Yupp. New HG for a subaru is nearly the same price as an engine and once you’re in high miles it just saves time and money doing the entire engine. The engine takes about 4h to do vs a head gasket which is about 12h. It’s stupid.
Head gaskets, plural, on a Subaru boxer engine! One on each side. The procedure for that job basically starts with step 1: Remove engine.
So at that rate, if you have a new crate motor on hand you can skip all the shit in the middle and proceed straight to step 2: reinstall engine. It doesn’t surprise me the parts cost for an engine outweighs the labor cost for removing it plus taking it apart twice.
I’m not sure it’s possible to get the heads out of a modern Subaru without pulling the engine. An older one where there was more room in the engine bay, maybe. But there’s too much shit in the way and the unibody and wheel arches are like 1/2" away from the tops (sides) of the heads. I’d doubt you could get a wrench on all the bolts, let alone snake the head bolts out which are like 10" long.
Honestly I didn’t even know it was plural. There’s no way to work on the engine while it’s in sadly so the engine does have to be pulled, heads removed, get everything resurfaced, and since it’s out replace hard to reach components or pay the price again a few months later. Knowing what I know now I won’t be getting another vehicle like this. The old legacy models it was $1,200-$1,500 for the head gasket so when the shop said $3,000 I nearly had a heart attack. My shop did the right thing and said engine swap with a few buddies and save some serious money so that’s our plan.
Honestly not that surprising. It’s the same reason why electronics don’t get repaired, they just get whole new boards installed even if it’s just a single bad component. Labor costs can easily outweigh the cost of any single part.
Yupp. New HG for a subaru is nearly the same price as an engine and once you’re in high miles it just saves time and money doing the entire engine. The engine takes about 4h to do vs a head gasket which is about 12h. It’s stupid.
Head gaskets, plural, on a Subaru boxer engine! One on each side. The procedure for that job basically starts with step 1: Remove engine.
So at that rate, if you have a new crate motor on hand you can skip all the shit in the middle and proceed straight to step 2: reinstall engine. It doesn’t surprise me the parts cost for an engine outweighs the labor cost for removing it plus taking it apart twice.
I’m not sure it’s possible to get the heads out of a modern Subaru without pulling the engine. An older one where there was more room in the engine bay, maybe. But there’s too much shit in the way and the unibody and wheel arches are like 1/2" away from the tops (sides) of the heads. I’d doubt you could get a wrench on all the bolts, let alone snake the head bolts out which are like 10" long.
Honestly I didn’t even know it was plural. There’s no way to work on the engine while it’s in sadly so the engine does have to be pulled, heads removed, get everything resurfaced, and since it’s out replace hard to reach components or pay the price again a few months later. Knowing what I know now I won’t be getting another vehicle like this. The old legacy models it was $1,200-$1,500 for the head gasket so when the shop said $3,000 I nearly had a heart attack. My shop did the right thing and said engine swap with a few buddies and save some serious money so that’s our plan.
Honestly not that surprising. It’s the same reason why electronics don’t get repaired, they just get whole new boards installed even if it’s just a single bad component. Labor costs can easily outweigh the cost of any single part.