Subaru America, Customer Service
My name is Nick, I am writing this Email as I have a problem with the Subaru CVT. A little background. I have just purchased a 2020 Ascent Limited, very nice SUV. This is my 6th Subaru. It all started with my first Subaru, a 94 Loyale wagon. Loved that car. Next was a 96 Outback, nice car but had the twin cam engine with head gasket trouble. Now for the wonderful # 3 car 2009 Outback Tungston. Awsome car. This was my first experience with a CVT transmission. At first test drive I thought there was something wrong with the car until the salesman explained the CVT in the Subaru. I was skeptical but still purchased the car. What made me a believer was I started up a very large grade at 70 MPH and set the cruise. My old 96 Outback struggled and shifted quite a lot. This one never shifted and it did not lose speed either. What I noticed was the RPM's would slowly come up and the car never shifted, it held the speed perfectly! I could feel or hear nothing just the smooth hum of the motor. The other test was taking off from a stoplight, slight throttle. The RPM's would come up and as long as you did not change the throttle angle they would never change, the car would just keep accelerating. It was so smooth and powerful. No jerking or lugging or trying to shift gears when its not needed.
Alas the old Outback got a few miles and we decided to trade it in. We then purchased a 2015 Outback Premium. Very nice car. After driving it I noticed it shifted gears!? I asked the salesman about it and he told me it was simulated shift points to appease drivers who did not like the feel of a CVT. He also told me it was a learning transmission and when it learned my driving style it would go back to a smooth CVT. Not so! It never did. It lugged and jerked from stops and was not smooth at all. I watched the tach and you could see it trying to shift, not needed! I complained to Subaru for quite some time. They finally had a rep come and drive my car and I drove his 2017 Outback. He agreed mine was very rough and Subaru helped us get into a new 2017 Outback Premium. I will say it was smoother but it still was rough compared to my 09 Outback. Again the salesman gave me the speech about learning transmission, well maybe this time he might be right, Not So! Folks I have spent the better part of my life as a diagnostic technician s I know a thing or two about cars.
Lets cut to the chase, I got rid of the 17 Outback for the Ascent. The salesman again gave me the speech about learning transmission. This time I did not believe him. I want my new Subaru to be smooth and fun to drive. The CVT in my new Ascent is rough. Here is what is happening. From a stop you give it a small amount of throttle, it revs up a little then falls on its face trying to go to a higher gear, this is not what you want. Most drivers must push the throttle down even harder to get the big SUV moving, now we are using more fuel and then all of the sudden the vehicle upshifts (fake of course) and takes off. Now back off the throttle. Hence some drivers complaints of poor in town mileage and jerking. As a lot of you mechanics know jumping the chain under torque in the CVT is not good for the transmission, parts will wear out faster and shorten the life as opposed to a CVT that enjoys smooth operation with small incremental movements. Also the torque converter seems to be coming in way to soon causing the infamous torque converter "Chuggle" as we called it when I was with GM. All in all these things make the transmission rough and the car irritating to drive. I have been on most all of Subaru's forums and lots of owners are complaining of the fake shift points. I have heard lots of people complaining about their new Ascent's shifting rough. You as a corporation are trying to tweak little things in the transmission shifting to fix the problem. Really all you need to do is take out the fake shift points and restore the CVT to what it does best, select the best ratio according to throttle angle and let it incrementally keep changing it until you reach the desired speed. We want the smooth silky feeling of the CVT we knew when it first came out. Its better for the CVT, better mileage and will quell most of your complaints with the CVT. If you continue with the fake shift points I will be forced to look at other SUV's which do not have these engineered into the software of the TCM. Hyundai, KIA or Nissan. Please fix this issue and make us happy owners of Subaru vehicles. I do not want to switch car companies after owning six Subaru's.
Please let me know of your decision.
Thanks, Nick
My letter I sent to Subaru, hopefully they will respond. When they do I will post. Thanks