Subaru Forester Pricing and Specs

Before you commit to any costly course of action, go back to basics. A car that jumps out of gear might have a poorly adjusted shifter or linkage mechanism rather than something internal to the gearbox. Even a worn engine or transmission mount can allow enough movement for the car to jump out of gear. So check that stuff first.

In terms of rebuilding a gearbox like this one, you may find the cost is greater than the retained value of the vehicle. Not to mention, with that sort of mileage, that you’ll lie awake at night wondering what’s going to break next. At that point, you have to make a call. But don’t forget, you might be able to find a second-hand gearbox in good condition at a parts recycler, and have that fitted for a fraction of the cost of an overhaul. And then you’re on your way to your second half-million kilometres.

The noise could be from the electric motors themselves or in the gears and cogs that physically move the mirrors to their new positions. Pulling the mirror apart and lubricating these mechanisms might help reduce the noise and may even fix the one mirror’s reluctance to move through its full range of positions.

As far as warranty goes, the situation is a bit complicated in that the dealer may examine the noise and decide that it’s not abnormal. But what you should do before the warranty runs out is have the car examined and the problem logged at dealership level. That way, if anything goes wrong as a result of the problem, even if it’s beyond the warranty period, you have what’s called a pre-existing condition whereby the problems is Subaru’s to fix because it existed while the warranty was still current, even if it wasn’t fixed at that time. The point being that the dealer can’t delay a fix reported during the warranty period and then claim that the vehicle is out of warranty and refuse to fix the problem.

A car can stop in its tracks for hundreds of reasons, but in a car like yours, first suspicions would be either the fuel pump or something like the crank-angle sensor. If the problem had been a clogged fuel filter or a dud spark plug, the problem would probably have made the engine run poorly, but not stopped it dead in an instant.

Electric fuel pumps don’t last forever and, when they die, they die quickly and without notice. Same goes for crank-angle sensors, without which, the computer doesn’t know where the individual pistons are in each cylinder and, therefore, can’t inject fuel or create spark at the precise time it needs to.