Are there any frequent or common engine problems with the 01-04 Legacy's? Apparently Consumer Reports is saying that there are engine problems with them, and I have never personally heard of anything being wrong with them. A customer has asked me about this, and is looking for an answer. Any help would be great.

headgasket mainly, thought not as prone as the earlier Legacy's.

almost all the NA EJ25s that are phase 2 have headgasket problems. They mainly leak coolant externally and depending on how severe they are can actually be driven while leaking for quite some time as long as the coolant level is kept up.

Are there any frequent or common engine problems with the 01-04 Legacy's? Apparently Consumer Reports is saying that there are engine problems with them, and I have never personally heard of anything being wrong with them. A customer has asked me about this, and is looking for an answer. Any help would be great.

I had a 2003 Legacy (which I bought new) with the 2.5 engine and a five-speed manual transmission. The car had a very jerky/laggy engine that eventually led me to sell the car. I tried everything I could think of to fix it and nothing helped. The service manager at the dealership said, "They're all like that," which I know to be pure BS. I've driven other recent (2005-2007) Imprezas and Legacys that were either perfect or showed some evidence of this same jerky/laggy throttle, so they're not all like that. Some have the problem and some don't. If my dealer is any indication, Subaru has little interest in fixing the ones that do have the problem.

When Consumer Reports sent me the survey, I marked down that I had problems with the engine. It could be that others with the same seemingly unrepairable problem did the same thing.

Don't get me wrong... I like Subarus and still own one. My 2003 Legacy was a terrific car except for a maddeningly uncomfortable engine. In 4.5 years of ownership, I drove the car just 20,000 miles -- the engine was THAT uncomfortable.

--Bob

I thought it was all Phase I that had the HG problem and not too many of the SOHC models...?

nope, we see them all the time at our dealer.

bobko your dealer may have been right, you would need to compare your car to one exactly like it to know if its normal, the NA 25 isnt a real powerhouse but still a decent reliable engine and it sounds like your comparing one of the older ones to the newer ones which have more throttle response and are smoother sue to a couple things like electronic throttles and variable valve lift etc...

I had a 2003 Legacy (which I bought new) with the 2.5 engine and a five-speed manual transmission. The car had a very jerky/laggy engine that eventually led me to sell the car. I tried everything I could think of to fix it and nothing helped. The service manager at the dealership said, "They're all like that," which I know to be pure BS. I've driven other recent (2005-2007) Imprezas and Legacys that were either perfect or showed some evidence of this same jerky/laggy throttle, so they're not all like that. Some have the problem and some don't. If my dealer is any indication, Subaru has little interest in fixing the ones that do have the problem.

When Consumer Reports sent me the survey, I marked down that I had problems with the engine. It could be that others with the same seemingly unrepairable problem did the same thing.

Don't get me wrong... I like Subarus and still own one. My 2003 Legacy was a terrific car except for a maddeningly uncomfortable engine. In 4.5 years of ownership, I drove the car just 20,000 miles -- the engine was THAT uncomfortable.

--Bob

Like I said before, I didn't have this problem with my car, and it's a 2003 as well. The throttle response is very sharp now after the stuff I've done to it but even in stock form it wasn't like I was driving an automatic transmission.