Hi all, I'm hopeful to join the club tomorrow after I look at a 2003 Forester! I'm doing some searches to look for common problems on these but thought I would check here to see what others had experienced. I've read about the control arm recall, I'll be planning to check head gaskets other major seals, anything else recommended that's specific to Foresters or to Subarus from that vintage? It's a cheap deal which lessens the risk so I wasn't planning on doing a PPI, but in case I decide to do one if anyone has a recommendation that would be great. Erik
Take it on a good long test drive, get it hot. Take several full lock turns, see if it binds. Other than that, check t belt history. Get underneath and look if the HGs are leaking, listen for wheel bearings. They are a pretty solid car.
I was looking at an 03 for a while until I backed off due to my needs not matching the car's offerings. I did a lot of research and although I've never owned one, the consensus that I found was that they were generally a good car with two issues: almost guaranteed head gasket blowouts somewhere between 80k-130k miles, and a slight to major fuel smell in the winter due to a poorly designed fuel filter. Many have reported the latter problem as being non-existent or minor, and I don't know if there's much you can do in the summer to replicate the winter shrinkage that causes the gas smell to see if it exists in this vehicle.
