Hey. I know. Or a lot of people have outbacks as new as mine (2015) but are Subaru’s plagued by poor alignment??? I had issues with my 13 crosstrek staying aligned (and being safe to drive in my winter) and replaced it with a 15 outback. I put new 90,000 Miles tires on it at 35,000 Miles. Today at 68,000 Miles I’m told my tires are down to 3 and 4 mm. And to make matters worse the edge of one of the tires is worn almost smooth. These tires have never been ran low. We actually have the same brand tire in my wife’s car (different size) and at over 40.000 Miles they still look perfect Can anyone offer any help or suggestion? The outback was purchased CPO and I was promised that the alignment was perfect on delivery. (Yes I asked because of issue with the crosstrek) it hasn’t been hit or hit any major curb or pothole. Help!!!!????!!!
Do you carry alot of weight in the rear of the car? I don't know about the newer Gen cars but the Gen3's deff struggled with rear alignment issues with stock parts. If you regularly carry a decent amount of weight/people in the car I would recommend adding some negative toe to the rear of the car. If the suspension reacts the same way as mine did the more weight you added to the car the more it liked to push the toe positive. So I tossed 300lbs in the back and we set my toe at -.02 handles much better now then it did before I did that.
I don’t know that I would say regularly. Maybe 5-6 times a year. Would about 500 lbs of adults in the front and about 150 lbs of kids in the rear be enough to cause an issue? And if you set it the other way does that cause an issue when not loaded? (I’m sorry I know like 0 about alignment beyond it pulling the car wen you drive it). Are Subaru’s just that touchy? Do I need to get it aligned every 6 months? Did I just happen to have bad luck twice?
Negative toe is not an issue. Positive toe is where you start to have issue from my understanding. Where have you had your alignments done at and do you have any of the sheets from the alignments you have had done?
Would not hurt to have the alignment checked by a 3rd party and get advice on how they would tweak it. I have seen tonnnnnnnns of really bad dealer alignments.
Thanks! Ok. I guess first I’ll get that checked. It currently tracks down the road perfectly. It doesn’t pull on a smooth surface. Maybe it’s the result of a off alignment. Maybe it’s somethig more. I got rid of my crosstrek at 64,000 Miles after that wouldn’t hold an alignment for 200 miles and destroyed tires and was unsafe to drive. I’m nervous to be revisiting this issue with the outback at a similar mileage (I’m at 68,000 today) I’m heading out of town with a rental tomorrow. So I guess I’ll be tackling this next week. Of all the other cars I’ve ever owned (just about every make) I’ve never had anything like this happen. I really hope the dealers allingment just sucks and that’s what is causing this.
Check in with Samaritan tire or Jeff the Alignment guy. Jeff is in between shops right now so he might not have much for open slots.
as i sit here making my plans for how im going to deal with this, it really makes me upset how dealerships operate their service dept ( and maybe its just this one) It upsets me that I can bring the car in multiple times for the battery being iffy (a well documented issues on the 2015 outback) and they always say its perfect. yet i buy a brand new upsized battery and the first visit they are telling me i should replace it. (this only happened once and i think they mistested it. its never been marked bad since) They'll sell me a cabin air filter replacement for $69 telling me "its a fair bit of labor to replace it" When there obviously done 98% of the labor to check it. Im sorry is opening that box or bag and putting a new filter in harder than just shoving my dirty filter back in? yet in this situation, my one tire is visually more worn.the guy rotating them should have noticed. the guy checking the tread depth should have noticed. Wouldnt this be the perfect moment to tell me about an important issue in my car? nope. they just try to sell me tires. ive said it before, and honestly i just went there this time because it was convenient with the other appointments i had scheduled in the area. but im not going back to that dealer. im tempted to complain to them (done that before a few times not sure if that will do anything or just label me as the person who always has issues.) or to SOA. I guess it would make the most sense to have a alignment and a print out of the before and after to bother with that route. I also have the tire warranty to deal with .... maybe i just got a bad set? sorry for all the ranting. it stresses me out. and not being able to do anything about it right now just makes it more stressful for me Thanks again for the help. I'll update this when i find out what the deal with the car is.
Which edge is worn? .... Which wheel had worn down the tire. Did you verify the 3mm-4mm? I never had an issue with my crosstrek, you just might of been unlucky/bad stealership doing the same crappy service. Also, if the tire has a 90k mile life. You should get your tires prorated back to you....typically. Sounds like a bad set possibly? It's highly unlikely that you get 30k miles out a 90k mile rated tire.
We're in 'Murica here...we talk tire tread depth in thirty-seconds of an inch, not millimeters...even though depth gauges have both on them.
It’s the outside shoulder of the tire that’s worn. They’ve been rotated. So I’ll have to check if they cross em or just front to back rotate em. I haven’t verified the tread depth. I’ll have it aligned independently. Then I’ll take it to have the tires warranty verified. You could be right on my crosstrek. Everything I saw on research of that said sometimes they had it and sometimes they didn’t. I think mine was weird for developing a handling issue. Whoops. That was my typo. 3/32nds.
I thought that might be the case. I believe 2/32" is legal minimum and 4/32" is generally considered the safe minimum for wet weather driving. If the wear across the face of the tread is not even, I suspect the tire manufacturer will not honor any sort of pro-rated tread-wear warranty and the tire dealer will claim that improper alignment is what caused the tire(s) to wear out prematurely. It is sure worth investigating though. You might have to pay the tire dealer to throw the car on their alignment rack and verify the specs.
And I’m sitting at Morris Minnetonka right now. They told me they can’t give any suggestion as to why my tires are wearing like they have. But I’ve requested print outs of both the before and after alignment on the car. I was hoping for more insight on what could be the cause of the problem. I’m also hoping my extended warranty helps cover the cost (though I’m pretty sure it won’t) The wife is currently livid about this issue and the fact we are having a problem with the 2nd Subaru as well. Thats my small update on what is happening. After my visit here I’ll take it to the tire place to have them look at the tires and see if they are warranty covered at all. I’m hoping they should be as I’ve only gotten 1/3 of their projected life out of them.
Alignment was done. They told me everything else looks good for the steering when I talked to them. Then I went to the Discount Tire, and they agreed the tires were not where they should be. So they are replacing them as I type this. So, i *think* everything will be ok. I will say that I think I’ll be driving down to Morries from now on.
Your wife is sabotaging the car as she is getting tired of being hit on by other women. Get her a Toyota...then just old men will bother her.
Ha! The wife already has a Toyota! She’s put 230,000 miles on her Prius (yes I know, but it’s an appliance and meets her needs for a high mile commuter car) and is determined to hit 300,000
One suggestion...don't wait 30k+ miles to get your alignment checked. Everyone should do it yearly, but scale to your mileage (in other words, do it every 12-15k). Many places will check it for free...just be prepared to pay for an alignment if it is out of spec (they won't like it if you use them to check, but don't have them align if needed). That said, glad to hear they are working with you on the tires.
I’ve actually been told not to worry about it if no driveability issue when I asked about having it checked once. SOA and Morries said there is no recommendation of when to have it done, just if driveability issues come up. The tires were wearing faster than they should have, but that may have been just the tires. (As the treadwear warranty covered it.) It was just over the last oil change interval that the difference in treadwear happened. But we are driving to FL in December. So I would expect this issue to resurface after that trip if it wasn’t just the existing tires.
The tires the gen5 outbacks came from the factory with are known to be supppppper ****ty tires. Did it have the OEM tires on it? Duelers I think they were?
