Subaru Reviews

Being a previous VW Bug owner and having gotten the original "VW Idiot's Guide" all greasy and dirty, I love this book. (It was fascinating to learn that Fuji (Subaru) built their motor based on the original Porsche/VW design but added water cooling!).It puts you in touch with your car...gives you confidence that you can become a hobbiest/mechanic... and you can easily figure out what maintenance you can do at home with minimum tools and which maintenance you should let some real mechanic take on. Best of all: Save money! Do maintence yourself! Spot problems before they amount to big money! As they say in the original VW book: "Know your ass....(donkey)" and it will treat you well!

I never really knew a thing about cars, and received this as a gift 8 years ago. Motivated by limited cash and that nagging sense of being taken advantage of at car repair places, I started making my own repairs and doing my own maintenance. My 84 GL is, now, in way better shape than my dogeared, oil-stained copy of this book, and I feel much more in control
Owens rules--the book is exhaustive and methodical and, at the same time, entertaining. The advice is wise (like that of a cool older brother, in one reviewer's words), the directions precise, the illustrations great (especially the one with the dogbone, the pie, and the toilet).
Thanks, Larry & Joe.

I got my Subaru GL used about 3 years ago. It needed a bit of work. After the dealer persuaded my to let him replace all of the gaskets in the engine, I didn't have much money left for any other maintenance. Thankfully, I found How to Keep Your Subaru Alive. Using this great resource as a guide, I've done all kinds of repair and maintenance on my car. Now if only the publisher would update it so I can work on my Dad's '93 Legacy... Oh, well.

As a native Montanan and one who was mandated to memorize Lewis and Clark trivia to get her high school diploma I started the book with trepidation. I was more than surprised to love this book! I have read it twice and bought one for a friend. This book takes details and facts and puts life, love and laughter into them. Read this book- it makes you feel good and brings a bit of nature inside.

Skookum. Backtracking is a skookum adventure. Long explains that in the Chinook language skookum means big or powerful. This account of a trek backtracking the route of the Lewis and Clark expedition is just that. The book is a fascinating blend of history, biology, ecology, and philosophy that took me, a confirmed lover of comfort, along on the trip.

Long and his wife retrace portions of the trail and report on the status of several of the wildlife and plant species that Lewis and Clark described in their original journals. We learn about the black-tailed prairie dog, the grizzly bear, the American bison, the Missouri River beaver, the Westslope cutthroat, the Columbia sharptail grouse, the Whitebark pine and the Clark's nutcracker, the wolf and the coyote, the White sturgeon and the Great Plains cottonwood. We learn why and how these animals and plants matter today.

Long, although his view is clear, does not resort to the adversarial language that pushes opposing forces further apart. He reminds us that, "There is too much at stake for us to give pessimism a chance. There is still too much to be lost."

Grouse dancing at dawn on some remote and windswept lek. After reading this book I want to see for myself.

I bought this book a couple months ago and in those couple of months this book has helped me numerous times. I fixed the hill holder on my Subaru and many others parts. If you own a 1970-1984 Subaru this book will really help and it just might save you a mechnic bill or two.

I like to fix my subaru myself

Short and sweet, this book will give you the confidence needed to successfully repair your Subaru! Not only did I use this book as a 'reference guide' I went ahead and read it like a text book to learn EVERYTHING about my 1984 GL wagon. This book also enabled me to do big jobs from replacing engines and clutches, to swapping out drive trains. All with NO prier knowledge! Now that I got a '93 Loyale, I will be picking up the updated version. Remember: ALWAYS go with Haynes. Chilton's manuals are TERRIBLE.

I have always been a fan of Subarus and this book is the most extensive thing I have found about its history. If you don't own a Subaru, you will after reading this book. There are many pictures showing the different models. I think there might be EVERY brochure ever released from FHI(for the impreza). Although, there is some technical info, I wouldn't rely on this book to help you take apart your car. GREAT BOOK!!!

Based on other reviews this might be the best Subaru manual but it is a very poor shop manual in general. They need to learn a few things from Bently shop manuals.

I bought a used legacy station wagon and found a peice of weather striping (top of rear window) not properly attached. So I bought the manual hoping it would help me fix it. The manual doesn't cover how to remove the weather stripping. I have since found out how to do this by inspecting the replacement part I purchased. In figuring out what to do, I learned that I need to remove the interior molding in the back of the car. Guess what, the manual doesn't tell you how the remove that either. In the world of car repair this falls somewhere between Simple and Intermediate in complication. Well with the realm of a home mechanic and well with in the scope of this book.

This is a shop manual and therefore should cover everything. In my search to find out how to repair the weather striping. I found that the manual states that it doesn't cover how to repair the 'perminent' windows (i.e. non moving windows) becuase the authors believe that repairing the window is to difficult for us readers. The part I need to repair is related to a 'perminent' window, but not part of the window, and therefore might be omitted for this reason, but I don't really know why.

If something my be very difficult they should have a note saying so but then contiue explaining how to do it. IMO they should not decide for me.

To my above reference to Bently manuals. They are a company that writes shop mauals for VW (my previous cars), Volvo and a few others, unfortunatly not Subaru. They are exellent manuals. They cover everything. Sometimes a little hard to find the info you want but it is there somewhere.

From what I can gather Subaru sells a shop manual. I shall look into getting that one inthe hopes it covers everything.

After having this and a Chilton's manual side by side, the Haynes book wins hands down. There is less ambiguity and more info, tips, tricks, and warnings. Diagrams are clearer. There's still room for improvement, but aside from experience, it seems to be the best option around for keeping yourself out of trouble. ;-)

I have found this book to be a great help in repairing and diagnosing my '97 Subaru Outback. Also, reading through this manual has allowed me to anticipate what I would be getting into before starting a project. This book is definately a great guide for the do-it-yourself Subaru fanatic.

I have been an avid user of automotive manuals for some time now. I perform all repairs on the vehicals that I own. I have used Chilton's, Haynes, and vaarious other manuals, and they all are about the same. This manual is a little more informative then the others. I really like the way that this manual was organized.

Going into a project with a pro-union (which, these days, is not necessarily the same thing as pro-worker) agenda, Laurie Graham proves once more that the term "labor journalist" is an oxymoron.

I have read this book.. What a work of fiction! I work at the same auto plant 'Laurie Graham' worked (worked??) and wrote about.. This book seems to have been written with a pre-determined opinion.. She had it in her mind before she worked in the plant to knock the SIA work place. She writes about a few months that she worked at SIA.. Well after most of us have worked at SIA (5-9yrs Union Free) Zero layoffs. Low OSHA's comparied to other autoplants and great pay and benifits! This book seems to give most of us at SIA a good laugh! Try Reading Ben Hampers 'Rivet Head'.. Good for a laugh also.. but much more accurate.

This book is a very good account of the process a person had to go through in order to gain employment at the Subaru-Isuzu and the working conditions that were present at the plant at the time the author worked there. There continue to be problems at the plant with them being cited by IOSHA (Indiana Occupational Safety and Health Administration) on August 20,1998 for not recording all safety and health violations present at the plant. The company did not document approximately 567 Manpower employees who had recordable injuries and/or illness during the years 1995 - 1997. The company also did not provide a copy of the OSHA Log 200 in its entirety for employees for the years 1995 - 1997. The reader from Lafayette needs to get the facts straight before making statements about the low OSHA statistics. The use of "temporary"workers to keep OSHA numbers down is only one way the company has manipulated, and continues to manipiulate, the system and the workers. Laurie Graham has been, and continues to be, open to imput from workers from Subaru-Isuzu and the conditions that exist there. She welcomes workers to contact her with both positive and negative information, seeking updates on the changing atmosphere and attitudes that exist as a plant grows and changes.

I bought this book attracted by "maintaining, modifying" words pointed in the title, however, this book has nothing to do with aforementioned subjects. Mostly it is the history of Impreza. This book has a zero practical value for maintenance. I am very disappointed by misleading title.

If you like the WRX or the Impreza in general, then this book does a really nice job of covering the differences between model years, and various international models, with some maintenance and modification information information to boot. Also contains some great photos for the various models and options.

This book has errors of omission and commission. It will contradict itself from one section to the next, and doesn't portray information in a coherent format. I have learned to regard the guidance given in the book with a certain amount of skepticism. Only recommend this book if you absolutely cannot find anything else.

This manual is garbage. I've tried to use it for three separate jobs on my 96 Legacy and every time it has proven worthless. The latest example concerns the camshaft position sensor. The manual lists trouble codes that would confirm the diagnosis, but lacks sufficient info to get the car to display the codes. The book gives only a vague arrow in the general direction of the sensor location. It details the steps to remove the timing belt in order to change the sensor on the Legacy. As I look at it, and as my mechanic assures me, the sensor can be removed and replaced on a 96 Legacy without disassembling anything else. Worse than worthless, this book would have me spending hours on a 2 minute job!

I'm going to buy the Haynes book, and never buy another Chilton.

This book claims to cover Subarus up through 1996. The cover shows a '95-'96 Outback, which is exactly what I have. I bought the book to help me fix a faulty power window switch. In the section on removing the door panel around the switches, the newest Legacy shown is a '91, whose door panel does not have power switches at all, and is completely clipped on and must be pried off. After two of us pried around the switch area on my own car with no success, we ditched the book and discovered that the switch area of the door is firmly screwed in, and in multiple layers. Had we followed the book and kept prying, we would have damaged the door. I understand that you can't cover every difference on every model in such a wide range of model years, but I don't think it wise for the book to imply it is complete when following the book could end up in damage to your car because of inaccuracy or incompleteness. I also couldn't find information I needed on the glove box hinge and how the front passenger seat anchors to the floor. I have used Haynes manuals on my two previous cars, and am going back to buying those. They are more model-specific and contain more relevant information.