Subaru dealership experience

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TurboFiat124

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I've been lucky that I've been able to avoid dealerships for years. About the only time I have to take my cars to a shop is to have the tires replaced or a front end alignment since I don't own these types of tools.

So I took my 2003 Subaru Baja in to have the defective Takata airbag replaced. Come to find out, mine didn't have the defective one. Wasn't even made by Takata.

But they did give my car a *free* inspection. I guess to drum up some bizness.

This car has 79,000 miles on it and I've done all the required maintenance to it myself.

Here is what they told me.

1) New timing belt and waterpump. Subaru says this isn't required until 100,000 miles. The dealer says every 10 years or 100,000 miles. The water pump is one of those (while your down there) items because it's driven off the timing belt.

2) New brake pads and front rotors. Yes the front end shimmies a bit under hard braking. I'm not sure why because I never recall overheating the brakes on this car. I always gear down when going down hills. I measured the thickness of the pads at 65,000 miles and they were 5mm / 4.5 mm front and back. The new pads are 10mm/8mm so I took them back to Advance Auto. At this rate I shouldn't need new pads until around 130,000 miles. Surely the pads cannot be worn out at 79,000 miles?

3) new wiper blades. I replaced these back in November.

4) New Tires. I measured the tread depth and they are still within spec. I may replace these before winter.

5) New battery. The battery was dead before I took it up to the dealership so the car only got recharged for 8 miles off the alternator. But yeah, it's probably bad.

OH, they quoted me $800 on the timing belt and $170 on a new battery.

Lets see I can get the parts for around $220 and a battery for $89. I think I'll do the job myself.
 
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They have no idea how much you can do or say you can do. For your average driver it seemed like they were reasonable and the car would benefit from their their recommendations.

The wiper blades went through a winter, I replace them in the spring. Timing belt is 14 years old. Battery is dead and tires maybe be within spec, but just barely.

Brakes need something if they shimmy. Your last brake job, did you replace pads and rotors or a quick pad slap?
 
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I honestly think for the average non-DIY'er, thats a pretty fair assessment. Not a bad price on the timing belt (if that includes belt and pump plus labor).
 
Are you sharing a good experience or are you unhappy with your experience? Kind of sounds like they did you a solid.

What's your tire tread depth? If you measured it, why not share?

Also, did you measure/check their findings afterward or did you already know, before they told you (e.g., remaining brake pad material)?

RE: dead battery: invest in a decent battery charger. You're right, that driving 8 miles won't charge your battery. Simply driving for more than 8 miles is NOT the solution.
 
Sounds like they may have been premature on the brake pads. But from what you say, it looks like they advised you pretty accurately on the other items.

Your timing belt is 4 years overdue from the 10 years you say is stated in the Owner's Manual. Rubber belts are one of those things that age can have as much of an aging effect as mileage.

If the pads were down to 5 mm at 65k, based upon the wear rate you state, they are probably down to about 4 mm at 79k. At the current wear rate you say, that gives you maybe 26k miles more before you are down to 2 mm. Considering that pads should really be replaced at 2mm, you really don't have enough pad to make it to 130k miles, but more like to around 105k miles. Still, they don't need to be replaced yet.

Wiper blades should be replaced every 6 - 12 months, and you are at 8 months. Good call on the dealership's part.

You didn't say what the tires measured, but if you had already recognized that they needed to be replaced before winter, they aren't that far off.

Dead battery? Yup, that was an easy call.
 
Originally Posted By: FirstNissan
I honestly think for the average non-DIY'er, thats a pretty fair assessment. Not a bad price on the timing belt (if that includes belt and pump plus labor).


This

Sounds like a good dealership imo.
 
Originally Posted By: aquariuscsm
Originally Posted By: FirstNissan
I honestly think for the average non-DIY'er, thats a pretty fair assessment. Not a bad price on the timing belt (if that includes belt and pump plus labor).


This

Sounds like a good dealership imo.


THIS^^^^^^^^^^^

They gave a good/accurate assessment of the vehicles condition-per the OP's statement of what is wrong/needed.

No dealer bashing here is warranted. Instead the OPs post says there are decent dealers out there.

Well....maybe next time.
 
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Agree. Also, giving you a no-pressure advance warning of something is much appreciated. The guy at the Ford Quicklane told me last time that "next time you will be up for the radiator fluid replacement."

I knew that, but probably most owners don't. No surprises, no pressure. Perfect.
 
Agree. Also, giving you a no-pressure advance warning of something is much appreciated. The guy at the Ford Quicklane told me last time that "next time you will be up for the radiator fluid replacement."

I knew that, but probably most owners don't. No surprises, no pressure. Perfect.
 
If you do the timing belt yourself, make sure you get a good quality timing kit made in Japan or America that in addition to a new water pump, includes new idler and roller pulleys. On Subaru's it's critical that those pulleys get replaced every time a timing belt replacement is done because those pulleys often go bad before the belt and could take out your engine.

Subaru timing belt kit info: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7qYmNXOhn_o

Important info about replacing Subaru timing belts at the 34:00 minute mark: https://youtu.be/ddFsFfiyOvg?t=34m
 
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You sound like the kind of guy that does not do maintenance until catastrophic failure has occurred.

Besides the tires and wipers, everything else the dealership recommended was withing reason. Bring in a 14 year old vehicle that has not been inspected, I would expect a litany list of things needing to be done. That dealership was not out of line.
 
The recommendations seem reasonable to me. I usually stick with wipers longer because I'm cheap and lazy, but even good ones seem to start to go south for me after about 6 months...yes, I have tried cleaning the blades off and it has never helped much.

The real problem would be if they charged you for recommended maintenance and didn't actually do it. I verified with a local Subaru dealer that they were going to replace my PCV valve as part of their 60kmile package and then they didn't do it...I called them on it and they said it was too hard to do on turbos, so they didn't bother. They had an out because their paperwork said the PCV valve would be changed "if applicable" and I didn't document my phone conversation with the service advisor. They hosed me over on that visit at the cost of losing any possible business from me for the rest of my life...
 
If the Baja has an interference engine, to me it's not worth going 14 years without changing the timing belt. I had a 1987 Loyale wagon that broke the timing belt at 45K miles. And age does matter.
 
Are you really on the original timing belt at 14 years!?! They are definitely correct in that you need to change it.

I have a friend with an 04 Impreza who won't change the timing belt because the car only has 40000 miles on it. Living on borrowed time.
 
This also can cover the dealer if something fails later and the customer starts to cry out "I had it at the dealer and they didn't tell me!"

The TBelt and WP job on the 2.2 SOHC was easy the second time, and moderate the first time. You just have to peal off a few layers of components to get there. 2nd time I did it in 2.5 hrs.

-m
 
Sounds very fair to me. Brake shimmy and 5mm pad you know they need work, 8 mo old wiper blades, tires you say will to replaced before winter that is only 4 mo away so they cant be too good, $89 for a battery and timing belt with pump thats 14 yrs old. What did they do wrong it sounds like they did a pretty good assessment?
 
You're not in any way obligated to have them do the work. They gave you a free assessment of what needed to be done, check for yourself and determine what needs to be done. Do what you can yourself and shop around for what you can't have done. Just be sure you pick someone competent to do the work you aren't planning on doing. For the age of the vehicle the work they recommended having done doesn't seem too bad.
 
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