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Add Your Review!
Subaru Forester
| Model | Subaru Forester | |
| What things have gone wrong with the car? | No moon-roof (at least not in the mid-range model I got); lame brakes (soft, mushy); not roomy enough for people over 6' or over 300 lbs in weight, so-so handling (the Impreza frame is a shade too small for the car IMHO); seats are a bit hard, and lumbar support only for the driver; door cams aren't strong enough (so the doors slam shut by themselves if you're parked on a sidehill angle); computer resets if your battery dies and you have to take it to the dealer to reset it; poor factory stereo (go figure) and WAY OVERPRICED Bose subwoofer option (like $400 with wimpy performance); excessive wind noise; mine has a LOT of trouble starting in the mountains about 10,000 feet. | |
| General comments? | My Forester has 91,000 miles and change on it, so before I get started, let's go over all the bad points about the car that I'm seeing OTHER reviewers list, so I can validate them yay or nay. "Engineering could be better": I don't see how. Use of space is superb, as is fit and finish. "MGP is consistently poorer than advertised": this hasn't been my experience. It's a 2.5-liter engine pulling a small-to-midsize SUV; do the math. I commute 54 miles a day total (highway miles), and even with the additional light driving I have to do in the city, I have to fill up maybe once every five days or so. And that's in Colorado; it might even do better at sea level where there's more oxygen... "Brakes are untrustworthy and frequently serviced": my brakes have stopped my car every time, so to call them untrustworthy is a little extreme, but in general they pretty much suck. I need to get mine done AGAIN; that'll be twice in less that 100K miles. GAG! Mushy and soft, although at least they aren't grabby. "Automatic Transmission consistently sticks in first gear until the car is really warm": This hasn't been my experience, and I've only heard this in one review. The person may be low on tranny fluid. "Cup holders sweat all over the stereo": I don't drink hot liquids in the car so I can't confirm this, but the cup holders are flimsy and WAY too close to the stereo. Once I got a Coke from Wendy's and left the half-full cup in the cupholder while I was in a friend's apt for about 2 hours, and when I got back in the car, the cup had sprung a leak and there was Coke all over the stereo! DOH! But the cupholders themselves have never failed me. "Rear windows don't open all the way": true, but hardly a problem. They open 3 | |
| Previous car | None, only other car was an 84 Honda Prelude | |