2010 Subaru Legacy
This year drew an ordinary 150 complaints for a Subaru Legacy — the model's median is 87. What they were about is the unusual part: 6% of them mention vibration, against 1.1% across the other years of this generation.
First year of a new generation. The Subaru Legacy was redesigned for 2010. A first year carries problems nobody has found yet, and they are found by the people who buy it — which is worth knowing before you become one of them.
NHTSA opened a defect investigation into this model year.
| Complaints filed | 150 |
|---|---|
| Median for this model | 87 |
| Involving a crash | 10 |
| Involving a fire | 1 |
| Recalls | 18 |
| EPA combined | 21.5 mpg |
What the complaints were about
- vibration — 6% of this year's complaints, against 1.1% across the other years of this generation (5.4×). Owners wrote it as: vibration, feels, highway speeds.
Words owners used for the same problem are counted together, so a fault written four different ways is measured once. Grouped by which complaints they appear in, not by a list anyone wrote in advance.
What owners wrote
AFTER 2 RE-[VIN] TRANSMISSIONS INSTALLED THE SAME PROBLEM WITH THE CARS TRANSMISSION. THE CAR IS STUTTERING AND WARNING LIGHTS ARE ON. THE CAR FEELS LIKE IT'S GOING TO TURN OFF WHILE DRIVING. AT TIMES THE VEHICLE ACCELERATOR JAMS. I WORRY ABOUT MY AND MY PASSE…
WHILE DRIVING THE CAR, IT FREQUENTLY JOLTS, MAKES A SCREECHING NOISE AND IT IS SCARY BECAUSE IT ALSO FEELS AS THOUGH IT MAY SIMPLY TURN OFF. I HAVE CONTACTED THE DEALERSHIP FROM WHICH I PURCHASED THE VEHICLE AND I WAS INFORMED THAT SUBARU IS AWARE OF THE ISSUE…
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint filings, with identifying details removed.
Recalls for this year
- 18V626000 PARKING BRAKE Fixed free of charge.
- 19V007000 AIR BAGS Fixed free of charge.
- 19V009000 AIR BAGS Fixed free of charge.
- 19V008000 AIR BAGS Fixed free of charge.
- 20V002000 AIR BAGS Fixed free of charge.
- 20V001000 AIR BAGS Fixed free of charge.
- 20V003000 AIR BAGS Fixed free of charge.
- 19V297000 ELECTRICAL SYSTEM Fixed free of charge.
Showing 8 of 18. The rest are on NHTSA's site.
How this was worked out
Every year of the Subaru Legacy was compared against its own history rather than against other cars, which removes popularity and age from the answer — a common car draws more complaints at equal reliability, and an older one has had longer to accumulate them. A year is flagged when it drew at least 2.5× this model's median and at least 50 complaints.
This is a fault record, not a review. Nobody files a federal complaint to say the car was fine, so it shows what tends to go wrong — not whether owners liked it, and not whether it is a good car.
Source: NHTSA complaints, recalls and investigations, retrieved . Look this vehicle up directly on NHTSA's site to check anything here.
Own a 2010 Subaru Legacy? What happened to yours?
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