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Subaru

Geoff

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for real?

I haven't routinely checked the oil in a car I've owned in probably 15 years and those were older cars with known consistent engine issues.

The last time I had to check my oil was when I owned a 1987 S-10 Blazer with 160,000 miles on it. The valves and rings were totally shot so I kept a case of oil in the back and added a quart with every fill-up. With that kind of oil consumption, I didn't change the oil for the last 15,000 miles I owned it. I screwed up and left the dip stick ajar at 162,000 miles. All the oil blew up the dip stick into the engine compartment and the "call tow truck" light lit on the dash. I added 4 quarts of oil, got it home, and bought a new car the next day.

I check the oil in my boats and lawn mower.
 

wa-loaf

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for real?

I haven't routinely checked the oil in a car I've owned in probably 15 years and those were older cars with known consistent engine issues.

I'm on a 10k cycle with my car. I just take a look around 8k to make sure things are cool

It's an 09 Outback 2.5i, 5-speed. Apparently it is the piston rings dating are the cause and after 12 years people are finally pissed. When her oil pressure sending unit was spewing everywhere and she was down to about 2 quarts the oil light never even came on.

She already had the good old paper head gasket issue at 48k, luckily it was covered under warranty. In the past year I've had to do a coil, an axle (weirdest, scariest set up I've seen too, just pop in, no pin), 2 oil pressure sending units because they were pissing everywhere, belts, plugs (one twice), wires, and I'm sure more. It got to the point where we had to park it in doors because after a rain it would hardly run and misfire. They are very, very easy vehicles to work on but it seems like they need a lot of it.

I had an 05 2.5 5 speed. Really had no issues with it until around 100k and then it seemed every time I was in I was spending $2k on something. Traded it in at 120k. Figured If I was going to be spending that much cash all the time I'd rather have a payment on a new car.
 

hammer

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I had to do the dreaded head gasket change on my old Outback a number of years ago, but my son's 2009 Impreza is behaving so far, around 60K miles and no measurable oil consumption. I thought I might have some minor oil consumption issues on my Volvo S40 last year but the level didn't really drop in the last 7.5K cycle. Four cars in the house and the most significant issue recently was bad cam phasers on the Jeep which was covered under the powertrain warranty. All of the vehicles are over 50K miles, hoping they can each make it to 100K before the repair bills start coming in...
 

Tin

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Ha! She is at 116k now, time to sell.

The Subaru dealerships around here are horrible. When we first started dating a few years ago she needed new brakes and got a quote from the dealership. For just changing pads all around they wanted almost $700, have never gone back to the stealership since.
 

hammer

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Ha! She is at 116k now, time to sell.

The Subaru dealerships around here are horrible. When we first started dating a few years ago she needed new brakes and got a quote from the dealership. For just changing pads all around they wanted almost $700, have never gone back to the stealership since.

Just had my front brakes done on my Volvo, thought that just under $500 was a pretty good deal until I saw online prices for the pads and rotors. Makes me wish I had the time, tools, and talent to take on stuff like that myself. I still take the Volvo to the stealership for routine maintenance visits so I can get any needed SW updates.

We've only had to take the Impreza to the dealer for recall service and an oil change so I can't speak for their prices.
 

wa-loaf

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for real?

I haven't routinely checked the oil in a car I've owned in probably 15 years and those were older cars with known consistent engine issues.

Ha! She is at 116k now, time to sell.

The Subaru dealerships around here are horrible. When we first started dating a few years ago she needed new brakes and got a quote from the dealership. For just changing pads all around they wanted almost $700, have never gone back to the stealership since.

I bought mine at Anchor Subaru, they were pretty good. I've been largely satisfied with the subi dealers I been to since (North End in Lunenberg, and Patrick in Shrewsbury). I actually went to a few independent shops and found they wanted to charge as much or more than the dealer for a lot of the work.
 

steamboat1

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I have an 11 Imprezza Outback Sport. Change the oil every 8k (synthetic). Usually I'm down about a 1/2 qt. after 5k. I think that's normal for any car. Never had any work done by dealer so I don't know how they are. I did have the brakes pads changed after 48k on all four. I went to the dealer for the pads because I was impressed getting 48K out the pads so I wanted the same pads. I do a lot of stop & go driving in NYC. Don't remember exactly what they cost but I don't remember them being expensive. Had my regular mechanic change the pads. Once again I don't remember it being expensive. Certainly didn't cost anywhere near the $500-$700 you guys are talking about, I'd remember that. I guess I'll have to go to the dealer soon because I recently had a recall on the brake lines, they say they can rot out. I have about 75K on the car & that's all I've had to do to the car (oil change & brake pads).
 
Last edited:

deadheadskier

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Question for those who cycle out their oil changes to higher mileage - 8-10K range.

Do you wait equally as long to rotate tires or make a separate appointment? Factory recommended in my car is 7500K or 3750K for "severe" driving conditions. I've settled on 6K as a decent change interval and rotate my tires then.
 

steamboat1

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Question for those who cycle out their oil changes to higher mileage - 8-10K range.

Do you wait equally as long to rotate tires or make a separate appointment? Factory recommended in my car is 7500K or 3750K for "severe" driving conditions. I've settled on 6K as a decent change interval and rotate my tires then.
Really can't answer that question. I have two sets of tires (all season & winter). The only time I rotate them is when I change the tires in fall & spring. Both have been remounted twice so far & I'm pretty sure I'll get another season out of the all seasons & the winter tires still look brand new. I didn't put a lot of mileage on the winter tires the first season I had them because if you remember I got injured that year so I didn't do much driving. The remounts doesn't cost me anything because my tire guy told me as long as I keep buying tires from him he'll remount them free of charge. This is the second set of all seasons on the car & I didn't buy winter tires until two seasons ago. Even with AWD I find the winter tires make a huge difference driving in snow.
 

wa-loaf

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Question for those who cycle out their oil changes to higher mileage - 8-10K range.

Do you wait equally as long to rotate tires or make a separate appointment? Factory recommended in my car is 7500K or 3750K for "severe" driving conditions. I've settled on 6K as a decent change interval and rotate my tires then.

I'm putting 20k on my car every year so that's two 10k oil changes annually that have included tire rotations. The oil changes are kind of offset from when I swap the snow tires so I'd say they are getting rotated with around 6-8k and then a shorter interval before the wheels get swapped for the seasons.
 

deadheadskier

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I guess for me rotating tires during an oil change is a simple thing to do and a way for me to not forget it. I typically average about 30K miles a year on a car. Five months of winter see 2 oil changes/rotations, 7 months of summer 3 oil changes/rotations. Snows go on from November 1st through April 1st.

It's worked out so far for tire life. At 68K miles I just dumped the original summer tires the car came with and also bought new snows for this winter. I may have been able to get 5K more miles out of each set if I stretched it. That's pretty decent tire life for a Mazda3, which are known to chew through tires. If I can get another 70K out of the new snows and next set of summer tires before looking for a new car, I'll be happy. %~$1600 tire expense over the life of the vehicle.
 

Edd

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My 2010 Forester is at 70K for mileage. It's my second Subie and my experience with the brand has been one of complete reliability. I guess I'll start checking the oil. Haven't done that in years, myself.

I look at cars as completely an appliance. Reliability is far and away my top priority. If the Forester went south I'd be glad to buy a Honda or Toyota. One thing, though. This Forester has an awesome, huge sunroof. I sure would miss that.
 

Cannonball

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My wife recently bought a '15 Forester. We've had it since November so we've been driving it through all of this winter's snowy weather and it's been great. But Saturday and Sunday it was virtually undrivable on the road conditions we had. On Saturday we were on 93N and starting drifting all over the road. It felt like we had literally zero traction. We carefully slowed down and got off at the first exit. I scraped all of the snow out of the treads thinking we may have just iced up. Got back on the highway and same thing! Felt like we could just start spinning at any moment even going 30MPH. Other people were passing at 70. We ended up crawling through back roads just to make it to Lincoln. Then Sunday we couldn't even get out of town to get to Cannon. We were all over the road.

Are these Geolanders literally the worst tire ever?
 

o3jeff

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Now I'm going to have to check which tires I have when I get home, have Yoko's on my 2014 Crosstrek that aren't too bad in the snow.
 

Edd

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Are these Geolanders literally the worst tire ever?

My original Geolanders lasted like 70k miles. Can't say they were amazing in the snow but I never got stuck or in an accident.

I remember I replaced them with something different because the OEMs are expensive as shit.
 

Cannonball

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Been reading some reviews on the Geolanders since I posted this. Many, many others with the same experience. Literally the worst traction I've felt since my 2-wheel drive Chevy s10. Really scary stuff.
 

JDMRoma

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My wife Mitsubishi Montero sport had them from the dealership! They sucked and replaced them at 30k with Michelin XCH 4s. Have about 70 k on them and their still passing inspection. Great tires but certainly not cheep.



Sent from my iPhone using AlpineZone
 

Geoff

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The last time I had to check my oil was when I owned a 1987 S-10 Blazer with 160,000 miles on it. The valves and rings were totally shot so I kept a case of oil in the back and added a quart with every fill-up. With that kind of oil consumption, I didn't change the oil for the last 15,000 miles I owned it. I screwed up and left the dip stick ajar at 162,000 miles. All the oil blew up the dip stick into the engine compartment and the "call tow truck" light lit on the dash. I added 4 quarts of oil, got it home, and bought a new car the next day.

I check the oil in my boats and lawn mower.

Famous last words. I ran my GTI out of oil last week. The "stop engine immediately" went on while cornering and the oil sloshed away from the oil pump fill in the bottom of the oil pan. The car is running fine but I now distrust it. I need to do some test driving but I'm pretty sure I have an Outback 3.6R in my future.
 

Glenn

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My wife recently bought a '15 Forester. We've had it since November so we've been driving it through all of this winter's snowy weather and it's been great. But Saturday and Sunday it was virtually undrivable on the road conditions we had. On Saturday we were on 93N and starting drifting all over the road. It felt like we had literally zero traction. We carefully slowed down and got off at the first exit. I scraped all of the snow out of the treads thinking we may have just iced up. Got back on the highway and same thing! Felt like we could just start spinning at any moment even going 30MPH. Other people were passing at 70. We ended up crawling through back roads just to make it to Lincoln. Then Sunday we couldn't even get out of town to get to Cannon. We were all over the road.

Are these Geolanders literally the worst tire ever?

If they're OK in the warmer months, get a set of snows. That'll allow you to ride out the Geolanders for a bit longer and worry about replacement down the road.

AWD and snows= Win. We put a set of snows on my wife's AWD car and it's great in the snow. Just limited by ground clearance; it's a lower car than a Subie.
 

deadheadskier

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OEM tires on Mazdas suck in the snow too. After using snow tires the past 8 years or so, I don't think I could go back to All Seasons.
 
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