Turbo failure

[Theride]

Hi guys. I am looking into a 2005-07 Legacy GT.

 

Are the turbo failure a fault of the owner or is it simply a very weak spot? I read that it can also kill the engine.

 

I know I can read about it but I want to know if I should stay away. I am looking into somewhat a problem free vehicle after coming from a BMW X5 4.8IS.

[JmP6889928]

Almost all turbo failures are the fault of the car owner. Poor/lack of maintenance is a large part of the issues as is driving like an asshat. I do a lot of the turbos for LGT so I've seen them in about every condition.

 

If the maintenance is performed as it should be and good quality oil (synthetic of good quality but not Mobil 1-lack of zinc) and Subaru spec filters are used, I've seen the turbos go 200K and be in not bad shape when they come for rebuild.

 

If you are a hands on guy and can do your own work, this can be an amazing car. If you have to send it to the dealer, then you'll need to find someone that you can really trust and use them exclusively because many repair facilities don't know anything about how these cars work.

 

Good luck.

[jwag74]

I will disagree and say do not go with a 05-07 expecting it to be reliable. The turbo is only one issue. There are lots of problems with items that are not maintenance schedule dependent. The crank pulleys are prone to failure, the valve covers will leak, the passengers CV boot will crack, throw out bearings are prone to failure, wheel bearing are enough of an issue to cause Subaru to extend the warranty on them, transmission synchros tend to fail early.....

 

There are guys who run lots of miles and claim to have very few issues then there are guys like me who have had virtually ever single "common" problem mentioned on this forum happen to their LGT.

 

I bought mine used so it's possible poor maintenance by the previous owner led to my turbo going out at around 140k miles (banjo bolt filters were still in) but the other problems are all items that aren't really something that fall under a maintenance schedule. Even doing the all the repairs myself except for the turbo failure (too far from home when it failed) I've still dropped about $5k in repairs in less than 3 years. They would of easily been $7-8k if I had to have a garage do it and $10+k if I hadn't been one of the lucky few who didn't have to replace the short block with the turbo.

 

Coming from an 01 Explorer that went 300k miles with less than a $500 in non normal wear item repair and a 02 WRX that went 180k miles with a similar $500ish in repairs I'm not a big LGT fan.

[08 LGT]

Yeah, these cars appear to be a bit of a dice roll. The major sticking point with the 2005-2006 turbos is that these years have a filter inside the banjo bolt part of the oil line to the turbo that can get clogged and gradually starve it of oil. People who know about it remove it.

 

Generally, this isn't a used car to buy without a couple grand set aside to deal with problems, especially the 2005-2006 model years. You'll find some examples here with no major problems all the way to 200,000 miles and beyond, and many others that needed engine rebuilds around 100,000 miles. It's a great car if you get lucky...if. Don't buy one without thorough maintenance records and an inspection from a Subaru specialist who is familiar with the car and knows what to really look for, including a compression and leakdown test of the engine.

[Theride]

thank you for the responses guys. I may have to look into other brands. I do like the fact that this is a wagon plus AWD. And the parts should be relatively cheap compared to BMW. Not many companies offer those in one package. But im looking for reliability first and formost. and also a wagon, preferable with AWD.