'01 Impreza RS - am I just having bad luck?

[Paul Braun]

I'm curious about something. My '01 2.5RS has 90k miles on it now.
Most of it highway miles, and while I drive a bit aggressively, it's a
very smooth aggressive. No off-roading, no racing, no high-rev clutch
drops.

I switched out to amsoil at the earliest opportunity. I do my oil
changes and preventive maintenance according to schedule.

So far, I've had to replace a knock sensor, my cat, and my flywheel
(all under warranty), but also the clutch (at the same time as
flywheel -- SOA wouldn't cover that) and I just had to replace the
rear oil seal in my tranny, which added about $500 to the 90k service.

Also, the lights burned out behind the fuel and oil guages, and that
requires removing the entire dash to replace. Not gonna happen.

Don't get me wrong - I love my car. It's the first car I've had that
really feels like an extension of me when I drive. But based on what
I read here before I bought, I certainly didn't expect these kind of
mechanical failures. I know we didn't have these kind of repair bills
on my wife's 94 Civic before we traded it in on an Insight, and it had
150,000 miles on it.

Am I just having a streak of bad luck? Or are the really high-mileage
Scoobys the more pedestrian ones? Does my car have a higher failure
rate because of the performance factor?

I've learned to accept the really soft windshield and the extremely
thin paint job. Not happy about it, since I had to spend $700 so far
to get stone chips and minor dings repainted, something I never had to
do with my Probe LX.

However, I read the stories here of 200,000 miles with no major
problems and I'm jealous. I'd like to think in 4 years I'll replace
her with the current WRX-ish model, but I'd also like to know I can
count on slightly better reliability that I'm getting so far.

Any thoughts from the group?

Paul

 

[Carl 1 Lucky Texan]

I'm curious about something. My '01 2.5RS has 90k miles on it now.
Most of it highway miles, and while I drive a bit aggressively, it's a
very smooth aggressive. No off-roading, no racing, no high-rev clutch
drops.

I switched out to amsoil at the earliest opportunity. I do my oil
changes and preventive maintenance according to schedule.

So far, I've had to replace a knock sensor, my cat, and my flywheel
(all under warranty), but also the clutch (at the same time as
flywheel -- SOA wouldn't cover that) and I just had to replace the
rear oil seal in my tranny, which added about $500 to the 90k service.

Also, the lights burned out behind the fuel and oil guages, and that
requires removing the entire dash to replace. Not gonna happen.

Don't get me wrong - I love my car. It's the first car I've had that
really feels like an extension of me when I drive. But based on what
I read here before I bought, I certainly didn't expect these kind of
mechanical failures. I know we didn't have these kind of repair bills
on my wife's 94 Civic before we traded it in on an Insight, and it had
150,000 miles on it.

Am I just having a streak of bad luck? Or are the really high-mileage
Scoobys the more pedestrian ones? Does my car have a higher failure
rate because of the performance factor?

I've learned to accept the really soft windshield and the extremely
thin paint job. Not happy about it, since I had to spend $700 so far
to get stone chips and minor dings repainted, something I never had to
do with my Probe LX.

However, I read the stories here of 200,000 miles with no major
problems and I'm jealous. I'd like to think in 4 years I'll replace
her with the current WRX-ish model, but I'd also like to know I can
count on slightly better reliability that I'm getting so far.

Any thoughts from the group?

Paul

was the cat replaced under emmissions warranty?
It does seem you're having a few more issuse than normal. But you didn't
mention headgaskets and I THINK the '01 may be vulnerable. No, it
doesn't seem like it's any high performance issues. probably bad luck to
have the cat, flywheel and seal probelms.

Carl

 

[Clifford Heath]

I'd also like to know I can
count on slightly better reliability that I'm getting so far.

As Carl said, make d*%@ sure you're bleeding *all* the air when you
change the coolant, assuming the 2.5 is the DOHC "EJ25" version.
Failure by our service folk to spend 5 minutes doing it properly
just cost me over $3k in repairs due to gasket failure caused by
local overheating.

Better yet, drill and tap a small bleed tube into the coolant cross-
over pipe on top of the engine, and feed it into the radiator return.
That way you can easily be pretty sure you've got all the air out.
Any gurgling when you turn off the hot engine is an indication of
potential trouble.

Clifford Heath

 

[TG]

I'm suspicious about the cat and rear oil seal, often misdiagnosed in
Subaru's...why were they replaced? Tracy

 

[Paul Braun]

I'm suspicious about the cat and rear oil seal, often misdiagnosed in
Subaru's...why were they replaced? Tracy

Cat was replaced under warranty because it was throwing a CEL code
that wouldn't go away. New cat - no more code.

Changed to midgrade gas, and it hasn't come back.

Rear oil seal was seeping... I saw it myself last time they had her up
on the lift for an oil change. He thought it was either the baffle
plate or rear seal... fortunately, it was the rear seal. My trans
(5-spd) was, in fact, leaking oil and I had started to get downshift
mismatches (usually 3-2) with a bit of grinding from time to time.
New seal, fresh load of gearbox goo, and it shifts like new.

Paul

 

[Paul Braun]

As Carl said, make d*%@ sure you're bleeding *all* the air when you
change the coolant, assuming the 2.5 is the DOHC "EJ25" version.
Failure by our service folk to spend 5 minutes doing it properly
just cost me over $3k in repairs due to gasket failure caused by
local overheating.

Better yet, drill and tap a small bleed tube into the coolant cross-
over pipe on top of the engine, and feed it into the radiator return.
That way you can easily be pretty sure you've got all the air out.
Any gurgling when you turn off the hot engine is an indication of
potential trouble.

Clifford Heath

Head gasket appears to be fine... they checked everything over and the
only thing wrong was the tranny seal.

My mechanic said if I popped over when he was there, he'd show me the
proper way to bleed it to make sure I didn't get any air in. Yes,
it's the EJ25.

Paul