Which Subaru?

My old canoe van, the Magic Bus, is dying. I may need to get something that is lower, more fuel efficient and FWD, such a used SUV. I note a lot of folks here seem to have Subarus. Which model do you like for a canoe vehicle, the Forester, Outback or something else? Can you sleep in them with the seats down? (I've done so in a Honda SUV.)

I bought my girl as Ascent with three rows of seats. Room to sleep if you get the right seats.
4 cylinder turbo charged engine. It will pull 5000 pounds in theory. Some questions about the ATV trans.
She loves her Subie.

I like my 2018 Outback with 6 cylinder. Nice for passing on 2 lane country roads. Also a little lower than Forester. I just can't get used to the 4 cylinders - just seem underpowered.

I am on my 4th Forester - 2001, 2005, 2015 and now 2021. The 2021 is a test. I experienced what I consider to be major mechanical failures with Foresters #2 and #3. Number 2 had a valve stick open while I was on my way to the UP of Michigan. It was towed to a Subie dealer who dx'ed the problem and it was repaired under warranty with a new head (lucky me I had about 3K miles left on the mechanical warranty). Number 3 developed the known transmission problem, which is not repairable with the only fix being replacement with a factory rebuilt transmission at a cost of $7500, for a vehicle with a $7300 book value. So I consider Forester #4 a test - if I don't get more than 100-110,000 miles out it I m done with Subaru. All Subaru offered me toward the transmission problem was $1000 toward the repair or toward the cost of a new one. In Sept 2202 I could not order a new one the factory in Japan was shutdown (Covid) and no orders were being taken. So I got to buy a certified used 2021 (2 yours old) but I got to pay a new car price for it with several costly extra dealer extras that were non-negotiable. My wife has long lover Foresters but understands this may be the last one. My other car is 2008 Mazda 3 with 104,000 miles purchased new. Other than several O2 sensors being replaced nothing has broken on the car - just brakes, several batteries and sets of tires.

So much for Subaru's ad bragging about having more +200.000 mile vehicles still on the road compared to all other manufacturers.

I have a 2023 Subaru Outback Limited XT with the turbocharged motor. Great power, great fuel mileage and you can definitely put the rear seats down and sleep in it. Nice car.

We have owned 3 Foresters in the last 15 years or so, the first two had head gasket issues which forced us to trade both in before we wanted to. I was assured by Subaru that they had solved the head gasket issue so we bought our third. I recently smelled antifreeze from the 3rd one so we replaced it at 78,000 with a Honda Passport.
I liked the Forester otherwise.

This just got posted today from Kevin Callan:

The 4 cyl pancake has plenty of power, ,more than we can use actually.

Just got a 2024 outback with basic trim. Like it so far! I as well bought it after reading various threads on hear. (Thank you all for sharing, youre voices and opions are well recieved) Definitely can sleep in back. I chose it over the forester because it is 2" lower, and longer. They say the seats in the back lay flat but there is a little bit to be desired there. The retractable cross bars are 30" apart so a little short. Also my crossbars seems a little flimsey, deffently not as rigid as thules. I hear the wilderness bars are stronger. I have found good tie off points, for the bow under the hood, and under a piece of plastic trim. I belive subaru is trying to clear the 24 inventory, so you might get a good finance deal if that matters. This is my 2nd Subie the other one was a wrx, it was great at stock power but any thing more and the motor and trans are like glass (does not break, it shatters). Over all iam happy with it, it is a good designed car. Good luck with you're desison.

I've had both Foresters and Outbacks since they became available in Canada. I prefer the Outback because of the lower profile which, with the same engine, gives better gas mileage, comes with built-in roof racks and is easier to put a canoe on.

G.

I am on my 6th Subaru, since our first 2004 Outback, all have been Foresters ever since. When it came time to replace to the outback, or to add another, my wife did not like the low seating position of the newer Outbacks. She though she felt like a little old lady peering over the steering wheel. The Forester seating was much better with a higher position. Then again, newer designs of Outbacks had new design fold-out crossbars placed too close together to securely support a canoe IMO. They were better placed in the Forester.

All of my Suburas have been purchased with the assistance of their outdoor related VIP program, which provides a no-hassle significant discount of several thousand dollars, as much as 2% below actual dealer invoice, (invoice, not sticker). That puts the actual out the door cost to me the same as what a Subaru employee would pay. The best value of $25 annual membership to any organization ever. I use Leave No Trace for my VIP contribution, only one such organization that best matches my outdoor values.

My wife and have been mainly pleased with all of our vehicles, in spite of the reported head gasket problems that tended to occur in some model before 2010. Last December we decided to trade in both of our 2015 and 2016 Limited model Foresters for new 2024 models. Our dealer happened to have a new shipment that had just arrived off the truck, including a Wilderness and a Limited Forester. We snatched both with the dealer agreeing to apply the VIP pricing to both (normally you can use VIP only once per year).

There are few things that take some getting used to on newer vehicles. Top of the list is the push button start and the gigantic massive heavy key fob. With my previous cars, when I park in my attached garage, I would just leave the "old fashioned" key fob in the cup holder. I am told I cannot do that with the new one, as it constantly communicates with the car and will quickly run down the battery in the fob if it is in close proximity to the vehicle. So ,I must take it in the house with me. I cannot tell you how many times I have gone to the car, forgetting to take the key off the hook by the door, resulting in some amount of swearing about this "improved" key system. When parked at a trailhead, previously I could hide the key in a nearby location near the car, but now I must take the massive thing with me, protecting it from loss while hiking or getting wet in my canoe. Bring back the days of a simple metal key in my pocket. I note, as advertised, due to the different Wilderness gear ratio, I get about 3mpg less than my wife’s Limited model.

was surprised that the new cars do not come equipped with roof rack cross bars, as all of my previous Subarus had. But I was able to remove them from my trade ins and with some modification they fit the new Foresters for my light weight solo canoes. For heavier canoes my Thule bars do fit as well. There are a couple of other minor nits that I will forgive for now, but overall I love my new Wilderness Forester.


I

Subarus are just great cars with a high safety rating and high ground clearance and are certainly capable of carrying a canoe. I would recommend adding some crossbars to the stock rack for easier loading. We just did that with our Rav 4 with a Rino Rack we got at Costco for 200.00. Also between the Outback and Forester, the Outback is a higher level vehicle.

We are on our 12th and 13th Subaru. One was an Impreza, one an Outback, the rest Foresters. We prefer the Forester. The Outback is 6" longer which would make it more comfortable to sleep in for tall people and gives you more 'trunk' space. I disliked the relatively small rearview window; I guess backup cameras would alleviate that complaint somewhat. The roof rack on the Outback is a joke. I had to construct a 2x4 contraption to make it useable (I still have it, if someone is interested.) Recurring issues are soft wheel studs that get buggered up easily (I buy aftermarket wheel nuts which helps) and the fact that they seem to eat wheel bearings. The Kaizen concept has not reached Subaru in that respect. The other advantage of the Forester is - and I want to be as delicate as possible and not disparage the American auto worker - that it is assembled in Japan. Maintenance managers, if they are truthful, will tell you that they have a lot fewer issues with vehicles assembled in Japan. An acquaintance works in the heavy repairs department at the Lafayette assembly plant and they worked him seven days a week for years on end. My 2¢.

Only one Subaru so far, so I don't have the wide-ranging experience that some can draw on. Mine is a 2015 Outback. Some points that may be useful:

• Regarding height: It's true that the Outback is lower to the ground. To my mind, this is an advantage. I grew up driving SUVs as well as passenger cars on rural roads. The lower center of gravity gives me a lot more confidence when cornering, especially with a mid-weight vehicle like this. Don't worry about ground clearance - the Outback is competitive with other "real" SUVs, such as a Jeep Cherokee, and has more usable room inside. This is mostly because the transmission and front transfer gearing is up inside the mid-console, rather than hanging out the bottom of the vehicle.
• Folded down, the rear compartment + seat is 5'4". Note that this is exactly to the front edge of the rear seat, the entire rear footwell is still open/accessible. Front seats do tilt back far enough that you can do a La-Z-Boy doze in them, but that's not the same.
• Speaking of the footwell, it's nice and deep. If you anticipate carrying passengers, even long-legged people can sit comfortably in the rear seat for multi-hour road trips.
• I've got the baseline model with the 4-boxer, and never thought that I needed more power. I do drive mostly rural roads and small towns, and have a firm opinion that a large number of drivers accelerate far too hard in their day-to-day. I haven't pushed it, but I suspect that I could chirp out on dry pavement if I tried.
• Related: This car likes to drive. I use my cruise to put a top limit on speed so that I don't accidentally drift up 10-15 MPH above limit - it really doesn't feel like you are going that fast.
• I have the CVT with the paddle shifter range override. I do use it to add some engine braking on longer downgrades, but otherwise the automatic handling is usually right on.
• Backing, you will probably use the camera more than the rearview mirror, but that is typical of newer SUVs and crossovers. You do get a decent straight back view to watch your six on the highway, and the side mirrors give good coverage of the spots blocked by the body pylons.

Really, I'd suggest test driving a couple to see if you like/can stand them as a vehicle before getting too worried about some of the other details. I've not run into some of the more commonly mentioned maintenance stuff, other than replacing one wheel bearing rather early. That might have been a nasty pothole, though.

We bought a used 08 outback in 2014 with 34,000 miles on it.
When it had 90,000 miles I had to change both front axles. Then the wheel bearings started to go, one at a time until I changed all 4 of them, and one of the front ones twice. 100k timing belt, water pump and thermostat, best do them at same time because water pump and thermostat behind timing belt. Then The catalytic converter. Then I had to pull both heads because they were leaking oil out of had gasket. Dealer wanted 3k to do one side, and I could see spending that so it took me a week to change them myself. Then the exhaust system.
It's got about 150k on it now. Runs and drives good. Wife loves it, but I don't want another. Seems like I'm under the hood every couple of weeks. Maybe we just got a lemon.
Gas mileage, it's a 4 banger 2.5 non- turbo, is average 26 miles per gallon. Just my 2 cents worth.
Roy

Had a 21 Crosstrek, but gave it to my son. Terribly uncomfortable for me. Couldn't drive for more than 2 hours. Other than that, no real problems. Not big enough to sleep in though. And a side note. ACA membership for 6 months (maybe a year, check) gets you into the Subaru VIP program, which in turn gets you new subies at dealer cost. Some other orgs also participate (e.g., Leave No Trace, IMBA, ASPCA).

As I recall a paddling buddy told me that on older Subies when you changed the coolant a special additive had to be used to avoid leaking head gaskets.

Roybrew said:

We bought a used 08 outback in 2014 with 34,000 miles on it.
When it had 90,000 miles I had to change both front axles. Then the wheel bearings started to go, one at a time until I changed all 4 of them, and one of the front ones twice. 100k timing belt, water pump and thermostat, best do them at same time because water pump and thermostat behind timing belt. Then The catalytic converter. Then I had to pull both heads because they were leaking oil out of had gasket. Dealer wanted 3k to do one side, and I could see spending that so it took me a week to change them myself. Then the exhaust system.

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That all sounds like pretty normal stuff for a Subaru. We don't see a ton of them here in Iowa but they seem to be hit and miss. We have some customers that drive them for 300k and hardly have any problems at all. Other times they're more like what you experienced.

Alan

Another happy Outback owner here. I have a 2020 Touring XT (turbo). This is my first Subaru. It won't be my last.

I traded my Audi Q4 sedan to get it because I wanted something during the pandemic I could take "soft roading" -getting to unpaved put ins and take outs and forest service type roads. I've since taken it all over the North Maine Woods. I don't miss the A4.

The built in rack system is perfect for one canoe. If you want to run shuttle and carry two or more boats, you can get after market rack systems from the usual suspects. Relatively low compared to SUVs (it's a station wagon after all) makes loading/unloading easier than a taller vehicle.

The 2020 has front hooks (tie downs really for when the car is being transported) that I use for my bow line. For the stern line I have a tow hitch installed.

I find the car extremely comfortable on long drives and love the safety features. Some people don't like all the nanny features -- but they did save my life once on a really long drive when I momentarily dozed off.

The turbo models (XT) have incredible acceleration at the cost of some fuel efficiency. Subarus are a lot of car for th emoney.

My Outback all loaded ready for the road trip to Paul Smiths tomorrow.




A mix of old and new.
Jim