Head gaskets question for 2010 and up models...... only.

Your report has been submitted. Thank you!

Starting your own database, Grasshopper? Your sampling universe is (and will be) too small to have any validity. Regardless, you already learned that the 2000-2009 era HGs were replaced by a more robust design, but that the problem with the prior era 2.5i was with its fragile DOHC design. Some 2010-2011 Imp/For 2.5i still may be suspect, however, depending. What (and why?) are you trying to learn here?

Most late model subarus experience this problem around 140000kms and up.This is the forth generation subaru and it all started in1996 with the introduction of the 2.5 litre engine

Ernie, you've got a problem with being informed??

Not at all. But my early training in sampling statistics AND knowledge of the facts suggest your polling will be powerless, and thus meaningless.

See? Petrney's remark is an uninformed, simplistic, incorrect conclusion of the underlying facts and data. Where ya gonna put it, Mark?

Ernie,. I'm thinking that head gaskets might last long enough for me to sell my car around the 11 to 12 years range without any problems. And, get into another younger model?? I'll see later when I get closer to this milestone. It's always good to get feedback from others owning this particular vintage 2010 to 2014 or later.. if I can dodge this bullet, I'd rather do that... I'm pretty conservative with my cars - how else did you think that I got almost 20 years service from my 1995 Honda Accord? Besides, cars really last longer in SoCal...

Is the outback your retirement mark?

Hi Mark, Walt, et al. I wouldn't worry about the HGs in the 2010+ 2.5i...and since salt- free but hot climates have different issues, I'f perhaps focus more on dry-rot issues with rubber parts than metal corrosion. So start checking your t-belt annually for cracks after the 8 yr mark, and watch those hoses and brake lines, etc. Rubber hates ozone too! Aside from this easy stuff I fear that you'll be forced to a probably rude decision point when the CVT acts up. After all, it IS Subaru's big guinea pig of the 2010-2012 era; even the Phase 2 (2013+) are failing alarmingly....

Walt, I thought your query was aimed at ME! Ha. But yes, I doubt that I'll be around once the best-handling 2013-2014 OBs age out, as it looks like Toyaburu won't make a good-sized fine handling 5 door until after the next redesign...probably 2020...if history serves correctly. It'll have been an interesting four decades for me, eh?

Ernie, YES, I understand about the heat issues.... That is why I've thought about replacing the timing belt in the eighth or ninth year, just to be safe.. About the CVT....I had the transmission fluid changed by the Subaru dealership and it's running fine at 81,000 miles... I'll keep an eye on this.. you know, you can buy a new car even for $5,000 , SO, even if I were to have a costly repair, it would probably be something I would NOT have to revisit for a very long time... still, would rather not have to do this. There's no car out there without issues... This will not be my last car and depending on how the overall service is on my car, I'll decide whether or not to continue with Subaru... Funny thing on how you mentioned the 2020 model, I was thinking about one of these later on.... we'll see.... This is NOT Subaru's first CVT...that would date back to the Justy from 1989... And, CVTs are not at all new by any means, they've been around a long time... As for failing everywhere...sure, all the samples you see are failing, you're in this business, but, the question is what's the overall percentage...do you actually know... And, at what mileage?? I'm thinking around 125,000 to 150,000 average.... http://www.curbsideclassic.com/curbside-classics-asian/curbside- classic-extra-justification-four-door-subaru-justy/

Asking "the overall percentage" is the wrong question, as it's a moving population curve. Interestingly I checked out about a dozen CVTs last week; three (a 2010 and two2013s were too- buzzy or whiney. The bearing-noise failure may be correlated with use, but not consistently. The torque-converter failures seem more random across years and mileage. We're all afraid that lack of robust construction will be Subie's "new head gasket-like-crisis" era...but now Toyaburu's getting a bit too big to hide in the shadows and dodge bullets....

The issue with CVT's is that they are new technology as far as automobiles are concerned. Sure snow mobiles have them but all the automobile CVT's up till now have been a disaster. Maybe Subaru's is good and they seem to be the best but the rest are complete crap. Replacement costs for CVT's are astronomical meaning a lot of perfectly fine cars are going to be scrapped rather than pay more than the car is worth for a new CVT. My research has indicated that no one rebuilds CVT's and quite frankly I would be very skeptical of anyone that claims they can rebuild them. CVT's might save you a mpg of gas but the cost on the back end will wipe out all those savings and then some. This is Subaru trying to please the MPG fascists in the government and passing the costs back on to the customer.

The only way I would buy a CVT car would be with an extended warranty with a plan to sell the car before the warranty runs out.

Full_of_Regrets, please see this information below from Wikipedia, here's an excerpt from this page, again, CVTs are NOT new.... they are newer in domestic cars but, they have been tweaked . Older versions used rubber belts, Subaru uses a metal band or belt that is much more robust, And, sorry Ernie, but, overall numbers DO count, so, when you can show actual evidence of two or three of EVERY CVT transmission failure at under 100,000 to 125,000 miles, then and only then will I take your comments seriously. Yeah, there are lots of people who ABUSE their cars and cause their own problems... I don't think you're really talking about those people? Finally, if you are really expecting the Subaru CVT transmission to fail so prematurely, how can you justify selling a late model Subaru Outback as you do with advanced mileage?? Remember the person who went 300,000.... He just periodically had the transmission fluid changed. Normal maintenance and normal driving,. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continuously_variable_transmission CVTs have been used in aircraft electrical power generating systems since the 1950s and in Sports Car Club of America (SCCA) Formula 500 race cars since the early 1970s. CVTs were banned from Formula 1 in 1994 because of concerns that the best-funded teams would dominate if they managed to create a viable F1 CVT.[3] More recently,[when?] CVT systems have been developed for go-karts and have proven to increase performance and engine life expectancy. The Tomcar range of off-road vehicles also utilizes the CVT system.

So much useless noise again, Mark. The steel belts in Subie's iteration are not the problem; the BEARINGS (simple tech) and torque converter are. Dop you realize that your "two or three of EVERY CVT transmission failure" is nonsensical? Maybe a typo....

Ernie, look, my simple point is this.... you're in the auto shop repair business, of course you're going to see the problem cars! You can't just make wide sweeping assumptions about an entire class of vehicles on the small sample size you see coming to your shop or even your friends in the business. That's all...

ummm no. for someone who "used to buy and sell used cars" MARK, you should know better. He doesn't seek out bum cars to fix them.. he inspects cars with the intent to buy/sell cars that don't seem to have issues. blah, blah, blah mark.. give it up

Thanks, Walt. Mark simply doesn't understand sampling theory...or much statistical science at all. It's okay, except he continues to act the poseur....

Walt/Ernie- must be nice living in a fact free bubble, see this thread and comment from an engineer. So, you guys know more than a real engineer?? No,. I'm not an analyst, but, apparently you are? I'd like to just take your myopic view, but, NO, I'm going to have to put more emphasis on what an engineer says and I've had personal conversations with other engineers who have told me similar things about how good CVTs are. Sorry...... www.subaruoutback.org/forums/138-gen-5-2015-present/184610- cvt-reliability-vs-standard-automatic.html I've read about 4 specific CVT catastrophic failures reported on this site. That's out of ~450,000 CVT outbacks sold 2010-2014. As an engineer, early in my personal new-car search I had concerns about the long-term reliability of Subaru CVTs ... even though they have been building them in one form or another for more than 30 years. So far I have been impressed by the relative lack of defect or failure reports on the Internet and elsewhere. The Subaru defect/failure rate seems to be immensely lower than that for the GM and Chrysler conventional automatic transmissions I'm more familiar with. (My wife's current daily driver is a '98 Dodge Caravan with 284,000+ miles on the original 3.3 liter V6 engine and "fragile" A604/41TE transmission.)

Mark a few outliers are not statistically meaningful. The fact that a CVT costs double or triple that of an automatic is meaningful. The fact is that NO ONE has had a successful CVT in a car. NO ONE. MAYBE Subaru will pull it off but the jury is out still. Engineer largely deal in theory Mark and not enough time has elapsed to make a case for Subaru's CVT.

Mark, if a Subaru CVT craps out at 150,000 miles would you spend 7 to 9 grand to fix it?

mork, click^^best answer

Mark: again: huh? A "real engineer"! WTF do you think I did for 8 years in biochemical lab equipment design, manufacturing engineering and publication of my work as ASTM and ISO standards BEFORE taking on a secoind career as Boston's SubaruGuru? Sometimes you can be a REALLY insulting little shit...talk about myopia....

I only supervise engineers in the construction industry. Some are good, some are clueless.

Apologies to you both, but, I'm sure you are hoping that the CVT transmission by Subaru is better than we all think....

Hope springs eternal.

It's interesting that following the failure of a VERY high number of wheel bearing hub assemblies on Legs/Obs to 2009 and Imps to 2007, Subie replaced with a longer, supposedly more robust part. I've needed one for an '09 Imp and now for a '12 also...which is HALF of the Imps I've bought in the past two years! Makes me wonder if the "refreshed" 2013 CVT is using changed "better" bearings in this app too; but i doubt it as I've found a pair of '13 and a '15 bad CVTs with noisy internal bearings. The HEART of the CVT is okay...it's the brain and the legs that are under-engineered.

Is there any interchange in knuckles between L/O and Imp/Foz.. I see people take complete knuckles all the time. I'm thankful I haven't had issues with any bearings yet but I don't get it.. do people run the bearing so hot that it welds the race to the knuckle?

CVTs seem to vary willy-nilly across all apps: some L/OB have a CVT with a TC BELOW the body, whereas some (like maybe all Imps w/ 2.0) have a TB on top of the body (making replacement harder). Since the bearings aren't separately replaceable I don't the part number app matrix. Subie's been known to vary parts seemingly randomly over the years.

MArk I have a 2010 outback that is currently in the shop having the head gaskets changed. I have 113300 miles on it. However the head gaskets were done at 68000 miles. I am not a happy subaru owner right now. I was thinking of looking at a new outback with the 6 cylinder engine but may consider other options first since they have oil leakage issues with these engines. Other than these issues I love the car.

fjk799- I see, are you the original owner of this car? 68,000 miles is pretty early to have this failure. Did your car overheat and cause this to occur? And, what happened at 113,000 miles? Do you have the CVT transmission? And, if you do, is this working fine for you? I have 83,000 miles on my 2010.... No problems with overheating or head gaskets... I hope you had them replace the head gaskets with the multi layered reinforced gaskets. See this link below, http://www.felpro-only.com/blog/sealing-subaru-2-5l-engines/ https://allwheeldriveauto.com/six-star-subaru-head-gasket-kits/

Hello All, I'm not a car guru, but WAS a devoted Subaru owner. Our 2010 Outback just required a head gasket replacement at 91,000 miles. We were surprised to hear from a number of reputable mechanics, as well as two people in two different auto parts stores in Montana, that this was a known problem with Subarus. The car is 8 years old and we had hoped to keep it for more years and miles. The response from Subaru central was much less than adequate, with an offer of $500 toward a new car. Seriously????? We're so annoyed by such a lack of concern for a known problem that we will not buy another Subaru.

There are a lot of prior love-hate owners, as Subaru could not afford to eat every HG repair back then. Yes, they dodged a bullet, Now we're trading HG frailty with CVT failure rates, for which they're too big to escape fully.

Yup. A CVT failure is far more expensive than head gaskets. If you had to pay full price for a new CVT a car that is over 4 or 5 years old might not make economic sense to repair.

Indeed. But I'm seeing pre-owned CVTs in salvage networks for well under $1k, so with a juicy $500 installation, the total cost is on par with the HG. But of course SOA has to use a NEW CVT for warranty repair. Even if the failure rate is an egregious 4% per year, that yields a 50% chance an owner will lose their CVT in a dozen years. So half the long-term owners would have to pony up the $1.5k. It was (is) worse for 2001-2009 HG eaters.

Subaru Outback Limited 2.5i 2010, milage: 78,000 Head gasket is leaking oil and Subaru dealer recommends HG replacement ($2100). This came up during routine maintenance at the dealership (old change) this week. No signs of overheating etc.

Unusual for a 2010-2012 SOHC 2.5i to have a leaking HG, as you're supposed to have the 3-ply newer gasket set. If you're just SLIGHTLY bleeding from either side I'd confirm that you've got 5w30 (winter) or 10w40 (better year-round) rather than the 0w20 that leaks out too easily. If eventually a leak on the RIGHT head is fast enough to smoke off the cat conv then it can be hard to live with, and you should bite the bullet...but at a good local wrench for $1.5k...not $2.1k. But first establish you're using a thicker oil. In a warm climate even 15w40 is fine year-round...or 20w50 summer.

Thank you of the comment, TheSubaruGuruBoston. This is very helpful! I have been using synthetic oil since 2010, but it could be the case that dealer is putting "0w20". I will contact them to confirm and change the oil to 10w40 (I live in New England). The leak is on the driver side. I will be taking the car to local shop to evaluate this leak one more time....

Ernie. You used diesel motor oil in Subarus?

Oil leaks on the driver side are indeed less common. 10w40 dino is quite fine in your 2010 2.5i SOHC motor.

My 2010 Outback with the 2.5L blew the headgasket summer of 2018 at about 170,000 miles. had to have the heads reworked, valves replaced, etc. To the tune of about $3400 not counting the round trip flight back home for the two weeks it was getting worked on since it blew 1,000 miles from home. im writing this as i sit in the subaru service lobby where i was just informed that my torque converter is one of the millions that were poorly designed by subaru and has now failed and they stopped offering the extended warranty july 2018... while my suby was getting the top half of the motor replaced. I have loved this vehicle but after this year being subject to $6500 worth of repairs for issues that were widely known by subaru to be manufactured poorly, and they still dont recall them.... I cant say i would want to buy another. Complete BS.

Sorry, Jacob! Wondering if you had an external leak (unlikely with the newer 3-ply gasket), or an internal high pressure breach? It's unfortunate that you had no choice but to pay double for the repair at a Subie store. If I read correctly you already replaced the CVT's TC? And why the valves replaced? Did you pop a t-belt? My advice to others needing to replace the first gen CVT is to chase a pre-owned one at $500-$1k salvage price and swap it in for $500 labor. Aggressive cost-cutting is slowly being weened out of Toyoburu, so let's hope the 2nd gen CVT proves to be more robust. I'm hanging my long-established rep out there by providing 2015+ OBs and Legs that sport the frugal DOHC 2.5i and 2nd gen CVT. After minor suspension mods these still have no competitor extant. Can't recommend you chase a RAV/CRV/CX5/blah-blah-blah as you'll often miss the sturdiness and handling of your aging OB.

Y'all seem very knowledgeable about the 4th gen. Of these cars, are there years you see more or less issues with?

You should start a fresh thread.

Yes. My 2011 Subaru Outback 2.5 Limited just turned 194,500 miles old and the head gaskets have failed. It is in the shop now with an estimate of around $2K to fix. If the CVT fails I will never ever buy a Subaru Again. I purposely bought a Subaru with over 100K assuming the head gaskets would have been addressed. If I buy a Subaru of any type again I will be making sure the HG have been replaced. My last Subaru, a 1998 Forester had head gasket failure at around 120K miles.

It's about heating/cooling cycles, not miles driven. So count cold starts (mornings?) instead of distance.

I like how this is the first result that pops up when you type "2010 Subaru Outback Head Gasket" into Google and it seems fairly promising at first until TheSubaru"Guru"Boston completely derails it for no good reason except to brag about his "early training in sampling statistics AND knowledge of the facts" as well as "8 years in biochemical lab equipment design, manufacturing engineering and publication of my work as ASTM and ISO standards BEFORE taking on a secoind career as Boston's SubaruGuru" ...Good for you, man. Although, it's been my experience that people who need to brag themselves up like that are never as accomplished as they say they are.

Pointless whine. Boston has a proven record of giving good answers.

“Brag themselves up?” What language is that, TDC?

Ebonics?

2010 Outback with 188,000mi and I got a brief overheat light that went away quickly, then bubbles in the coolant overflow the next day after a short drive with another light. I think the head gaskets are leaking. Sounds like it’s still a problem, but they made it last 50% longer with the reinforced gaskets. With all the talk of CVT failures I’m debating if I should bother with the head gasket job.

Yours is a tough decision, Ship. But if all your peripherals (tires, brakes, exhaust, body) are very strong, AND you've repeated proof of percolation, it may be worth the $1.6k investment. The continued risk of losing the CVT will remain, of course, but a good used on can be installed for about $1.6k also. Generally I suggest clients toss their aging Subies (now generally the late naughts) when repairs and service approach $1.5k/yr, as that's about the depreciation rate of the off-lease 2015-2017 OBs I'm sourcing for them. So yes, a head may have overheated, rupturing a gasket, but before making a final decision I'd purge the cooling system and watch for serious chronic percolation. Sometimes a broached system can still be useful for short trips in cooler weather, if you need a backup emergency vehicle for short trips, or as a temporary learner for that smiling nephew. Good luck. TSG/Boston

I have s 2011 with 148k and the drivers side head gasket just started leaking into the coolant. It air locks and pushes out the coolant and overheats in 15 minutes. Im not happy. The dealer says to get. New engine. Between transmission issues and now this, i think this is my last Subaru

Yes my 2011 2.5i limited just started blowing out coolant.

Pretty unusual for the DOHC 2.5i. Check heater hoses and radiator for blockage, and then sniff percolation to assure it's combustion gases. If so, replace HGs. Again, VERY unlikely to be t-stat nor water pump.

Misspoke: your '11 is the SOHC, which takes HG replacement (after checking head status) quite easily, so no need to touch the block.

Me again. I purged the system, did a hard 80mph 10min drive, pulled over and saw constant bubbling in the overflow. I went ahead with the head gasket and did the timing belt and hardware as well (due soon anyways). Car did great in a long 3000mi road trip the following week. As long as I get two years out of this car I’ll call it worth it. My guess is I’ll get 5-7 years out of it.

Great. It'll go until the CVT fails, then you'll throw it away. Good luck. Ern

2012 HG is failing. Found bubbles in overflow around 130km. Wasn't sure what went wrong. Coolant smells bad. Now 145km and car is still running without overheating if coolant is sucked back to radiator every now and then. HG job need to be done soon.

I just paid almost $3,500 to repair my 2011 Outback after the head gasket blew. I was out of town at the time, and because the car doesn't have a temperature "gauge", only an "idiot light", by the time I realized it was overheating, it was evidently too late.. I had approx 135,000 miles on the car. Most distressing is that I religiously take it to Subaru Sonora for scheduled maintenance work - because I never wanted it to break down. Long story short, I had to have it towed many, many miles, rent a car, and wait over 2 weeks to get my car fixed (couldn't get parts). So in addition to repair costs, add $$1,000 for towing and car rental. Aarrgh. And I do LOVE Subarus, so --- oh well... I've got myself a good used car now -- should last a while longer. I wish the car had a temp gauge though.

Were you told why the HG failed? Had you overheated it before because of lost coolant or oil? HGs on 2010+ are pretty robust. Ern

No. In fact less than 2 weeks earlier I had my car serviced at my regular Sonora Subaru place, for regular maintenance & there was no mention of any such problem or other big issues

That's unfortunate. I would've hoped that HG seepage would've been noticed and called out by the dealer's wrench, but it's probable that the HG fracture was internal, and thus not able to be predicted. $2500 for HG replacement is egregious, as the going rate through a good independent shop, inc t-belt and pulleys and outside machine shop testing, is in the $1700 range. I'd ask Sonora if they sent the heads out to a machine shop for testing, and be sure that they give you a LONG warranty (not just 6 mos) if they didn't! Good luck. Ern

Maita Subaru in Sacramento has a first class service department.