most WRX folks I know (including me) have had really good results with the Continental ExtremeContact DWS06+ since they’re way smoother, handle NJ winters decently, and take the edge off rough roads without killing the sporty feel
Subaru parts reviews
For me I personally went with Continental ExtremeContact DWS06+, it's been great so far in the summer and wet conditions. Drove through a bunch of pot holes not long ago at a hiking trailhead, but at the end of the day wrx are gonna be stiff anyways. But the tires are still holding strong so far!
I’ve long done 7500 oil change intervals for my naturally aspirated cars, and I’m sticking to 5000 in my turbocharged Subaru now, always with synthetic (Mobil 1 or Pennzoil Ultra Platinum, and a Wix XP oil filter).
Western Canadian skier here. I run Studded Toyos on my outback every winter, it’s amazing!
The Toyo snow tires on my car have been awesome. I kinda used them all season because the grip was just too fun. Somehow have lasted nearly 30k miles with a third of the tread left too, and I drive my WRX spirited on curvy roads a lot.
Snow tires make a car with decent grip in the snow into great grip in the snow. Especially in the slushy slop.
My 2021 with 84k miles was very similar. Even had the auto start fail to restart the car once when it was cold. I just had the battery replaced with the new larger size one and it made a huge difference.
New thermostat (Aisin brand), fresh oil, fresh coolant, replaced at that time. Coolant system bled well. No leaks. Heat worked flawlessly. AC worked after the swap. Overheated the drive home after that swap, turns out the radiator fan module got fried on the final drive (it was above 250 on coolant temps before replacing the engine, on a 30 minute, fast, highway drive). Ordered a new one. Everything working perfect now at the right temperature points. Engine times reading perfect too (watching live data). On a 30 minute highway drive tonight, returning home after the same drive 2 days ago with zero issues, it overheats again. Radiator fans are working. The one thing I changed during the drive was turning down the heat from HIGH to 75. No more than 10 minutes later I hear the bubbling in the heater core area. Take my exit from the highway, and the red temp light starts flashing, temps read 239, and the bubbling worsened. Temps stayed above 228 until I made it home from my exit. Worse at red lights. Turned off for 10 minutes, turned back on, temps went up to 232 at idle, holding steady. Lower radiator hose read 102 degrees, upper hose reads 190.
Weird starter issue with a fair amount of 22s
AC broke two months ago. Service writer put it down as AC compressor internals seized. Still under warranty though.
Tires (Kumho Ecsta LX Platinum) were installed 6/25/2024 @ 151,xxx miles (with receipts). Manufactured date is May 2023. Currently, car has 165,xxx miles. As you can see, the two front (now rotated to rear) tires are bald! The other two tires have a normal amount of tread remaining however. I was running about 1° of camber front and rear, and explains why the inside is more worn, but doesn't explain the overall accelerated wear that occurred only on the fronts. I also have an alignment report showing only the front left Toe is out of spec (-0.39° measured vs. +/-0.08 spec).
In my opinion, this would fall under the warranty via excessive/premature tire wear, but of course I imagine any shop would fuss about the lack of rotation. To make matters worse, I purchased and installed these tires at Walmart, which I'm now learning isn't an authorized Kumho installer and Kumho's warranty form says they must be installed by an authorized installer. However, Walmart's own listing for the tires says it's covered by a 50k mile tread life warranty (see last photo).
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