Edmunds dealer partner, Bayway Leasing, is now offering transparent lease deals via these forums. Click here to learn more!
Options
Popular New Cars
Popular Used Sedans
Popular Used SUVs
Popular Used Pickup Trucks
Popular Used Hatchbacks
Popular Used Minivans
Popular Used Coupes
Popular Used Wagons
Comments
Hope this helps.
-mike
Subaru Guru and Track Instructor
My freind owns it and she has a dim headlight on pass. side.
We changed fuse and new fuse blew as soon lights were turned on.
Still toubleshooting that's why I am here.
Couple of years ago, the clock on my 2002 forester L went out. I ignored it. Then my gearshift (automatic transmission) light went out and I ignored it. Then my cruise light went out and I ignored it then my dashboard lighting on the speed gauge went out and now my head lights are having an issue. When I turn them on, they are dim. When I pop the hood and tap the driver side headlight, the driver side is at at full power but my passenger light goes out and when I put my high beam on, my driver side light comes back to dim. Any ideas of what might be wrong and how to fix it will be greatly appreciated. The dealer is asking $100 just for diagnosing the issue.
Thanks :confuse:
We've taken the car in to the dealership when the two front door locks stopped working. Basically, the little motors that operate the locks need to be replaced (at about $600 for the two doors!). It's been a great car for the last 60K miles but this sort of electrical failure is just ridiculous. We've owned older cars (two Acuras and two Toyotas) with a lot more miles and have never experienced this kind of problem. I forgot to mention that we've had issues with the lock on the trunk/hatch door too but that was covered under warranty.
Kind of disappointed. I hope the Legacy GT I just purchased will be better constructed.
Sometimes, if I am driving, it feels like the power of the engine wanes and then sometimes even starts to feel like it is going to stop but doesn't and then will jerkingly kick back in. They have looked at it about 10 times now - this has been happening for some time.
Then today, I was driving and it started to do that jerky in and out feeling again - almost like you hit the gas hard fast and then dropped foot off and then back on - weird. So, anyway, today I start hearing the volume of a cd I had in go up and then back down. I was like, hmm cd must be messed up. But then it did it again and I looked at the stereo and sure enough it was not on the cd xxx track display - instead it said VOLUME 7 then went down to VOLUME 6 then 7 and 8 I think - as if someone was actually holding the knob changing the volume back and forth.
I started to think the in and out engine power feeling that comes and goes was linked to bad gas and figured it was he** gas because it seems to happen worse whenever I go to that gas station - I get premium everywhere as recommended for turbo. The shop did an air filter change a few months back and it seemed to solve the problem for a while - they did something else too - with thee pressure or something. So, the in and out like I am gonna die to ok I am back again feeling just started coming back but now with the radio, I am concerned.
If I were to have hit wires under the driver side, would that effect the radio - could it? Also, the light where the shift column is (for P D N R) went out a few months ago and they replaced the bulb. But, they had not put the center console piece back on totally right. Could they have done something replacing that bulb? Or could my foot or whatever have messed up a wire under driver side? If so, is that dangerous?
Also, anyone have problems with 06 foresters driver window getting scratched when you put it up and down? For some time we hear scraping a little when we put window up and down but of course dealer never hears anything. So, recently we noticed after washing it, it actually has scratches going up and down the glass.
Lovely. I said, hey we brought this to your dealership and asked about this 3 or 4 times and now that we have had it over 3 years and the warranty is up, we have to be responsible because that isn't right - he said yes but they would see what Subaru said. You've got to be kidding me - you complain and say something is wrong while UNDER warranty and they look into it say ehh it's nothing then it causes damage right after warranty is up and I might have to pay?
Ugghhh what is wrong with my car?
thanks
A group of us used to go to the Pine Barrens for some off road fun, and a V6 Trooper hydrolocked, and it bent a rod. Stopped it dead in its tracks.
The odd thing is that it runs at all.
Does it throw a check-engine light? If so a good OBDII scanner can read the codes.
Thanks
thanks...
Have them do a load test on the battery after a long drive to the dealer (next time it starts, obviously). By then the alternator should have charged it up.
A logical starting point is the harness for trailer lights, if fitted. YOu may be getting some sort of weak connections across pins between the left turn indicator and brake
Cheers
Graham
Thanks for any help,
hyat
Im seeking an answer to the same problem for a 2001 Forester. Its not the parking light switch though, unless there is something wrong with the switch itself.
For almost a week now, the exterior lights will not turn off when the car is off. I've had to disconnect the negative battery cable when I park the car for the night to get the lights to go out. Any ideas?
Ive got a 1998 Subaru Forester L, and I’m looking to do a full LED work up, but I’m not sure what could happen if I change out the interior lights. I know the turn signals could be a problem, but I’ve heard tales of electrical gremlins caused by interior lights.
about 3 weeks ago all the warning lights started flashing when I was pulling out of my driveway, it would only go into neutral from drive, and the car would not shut off, finally got it to shift into park and got the key out, the engine was still running, had to disconnect the battery and alternator after reconnecting everything it wouldn't start, towed it to the shop and they initially got 4 pages of codes but the only one that returned was the sunsetter sensor ( the ac hasn't worked for about a year) the car started and functioned fine
coming home a couple weeks later it happened again all warning lights came on lost the speedometer had to disconnect the battery and alt to get it to shut off.
next day started up fine and I got 2 code U0073 and U0122
a week later it started raining and we noticed the headlights were on, the keys were in the house
went out and discovered all the warning lights were on.
I'm pretty sure that this indicates a frayed wire but have no idea where to look
regular key start
Another would be a module that has power to it all of the time developing a failure where it allows the keep alive power to bleed into the ignition on circuit. That one cannot be ruled out at this time.
The third and often the most difficult to figure out is a component that has power all of the time is losing its ground circuit. When that happens, the voltage across the entire unit can get pushed high and that in turn that back-feeds and powers up another module and/or relay which then keeps the car running at turn off.
There are some clues that could help prove where the problem lies. First, all of the lights coming on while you are driving. There are four ways that warning lights come on. The first is a bulb check at start-up, the second is a module detects a failure and tells the cluster to turn the lamp on, the third is the cluster loses communication with the module and commands the lamp on itself and the fourth is the instrument cluster itself losing control of the lamps which BTW are usually LED's these days and that's important.
The two trouble codes you listed U0073 and U0122 are both communication codes. Do you know which module was able to talk to the scan tool and report those codes? "U" series codes are tattle-tale codes that you can retrieve from a module that needed information from another module but didn't get it. The U0073 means that the data bus is corrupted, and communication is disrupted. REMEMBER, that's one of the possible reasons for all of the lamps lighting up on the instrument cluster. From a diagnostic technician's perspective that will help greatly to figure out what is going on so long as the problem is occurring when the car is in his/her bay. The U0122 means whatever module was able to communicate with the scan tool is saying that the Vehicle Dynamics Module isn't communicating with it. That's the Anti-lock brake control module in Subaru speak.
BTW what kind of a scan tool / code puller are you using? Do you have the record of all of the codes that were set and what modules were setting them when you took this to a shop the first time? I'd be very interested to see if a module was missing from the list.
At this point you need to get the car to act up and be ready to pull fuses to various control modules that have both power all of the time and get power from the ignition switch when the vehicle is turned on. To do this you are going to need some schematics. You can do a subscription to Alldata DIY for them. You can either print out the power distribution schematics or simply create an outline to write notes on with the fuses ID and number. When you pull the correct fuse, or maybe fuses, you will get the car to shut off. Then you will need to setup the next round of testing which I can help you do. These kinds of problems require a lot of training and experience and beyond the schematics, service information cannot help the technician at all. There are a good number of technicians that given enough time and maybe a little help would figure this out without guessing. There is probably only a handful that would make this look easy. If you choose to have a shop wrestle with this, feel free to share this with them and if they jump onto this thread I can help them.