Anyone drive a Subaru Outback? What's the STW verdict?

driven them through work…

i work for subaru and i love them lol…

seriosuly nothing ever goes wrong on them

pads discs and tyres are culprits as also a 4 wheel alignment is always needed from new as they wear out your tyres quick.

great car

Nick_Christy- are you on the technical side?

most certainly am?

dad has the '09 spec one, with diesel motor. They are superb!!!

I have an '04 plate 2 litre normal legacy – dad's old one. They are such good cars. you can feel the extra height and larger wall section tyres on the outback compared to the normal leggie. The diesel is a good chunk quicker than the 2.0 petrol. no probs whatsoever with the car. lecci gremlin with the alarm unit on mine at a year old, but that got replaced. no problems with the car at all.

feel very secure and well planted to the road, very very refined from MY03 if that's what you're looking at. lovely on the motorway, good fun to drive off it.

oh, mine is on it's original discs and second set of pads at 74,000 miles.

…and second set of tyres with about 4mm left on them

Will pm you a quick question if poss?

What sort of mpg do you guys get from the 2.5L petrol?

Got an 06 Forester, fantastic car, feels great in the snow and ice over here. The 4WD system means I can drive to my house, whilst my poor old Volvo has to be left 300 meters away as it can't make the last bit in winter weather conditions.

not sure on the 2.5 – it's renowned as a thirsty fella. my 2.0 is crap around town (about 25mpg), but on a run you can easily get 36mpg. if it's just motorway you're doing, I've had 40 out of it (calculated, not car read out).

2.5? Real world I would say 25mpg.

I worked out that on my last tankful I had my Forester at 33mpg.

Someone on a Foz forum pointed out for me that if I drove 10,000miles a year. A 2.5T would only require filling up a handful more times a year than my 2.0 non-turbo. Reason? You have to rev the non-turbo a fair bit more just to get good progress. Ergo the turbo you wouldnt have to.

Another thing- they understeer abit. Thats the only criticism really.

I am a known serial car-swapper. My Foz has been with me for almost two years now and Ive struggled to think of a car that I want next 😕

Had a 2000 and 2003, both 2.5 manual, but been a Subaru owner back to the early eighties.
Bought the 2000 with 125000 miles at 3 years old, £3000. In four years/35000 miles I had to replace rear discs, a front caliper and disc, a few headlight bulbs and both front coils snapped, though I suspect speed bumps. Loved it.

Bought the 2003 at 4 years old, £8000, 68000 miles- had it for 10 months, no problems whatsoever. A lot more refined, but I felt more uneasy using it for carting bikes, rubbish etc around, and sold it for this reason.
Didn't bother calculating gas consumption really, but did hit 30mpg on a trip to Scotland once…
Very big in the back, bigger than a Mondeo, but load space isn't ideally shaped.

Took the first one to a Subaru main dealer when I got it for a service and to be checked over, then local garage after that- main dealer is exorbitant, even by comparison to other makes.

I gave mine a main dealer big service as the 72k one – I'm doing it from now on. They're not massively expensive from a labour point of view (if you shop around a bit and get them to price match, like any dealer really), it's just I prefer to know what's going on.

Parts on the other hand – wow, they take the piss. They wanted £365 for a single wheel for mine!!!!!!!!!!!!!

parts from eurocarparts or similar for normal car parts money.

cp your doing really well…

tyres normally last 55-60k unless you have adverse tyre wear

pads and discs also should be good till 40k turbo 48k non turbo.

nick

I have an 06 3.0RN, and I love it

except an ABS sensor has just gone 🙁

I get about 26mpg combined, but then it is a fast car!

Never got stuck once in the snow too

yes to be honest its the oils thats expensive actually…

my labour rate at work is £90 / hour which is about the rate in the area

my private labour rate is £30 / hour or price dependant on specific job.

for example cambelt change £120 inc cambelt

servicing is all set prices.

they are a 'farmers' type veichle where they need not much attending to and they go for years.

i serviced one recently had 180k miles lol most ive ever seen on one, orginal engine only he had to change the clock because it stopped working

lol

those 3.0 RN are sexy as! as fooking quick too.

nearly got my dad one but he went for a merc instead as he got better price on his trade in

Looked at buying a Subaru again in the summer but thought I would wait another year. So then with all the crap weather recently I was regretting my decision and looked up the price of second hand ones again. Bloody heck there are no private cars for sale and dealers are wanting top dollar prices. I wonder why?
Great cars miss my old Forester:-(

the oil was only 20 quid at my most recent service! In fact, consumables like that weren't too bad. I'm glad they are so reliable so I don't have to go into the subaru spares bin!

£20 for engine oil only surely?

theres no way to have all 3 oils paid for £20!?

4l-engine oil for a n/a
1l-rr diff
3.5l-gbox manual

there like 9l or so used

indeed, that's true – it was just the engine oil at 20 quid. I thought that was cheap for a main dealer… though I can't imagine it was anything special!

Where are you Nick?

nr milton keynes.. but im in austria for bit.

doing some work for austria subaru

what dealer was it?

We've got a 2.5 Legacy. Its a great car. Only problem with it in 160 000 was the viscous coupling in the transfer box. Replaced it with second hand part, well chuffed with myself. 25 mpg seems about right on a run. Its been brilliant in the snow and ice. It went everywhere the Shogun went though sideways 😀

my impreza isnt very good for taking bike on 😀

my impreza isnt very good for taking bike on

The only car that I ever felt 'scared' in was a chipped Impreza WRX that I had on loan when my cambelt was being changed. If I owned one I dont think I'd bother with bikes anymore!

Careful on this forum. Last week I said my Spec B Legacy was a better car than the Alfa 159 and the Alfa apologists went into a rage.

But it is. By miles.

I had two 2l legacies (the outgoing model) and loved them. Got rid of the last one though as I was sick of new discs and pads every year – even Kwick Fit want £400 for that. This was however due to me doing 5k a year and only using the car once a week.

Servicing is pricey and if you're using the main dealer network it can be a pain to drag yourself out there (I'm in Edinburgh and found going to Penicuik a right pain, and although there is service in Aberdeen I got the feeling they didn't care now they don't sell them anymore). Drive and ride was excellent though, really quiet to cruise in and that great boxer engine note. If I was doing bigger miles I'd have diesel in a flash again.

If anyone is interested I've a set of Thule aero bars with all the fittings.

My vote would go for Subaru too, but an Impreza

Get the Wagon – STi (import, so 300bhp). Practical, cheap to buy now, fantastic to drive, good for throwing stuff (& dog) in the back, and it's got roof bars so you can get the bike on the roof 😀

i have a 05 sti ppp, remapped to 350bhp, bike looked good on back of it the one time i used it to take bike to lee quarry 😀

Ive got a 2001 2.5lt Outback thats done over 100k now. I converted it to LPG @ 30k and Ive done over 70k on gas now with no probs. I constantly monitor mpg and on gas its 23/25mpg and petrol 31/33mpg. One thing with LPG servicing is they need the impreza turbo plugs and a £5 lpg filter evey 12/15k service. The engine oil is like new after 15k as you dont get the contaminants like with the petrol, but it get changed anyway.

Some spares are expensive, but there are a few more jap import places around now. Anyone know where I can get a good price on a full exhaust and cat. Subaru charge nearly £250/box and there are two boxes + the cat! Not bad orig exhaust.

Got a new set of all disks + pads for £100 recently, subaru wanted nearly £300! tyres are usually good for 40k and wear pretty evenly. Just discovered Kumho tyres, only £50/tyre and half the preice of the yokahama. They drive just as well if not better and are wearing really well..

goodyear f1 eagles

we found goodyears to wear badly due to the tread, but thats only in our place obviously.

If the customer wants them then we use them but we do recommend other brands.

nick

F1's won a scoobynet poll best tyre vote, second were Toyo's. Performance orientated the poll may have been, but I rate them as the best 'all-rounder' as well.

yes but they dont last that long, due to taking measurements across 3/4's accross tread.

proxies are worst for it but are great tyres as are f1's but dont last as long as bridgestones.