Audi vs. Subaru?

[BUONO]

I sold my 99 Forrester (@109K) a few months back.  It was a happy day.  I
had great expectations and hope for the car that were never met.  

Out of the following cars I owned , it was by far the most unreliable: 83
Rabbit GTI (sold @ 156K), 91 Mazda Protégé LX (sold @ 136K), 98 VR6 GTI
(still own - 36K), 91 Nissan  King Cab(sold @165K) , 2004 Passat 4MO Wagon
1.8T (still own - 6K), 87 Audi 5000TQ (still own - 12K) .  

Between 98 and 99 Subaru revised the 2.5 flat four to a series "B" that
reduced the moving mechanicals of the engine by about 50%.  Sounds great in
theory... but they are still working out the kinks.  I was plagued by oil
seal failures, clutch problems, 4 mass air flow sensors, rear wheel
bearings, etc, etc.  I got to know my local Suby service manager and the
regional service manager on a first name basis to dicker on warranty issues.
I finally started a Yahoo Subaru news group to complain about issues, with
the main topic being the mass air flow sensor.  After about 500+ threads in
the group, they issued a recall on the part and replaced it with a
re-designed model and refunded me the 2 sensors I paid for out of warranty.
I like to think the new group helped in that effort. 

I live I Colorado, a state with more Subarus per capita than prairie dogs,
and have met many people who had the same issues that I encountered in post
98 - 04 models. They have also fallen in reliability ratings with consumer
reports from above average to average.

The new 250HP 2.5 flat-four sounds interesting vs. the normally aspirated
2.5... But I would give them at least another year to refine it / R&D it on
someone else's time.  

-F

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Message: 1
Date: Wed, 22 Dec 2004 16:19:35 -0700
From: John Cassidy <JCassidy at DiamondConstruction.com>
Subject: Audi vs. Subaru?
To: "'quattro at audifans.com'" <quattro at audifans.com>
Message-ID:
	
<E3B67663A390FB4EA8085FAAF04DE87E2F2FB0 at mail.diamondconstruction.com>
Content-Type: text/plain;	charset="iso-8859-1"

Yikes!

The boss (non car guy) asked me whether he should buy his wife a late model
A4 quattro or Subaru Legacy wagon.  If it were me, I wouldn't consider the
Suby, but on the otherhand, I'm not sure I can recomend the A4.  I'm not
sure I want to hear the "you won't believe how bad the dealer screwed me on
the busted whatsit" every month!

>From my experiences with Audis (7, and looking for #8), you really have 
>to
want one...as some lister is saying, "it's not just a car, it's and
adventure!"

John Cassidy



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