So, in November of 2016, I bought a 2015 Outback 2.5 (everything factory, no upgrades or alterations of any kind) with 31k mi on it from a close family friend that is older and took impeccable care of the car with all records. They mostly drove it for “highway in the country” type driving so never really needed performance from the car and never noticed anything wrong because of that. I picked up the car and drove it 1100 mi home. I noticed that it wasn't easy to drive and was very different from the rest of the Subaru's in the family (Outback years- 14, 16, 17, Forester years 10, 16), none of them were 2015's though. Over the first 4/5 weeks I never could drive it right, not normal for me, I drive many different types of cars, I travel and rent, or borrow, or whatever, I just drive many different cars and this one just wasn't right.
• It bounces, like a rubber band at low speeds if I took my foot off the gas or reapplied it (especially at speeds such as in slow traffic or in a parking lot). It is a lot like driving a manual transmission, in too high of a gear at too low of a speed.
• It also had a shutter noticeable at 17-20 mi/hr, it has a significant jerk from a stop, as if it was a manual transmission slipping gears (this doesn't happen if it is in manual mode), the RPM's drop for a quick second and the car continues on with a little more acceleration than before the jerk. This issue is still consistent.
• It has an inconsistent acceleration, sometimes it accelerates with power and other times it’s like I was pulling into traffic with a golf cart.
• The above three, also result in a lower MPG, I’ll explain later.
• (RESOLVED) Sometimes I would need to accelerate into traffic and GO, such as turning onto an on ramp or heading up a hill that needed an immediate response from the car, BUT IT WOULDN'T RESPOND! I felt stuck, I had nothing the car would start out into traffic and then suddenly RPM’s would drop and NO response, I would pump my foot in panic and it would pick up and go as if nothing ever happened, this would only happen rarely and it was never duplicated by the dealership.
• (RESOLVED) My battery would die on me for no reason, a few times. Nothing plugged-in, no lights on or doors open.
Dealership 1: Fresno, CA- Originally took it in for the stereo, also mentioned that I noticed it was driving differently than other Subaru’s and they said they drove it and didn’t notice anything.
Dealership 2: San Diego, CA
Visit 1: Explained all of the above issues, they didn’t have time to drive it with me at that time, they drove independently and found nothing.
Visit 2: Drove it with them, they told me the CVT was just responding to my driving and nothing was wrong with the car. Recommended, do some reading on the Subaru CVT to learn how normal CVT’s learn from your driving habits and respond to them appropriately.
Visit 3: I was getting angry at this point and very assertive. Again, drove it with them, then drove another Outback to show them the difference. It again, was a significant difference. They did nothing. Said they checked for updates that would address the issues above, found nothing. I insisted they try something, they agreed to reset the computer. I knew this couldn’t be because the car was acting like this when I got it. If it truly was responding to how I was driving it, doing a relearn on the TCM would fix the issue. It did not.
WOOHOO It was like a new car!! Almost. The MPG went up to about 23 with the same driving habits as before. But I still had a shutter at 17 mi/hr. Then about 800 mi later I noticed my MPG starting to go down and continued to drop to about 19.5 MPG after around 1500 mi, then all of my issues returned. I was devastated, becoming hopeless.
Dealership 3: Boise, ID- I had a lot of hope for this one, Subaru’s are sooo popular here and this is where the car was purchased so I thought that maybe they got a batch of these cars with issues, even though this one was special ordered. I still had hope. NOPE, same old story… learn to drive a CVT, all you’re feeling is the normal lag that happens with a CVT. They also said they didn’t find any updates to address the issues above. They did reset it and that did, temporarily, get rid of the issue again.
Dealership 4: Walnut Creek, Diablo Subaru- First of all, I was most impressed with this location. Second, they are hands down, the most thorough.
Visit 1: I actually took it in for the stereo update. I had given up, was just going to sell it after the update. I was hesitant but I mentioned the issues but not in great detail, they said they would drive it. They didn’t find anything but as usual because this is the first time seeing the car, they reset it, but they did both the TCM and the computer. This was totally different than the prior resets that were done, it was set to do a transmission relearn, something no one had done prior. It was even better than after the other resets, but still had the shutter.
They recommended that I get SOA involved, I didn’t even know to do that, so I did.
Visit 2: About a week later I was at the base of a mountain pass (more like steep hill in my opinion, but around here…?) and accelerating from a stop. I was going up but it was very slight and the speed limit was 50 mph., as it got steeper the speed limit increased to 65. I, along with a lot of traffic, started to speed up, using more than the usual gas because of the incline and speed adjustment. Suddenly my car just started losing speed! I was panicking! I had hit about 60 mph along with the traffic around me still accelerating and I had no power!! I immediately put my hazards on and worked my way across another lane to get to a shoulder but there wasn’t much there to get fully out of the way so I had to keep going, cars were swerving and it was very dangerous!! At the instant that I lost power, over about 1 second my RPM’s dropped to 1200 and stayed there and within about 3 seconds my speed was only 22 mph and was maintaining that speed up a hill as I tried to get out of the way. I got to a full stop and the car suddenly acted like nothing was wrong, I tested it a little on the shoulder and drove the short distance home. I was very shaken up and called Subaru immediately. They offered to have it towed but I said no because this was the issue I had tried to explain before and it is so intermittent that I was confident it wouldn’t happen, so I took the safe way to the dealership, in no traffic. They found two updates, one that addressed this issue specifically and another for the transmission. At this visit they also checked for other issues with the car and I drove it with the head mechanic. At this time, the car performed like a champ, or maybe I should say it didn’t perform, either way, he felt it alllll, the jerking and bouncing and shuttering, all of it. I was totally impressed, based on my research I had something in mind but didn’t say anything at this point. However, he did just as I thought, he suggested that the shutter was the front axels. The front axels would explain everything, including, causing the CVT to learn to compensate for the possibly faulty axels causing a jerk and all of the other transmission inconsistencies. They replaced the axels (they were oblong!!! Crazy, right?) and did a relearn for the transmission also checked for other issues, such as the battery (I had other issues, I didn’t care that my battery died now and then so I had not even mentioned it), they noticed an issue and replaced it! I was impressed. Again, no charge for anything.
What angered me about these two updates…. THEY CAME OUT IN 2015!!! This dealership did the updates on 3/6/18, how is it, none of the other dealerships even thought to check for updates??? This power issue happed at least 8-10 times before and I told them about this and they did nothing at the other dealerships.
It is no longer shuttering, the battery is not having issues, all other issues returned. I will update this when I have more information.
Visit 3: At this point they want to replace the transmission. I will update when I have more.
