Subaru Ascent quick review

[mindless1]

Looks about like every other crossover, has about the same features. They'll all clones now with some a little more upscale than others, but one trend I keep seeing is an obnoxious amount of creases/crevices/gaps/etc inside, a real PITA to meticulously clean inside, but the same happened outside too.

 

[Zorba]

I don't like leather seats. Get back to your car after being out somewhere for over an hour & you'd burn your ass. Well, someone with short shorts anyways. Leather is easy to clean i guess. My 20 yr old truck w/ original clothe seats age well.

I agree, I've always been a cloth guy. Leather burns in the summer and freezes in the winter. I've never gotten rid of that wasn't at least 12 years old and never had a problem with the cloth seats.

 

[NutBucket]

Throw a seat cover over it in summer, especially wearing shorts that slows down any type of upholstery from getting dirty faster from skin oils/sweat/etc. Leather is easy to clean short term but if you use too aggressive a cleaner and/or don't condition it every now than then, it won't last 20 years. Then again if the seat wears to match the rest of the vehicle, that's not out of place.

There's so much crap applied to most "leather" seats conditioners aren't very effective. Once you get into high end cars it's a different story.

 

[JulesMaximus]

Looks decent. I like the interior.

FTR-I absolutely hate the Forester. I had one as a rental for a week and absolutely hated everything about it. It felt cheap, the CVT sucked, the seats were hard as rocks and the ride was just awful on the freeway (it was awful everywhere really). I couldn’t wait to turn it in and get my car back.

 

[pauldun170]

Looks decent. I like the interior.

FTR-I absolutely hate the Forester. I had one as a rental for a week and absolutely hated everything about it. It felt cheap, the CVT sucked, the seats were hard as rocks and the ride was just awful on the freeway (it was awful everywhere really). I couldn’t wait to turn it in and get my car back.

In-laws have a 2017.
I'm not a fan. Especially considering how much they paid for it.
However, don't you normally drive higher end cars? Do you feel you are giving it a fair shake for the segment it belongs to? Hate's a strong word to use.

 

[JulesMaximus]

In-laws have a 2017.
I'm not a fan. Especially considering how much they paid for it.
However, don't you normally drive higher end cars? Do you feel you are giving it a fair shake for the segment it belongs to? Hate's a strong word to use.

I didn’t hate my Camry Hybrid. No, the Forester was a miserable little car.

I rented a Jeep Compass which was also awful but worlds more comfortable than the Forester was.

 

[pauldun170]

I didn’t hate my Camry Hybrid. No, the Forester was a miserable little car.

I rented a Jeep Compass which was also awful but worlds more comfortable than the Forester was.

Holy crap, now I want to sit in a recent Compass just to compare.

 

[Kaido]

Looks decent. I like the interior.

FTR-I absolutely hate the Forester. I had one as a rental for a week and absolutely hated everything about it. It felt cheap, the CVT sucked, the seats were hard as rocks and the ride was just awful on the freeway (it was awful everywhere really). I couldn’t wait to turn it in and get my car back.

That's so weird, my experience has been the polar opposite in our 2015 (cloth interior) - feels like strong, solid plastic inside, wonderfully smooth CVT with lightning-quick pedal response, gets up to speed fast, decent seats, and good ride (granted I have the smaller base rims, which have more rubber on them).

 

[NutBucket]

My only complaint about our Fozzy is the seats. Then again I lack natural padding. I love the seats in our WRX as does the wife. 13 years later they still feel great.

 

[Herr Kutz]

Took my parents out to eat this weekend and drove their forester since I can’t use my driver side door in my vehicle. I’ve been in several long trips in this vehicle previously and had no issues with regards to comfort, but I did feel the seats were slightly uncomfortable on this latest trip (~50-60 miles round trip). It could have just been my imagination.


Btw, for a while I was noticing a weird noise when riding in the rear of the forester and kept mentioning it to my parents. For some reason they weren’t doing anything about it so I finally told them they should bring it in since their powertrain warranty was almost up. Good thing they listened, because a wheel bearing was bad and replaced under warranty. That would have been a fairly costly repair outside of warranty.

 

[rstrohkirch]

Is this Subaru's most expensive vehicle they've ever listed? I just optioned one with every realistic item/package and it was almost touching $50k. I don't recall them ever selling another vehicle in this price range.

 

[Kaido]

Is this Subaru's most expensive vehicle they've ever listed? I just optioned one with every realistic item/package and it was almost touching $50k. I don't recall them ever selling another vehicle in this price range.

Starting price is $32k & the top config is $55k (edit: $45k). At $32k with EyeSight with 3 rows, it's a phenomenal deal. At $55k (edit: $45k) (same engine, just with leather & some other nice features), you have a host of other options. Still a very nice selection, however. With the leather interior on the demo vehicle I took out, it did feel very high-end (surprisingly).

 

[postmortemIA]

Top model (Touring) is $45K, not $55K. So far they are selling well. Subaru has sold 4,500 Ascents in July... production is still lagging demand, most of these are preordered

 

[Kaido]

Top model (Touring) is $45K, not $55K. So far they are selling well. Subaru has sold 4,500 Ascents in July... production is still lagging demand, most of these are preordered

Oh nice, even better!

Very curious to test out the new Forester as well.

 

[compcons]

It will be interesting to see how the comparisons and road tests go against the competition. I am not in the market, but I like new models. The Tribeca was mediocre and far too small for 3 rows so this is a nice change. 8 seats seems like a stretch but the third row seat seems really generous for what it is. Not quite mini-van territory but not too shabby. I was expecting much smaller but this thing compares favorably for interior room to something like an Explorer that looks a lot bigger.

The price is steep but competitive for the most part. At the price point, I think I would tend to go with an Explorer Sport which has gobs more power for towing and general tom-foolery. If buying right now, you can grab a 1-year old certified full size SUV for the same money (which are $10-15k more new) and have full-size seating and towing capacity. But for die-hard subie families or those looking for a mid size SUV (3rd row seems to be where this is going to shine), this thing has got to be Nirvana. Let's hope Subaru delivers a glitch free first year (not necessarily their strong suit as of late) and brings more competition. With the size, it should have Honda and Toyota rethinking their 3 row mid size models.

EH

 

[Carson Dyle]

The Forester in the last couple of generations had passed into the realm of bloated oversized, doesn't-know-if-it's-an-SUV vehicles. Maybe this thing is what they were aiming for.

 

[NutBucket]

Every time this comes up:

2001 2018​

Length: 175 181.5
Width: 68.3 70.7
Wheelbase: 99.4 103.9
Height: 62.8 68.2
Weight: 3195 3422

That's not a huge difference over 17 years. 200 lbs is also pretty minor considering the safety equipment and creature comforts. It's still small compared to a midsize sedan. The only real annoyance is the height since I can't reach the roof to wash it without standing on the the rear tire.

 

[gorcorps]

This was my front-runner for a new vehicle, but after test driving it I sadly had to find another option. For some reason I'm finding it harder and harder to find a vehicle that fits my normal driving posture. When I'm at speed (on a highway or something) I like to keep my left arm/elbow resting on the interior door panel and barely hold on to the wheel with my thumb and index... like a crab person. For some reason, it seems like the Ascent has a smaller steering wheel than most and I couldn't reach the wheel while keeping my arm supported like normal. I also felt like the center console was too low to give my other arm the support I'm used to. So I was basically feeling forced to drive with both hands on the wheel because I couldn't find any way of holding the steering wheel otherwise. I don't think I could get used to that, but that's just my personal way I drive. I liked everything else about it.

I had a similar problem when I test drove the new pilot, except my problem there was the door panel was so thin/sloped I couldn't rest my arm on the panel at all. Plus instead of having a nice big center console to lean on, they made the center console low and used arm rests instead. The arm rests were tiny though, and not in a spot where I naturally wanted to rest my arm.