Consumer Complaints
| Fail date | miles | occurences | Purchase date |
|---|---|---|---|
| ENGINE AND ENGINE COOLING | |||
| 08/02/2011 | 45000 | ||
| Engine started knocking. set up an appointment with the dealer for the next day. on the way to the dealer the knocking got worse and the engine started squealing and losing power. engine seized up and would not start again. the engine had to be replaced with a new one. | |||
| 06/10/2011 | 33260 | ||
| The car was smoking on cold starts only. piston # 4 ringland cracked at 33,000 miles on the car. shortblock had to be replaced. | |||
| 05/16/2008 | 1987 | ||
| Car has an endemic problem with breaking piston ringlands, resulting in copious oil consumption and eventually a seized engine which, if it happens on the highway, can be the equivalent of slamming on the brakes in traffic. endangering surrounding vehicles and the vehicle's driver if the oil film on the roadway and the windshields of following cars didn't already cause them problems. | |||
| 08/06/2010 | 28000 | ||
| Driving the car on a windy road, accelerated out of a corner in 3rd gear. car started shaking, clicking, and running poorly. failure of connecting rod bearings on the crank shaft. engine long block needs to be replaced. | |||
| 04/15/2009 | 2250 | 1 | |
| Piston #4 had ringland failure of both ringlands on said piston in my 2008 subaru wrx sti. *tr | |||
| ENGINE AND ENGINE COOLING - ENGINE | |||
| 09/26/2010 | 37852 | ||
| 1. i was driving the car on a road trip to nc when the issue arose. 2. the failure to the car was cracked ringlands on the # 2 and 4 pistons. this caused the car to produce a white smoke cloud on start up. before i purchased this car subaru issued a stop sale on all 2008 wrx's. the car was repaired at a local dealership under a goodwill repair. to which i was responsible for part of the cost. this repair was conducted in mar 2010. since then the car has been operating very well until recently to which the engine has developed a knock. i had the car towed to the dealership to determine what the issue was. the dealership contacted me the next day to inform me that the rod bearing on cyl #4 had failed. this is the same issue that prompted subaru to place a stop sale on the vehicles. during the initial stop sale they had a range of vin's that could have been affected, mine was not in that list. i think subaru had mis-calculated the number of cars that were affected on this stop sale. 3. my car is currently at the dealership awaiting a re-manufactured engine, to which i have to disagree with. i purchased this car new with no re-manufactured on it from the factory. so why can a car maker place re-manufactured parts in a car for a repair? | |||
| 07/20/2010 | 30000 | ||
| While passing a tractor-trailer on a two lane highway in fifth gear at approx 70mph, the engine experienced detonation and went into limp mode. after incident, car runs rough, burns oil, smokes on startup, billows smoke out of the oil filler cap, and exhibits power loss. issue was first diagnosed by compression test. if engine fails while driving on highway during normal commute, may cause serious accident and/or fire resulting in injury or death. subaru of america has not yet corrected the issue, as they claim the car is running as designed. | |||
| 04/15/2009 | 2250 | 1 | |
| Piston #4 had ringland failure of both ringlands on said piston in my 2008 subaru wrx sti. *tr | |||
| 06/05/2009 | 28000 | 1 | |
| My 2008 subaru impreza wrx sti had a number four piston failure with only 28,000 miles on the vehicle. the vehicle was immediately taken to a local auto shop when a problem was noticed. the shop did a compression test and found the number four piston to be at fault. due to the possibility of damage to the cylinder walls the block and all associated internals were replaced. after removing the heads the shop owner said there were no signs of detonation on the cylinder and that the failure most likely was due to poor build quality. *tr | |||
| 10/01/2009 | 15500 | 1 | |
| At 15,500 miles, my 2008 subaru sti experienced a ringland failure on the #4 piston. this was verified via a compression/leakdown test. a longblock replacement was approved by subaru of america. my main concern, without taking engine components off, this mild cracked ringland was almost un-detectable. there was very little degradation in performance, for running on 3.5 of 4 cylinders. in addition, my mechanic also found fuel in the oil pan. *tr | |||
| 01/29/2009 | 1200 | 1 | |
| I own a 2008 sti and have just under 6,000 miles on the odometer. i bought the vehicle new with just under 200 miles on it in december of 2008. in january of 2009, i began to see white smoke coming out of my exhaust on startup. i had just over 1,200 miles at the time. my engine failed suffered a failure at just under 2,000 miles. subaru replaced the engine under warranty and sent me on my way. fast forward to june of 2009 and now i'm being told my engine has again failed due to the piston ringlands cracking and breaking off. this is a widely reported issue from 2008 sti owners and would seem to indicate a possible defect in the piston design. *tr | |||