turns to trash when images and file links turn dead . Is a massive loss to huge amount of data built up on forums, hopefully people will smarten up and stop relying on these wanky terminal hostings and take more controllable option for content they upload .

Just use a local autofactors as they not that expensive, even oem not too expensive :-/ Unusual have issues with blueprint stuff but lot of eBay stuff is rough old stock so can get stung . If going online then ICP is an option but best calling as they do stock a lot of cheap ranges these days so need know brands you getting before buying from them . eBay option - could try aceparts_uk . Used them for brake discs pads and hoses in bulk and been A1 in price/service

removing airbox will be causing air turbulence issues over the maf, mix that with heat soak and pcv's 'there's your problem' basically this a detuning mod, even forced induction subarus can have power/smoothness issues with filters similar to these unless fitted well and air flow mapping adjusted. Subaru airflow sensors are very precise and easy get issues when change mechanical air intake without changing digital data .

check your model be sure what fly you got, dmf needs plates backlash checked and changed if out of spec, they can be resurfaced , Not a cheap job on the legacy even without flywheel but worth doing right if intend doing mileage to get decent benefit from it .

Never really know for sure till look at them, if has a lot of over heating and surface cracks or bad scoring then ideally needs new. Ideally needs light skim to reface it unless in unusual good smooth condition, most shops don't skim as hassle with extra lift downtime while flywheel being refaced. Ideally want a 3pc LUK or genuine exedy clutch kit then review the flywheel. Most single mass flywheels only need a skim, new flywheel about 100 (non genuine) to £160 if bought as part of clutch kit so calculate that against refacing cost and what money you willing to put into the job. lot of garages just chuck a kit on old fly rubbed down with emery and brake clean and called good, obviously refacing is best but lots of shops likely jump on new fly for quicker/easier job start to finish .

Don't sound normal to me from your comments, some can get a bit heavy when done the miles but sounds like clutch cover or perhaps pedal hydraulics got issue (cover normally as we done a few), if car been tuned at all could also be a heavy sprung clutch been fitted . New clutch fitted wouldn't be more than £500 from experienced independent, super easy pull boxes on these and clutch kits sensible prices .

My P/N was for press fit to back of spindle, the bolt on ones like in your pic are a pain to find sensible priced, used hub is cheapest route on those, have welded couple of those and worked okay, new was over £80 and owners generally faint at that plus cost of splitting hub to fit it .

mapco 76295 , they about £20 price range . Same reluctor rings as on forester an impreza .

rear drop links on SG onwards are standard metal ball joints so just stick with them but if need replacing use MEYLE HD ones as seem best from what we tried. Whiteline is simplest kit get hold of, don't bother with the swaybar brackets as way way cheaper strengthen original ones by welding support plates to them (easily unbolt to work on or take to a welding/fabrication shop) . Other things check is rear struts as saggy/failing SLS struts give loose rear end as does poor tyre choice, old tyres, mismatched set, wrong pressures etc .

I wouldn't waste money on BC coilovers or coilovers in general for road use, they are junk, valving is poor and strut stroke is way way too short a travel range, they turn into a corroded mess in 18 months and will leak if on rough roads or venture down tracks a lot with your forester .. coilovers are totally useless for UK B roads if you know anything about suspension and how it should work . Pedders dropped struts about best sensible option for road use and cost to you .

Generally yes they are interchangeable . You seem be making hard work of this, your front noise clunking issue is indeed sounding to be a driveshaft and it will more than likely be just the outer joint which can be smply knocked off the shaft or pulled of the shaft, outer joints are around £30, whole driveshaft are around £70 to £160 pending quality level, if want good go SKF for whole shaft. DO be aware you get what pay for and cheap shafts don't work as well in terms of smoothness, balance or longevity as likes of a quality oem supplier like SKF Other area you want check is front coil spring and top hat as issues here cause similar symptoms from your other thread, you will also only really determine cv issues by striping for inspection unless seriously and unusually worn or internal parts broken . car not done much mileage so I would be inclined just do outer shaft joint both sides and inspect inner joint, clean/regrease so know all is good and no drama and no big bill. I wouldn't recommend used as front shafts work hard and most close to junk if split joints and inspect for wear and pitting . Parts can be found online easy enough or good local factors could get it but at more cost and ICP that gets talked about a lot on here will do outer joints posted to your door, easy to fit if you half handy with tools and as example on garage charge I would do 2 outer joint and inspect re-grease inners in 2 hrs labour easy , only heavily seized shaft in hub would slow it down ant that not a common occurrence .

Go to https://brakeparts.co.uk/ and search this disc part number BDS7058 just get pads to match your vehicle and vented disc/caliper . double check discs measures and eye up pad shape to compare before purchase. As far as I recall only a choice of 2 rear discs > vented or non vented <. without full model details can't confirm for sure though as SJ has diesel XT and NA models .

try J&R CV joints, used them a few times. http://stores.ebay.co.uk/jrcvjointsdriveshafts/_i.html?_sid=402113711&submit=Search&LH_TitleDesc=1&_nkw=SUBARU Legacy 2004 if just outer joint it easier, cheaper and better just replace that .

^ depends on the branch/staff I believe, ours have lot of pre formed bends and do pretty tidy mild bends , will still be better than original small oem bore and silencers. If not after absolute ultimate freeflow and nothing with too many bends they can do some good work for sensible money . Do need talk everything through with them so gets done to requirements or move on to other supplier/fitter.

simplest solution to get what you want (pipe size, neat fit, sound and tip style) is custom made from powerflow dealer or longlife dealer in your area . should only need mid section and rear as front and cats normally fine/serviceable on later SG, cat flanges can corrode but if rest not bad it easy enough cut and weld new flange to them. other option is 2.5 sti made to fit via new hangers and slight extension on rear. would go powerflow or longlife route unless find oem sti exhaust for cheap .