Subaru Automobiles

[jjeff]

Great thread my wife was looking at Subarus a few months ago, Wife currently has a fully loaded Honda crossover, 3 rows all the electronic gadgets, AWD, lane assist, adaptive cruise, auto dimming hi beams, auto windshield wipers, etc etc. It's 5 yrs old and 120k+ on it. Looked at Subaru recently, the only 3 row are the ascent for some reason the front seats are completely different than a outback and Forester. The seats in the Forester are much more comfortable than the ascent imo. I dislike safety and convenience gadgets when I'm driving her car Im thinking I'm dimming the lights out of habit and I end up flashing brights at the oncoming car, try to turn on the windshield wipers and I shut them off completely cause there automatic. Struggle with the auto lifting tailgate cause there's always something in the way and it won't close. Can't open the door to back up when everything is covered in snow and ice cause it automatically goes into park unsure if Subaru is the same? Worst was when I was driving my truck that still has a manually operated column shifter and I was in the process of hopping out of it and didn't put it in park cause I was so used to the Hondas push button and it automatically going into park when the doors open. My wife is a magnet for flying road debris and has had her windshield replaced 5 times now. All the electronic gadgets require all the sensors to be recalibrated at a qualified shop, we had to take it to one place for the windshield then take it to the dealership to get recalibrated or your dash looks like a Xmas tree.
I have a few friends that own Subarus and have nothing bad to say of them. I keep telling myself that car is for her not me I just have to occasionally relearn everything I know in order to get it out of my driveway.
Apologies for the long winded rant and my perspective.

 

[cqaigy2]

Great thread my wife was looking at Subarus a few months ago, Wife currently has a fully loaded Honda crossover, 3 rows all the electronic gadgets, AWD, lane assist, adaptive cruise, auto dimming hi beams, auto windshield wipers, etc etc. It's 5 yrs old and 120k+ on it. Looked at Subaru recently, the only 3 row are the aspects for some reason the front seats are completely different than a outback and Forester. The seats in the Forester are much more comfortable than the aspect imo. I dislike safety and convenience gadgets when I'm driving her car Im thinking I'm dimming the lights out of habit and I end up flashing brights at the oncoming car, try to turn on the windshield wipers and I shut them off completely cause there automatic. Struggle with the auto lifting tailgate cause there's always something in the way and it won't close. Can't open the door to back up when everything is covered in snow and ice cause it automatically goes into park unsure if Subaru is the same? Worst was when I was driving my truck that still has a manually operated column shifter and I was in the process of hopping out of it and didn't put it in park cause I was so used to the Hondas push button and it automatically going into park when the doors open. My wife is a magnet for flying road debris and has had her windshield replaced 5 times now. All the electronic gadgets require all the sensors to be recalibrated at a qualified shop, we had to take it to one place for the windshield then take it to the dealership to get recalibrated or your dash looks like a Xmas tree.
I have a few friends that own Subarus and have nothing bad to say of them. I keep telling myself that car is for her not me I just have to occasionally relearn everything I know in order to get it out of my driveway.
Apologies for the long winded rant and my perspective.

Loll, no apologies need, but you probably should just stop driving. They are going to keep adding all kinds of stupid stuff to cars that have absolutely nothing to do with driving and that's on top of the driving stuff that's getting added.

 

[Torvy]

Thanks for the reminder. A couple of other things...we considered a Cross trek or a Forrester, but on the 2018, only the Outback had electric seats. Switching brands can definitely make driving more challenging. In all fairness, if the home boss would go for it, I would trade the Outback for a Rav4 Prime. 42 mile range on full electric with the ability to go 530 miles total with the gas/electric hybrid. Almost the same ground clearance and 4wd. Too hard to find them and prices...eek!

 

[jjeff]

Thanks for the reminder. A couple of other things...we considered a Cross trek or a Forrester, but on the 2018, only the Outback had electric seats. Switching brands can definitely make driving more challenging. In all fairness, if the home boss would go for it, I would trade the Outback for a Rav4 Prime. 42 mile range on full electric with the ability to go 530 miles total with the gas/electric hybrid. Almost the same ground clearance and 4wd. Too hard to find them and prices...eek!

Yep probably put on hold til next year wifes now really interested in a 3row highlander hybrid, nothing close to what she wants anywhere around here. Only option id like it to have is heated windshield wipers. That was the best option ever, imo and was on her old minimally equipped 4runner which was also very friendly to technology illiterate people like me lol.

 

[Torvy]

Yep probably put on hold til next year wifes now really interested in a 3row highlander hybrid, nothing close to what she wants anywhere around here. Only option id like it to have is heated windshield wipers. That was the best option ever, imo and was on her old minimally equipped 4runner which was also very friendly to technology illiterate people like me lol.

I can understand why that is important up there. Not very useful here. With the kids all grown, I don't need that much seating either!

Did remind me I need to get new wipers on my truck.

 

[Dftodd]

I like the CVT transmission. No shift bumps. I got to drive my kid's Legacy several times over the years, so I was used to it.

Our Outback has the paddle shifters on the steering wheel. I suppose that would be handy in hilly terrain or on the racetrack . No need for it here in the flat part if Indiana. We're taking it to Oklahoma in April, and there's a few hilly stretches in Missouri where I like to kick the throttle on the Impala and Suburban at the bottom of the hills so it maintains speed up the hill before the cruise control kicks it down. So we'll see then.

Ours does not have the font camera that I know of. We test drove a 2023 that had it. Pretty neat. It also had the turbo engine. Man, it was responsive. But we don't need that.

You would actually have to remember to hit the paddles Past two cars we've had (Mazda and Buick) both have a slap shift option on the gear shifter. Other than playing with it with the Mazda just to check it out, we never used it.

Same for the Buick. I've accidently engaged it once.

 

[Dftodd]

Yes. It has it. My wife and I were trying to figure out why sometimes it stops the engine, and sometimes it does not. Stop signs, stoplights. No rhyme or reason. So we googled it up, and found that there's a whole list of criteria that it looks at before deciding to shut the engine down. It displays a little information each time it does it to show you how much gas it saves. You can reset the meter if you want to.

And yes, we have the little "A" button, and yes, it has to be disabled every time you start the car if you want to disable it. I don't mind it too much. They have supposedly designed the starter to be able to take it. The delay just annoys me. I'd guess the delay isn't half of one second, but my cat-like reflexes get thrown off when waiting that long for something to happen.

They don't use the starter to restart the car. The computer stops the engine at the exact point that all it has to do is fire off that spark plug.

 

[ericm979]

You would actually have to remember to hit the paddles Past two cars we've had (Mazda and Buick) both have a slap shift option on the gear shifter. Other than playing with it with the Mazda just to check it out, we never used it.

Same for the Buick. I've accidently engaged it once.

I use it all the time in the vehicles I have with manually shiftable automatics. But we live on the side of a mountain and our trips are invariably to other places with mountains. If I'm driving in flat or rolling terrain the lever's in D.

 

[MossRoad]

They don't use the starter to restart the car. The computer stops the engine at the exact point that all it has to do is fire off that spark plug.

Hmmm. That's interesting.

 

[IndyIan]

We ended up with a 2018 Outback 2.5i which in Canada has heated seats and mirrors. It's a japanese buick wagon, with AWD. My only real complaint is that they didn't put in a front bench seat so it would seat 6, and the sunglasses holder up between the sunshades is tiny...
It floats down the highway pretty smoothly and quietly, and gets quite good mileage. The CVT works great, and the simulated shifts are fine with me, or if you use under 20% throttle it will just hold 2000rpm and accelerate slowly to highway speed. The built in roof rack works well for us too.
In the first 130k km its just needed brake pads, and fluids changed.