It was an easy process to swap out and the shop it was at recently quoted about 60 Dollars to do it. I purchased a new filter on Amazon for about 15 dollars and it took a few minutes to do. My guess is it can be swapped out in about a minute or two if you have done it before.

DISCLAIMER: This post is for entertainment purposes only. I am not  a professional mechanic. This is just explaining how I fixed the issue on my car.  I will not be held responsible for any issues that may arise if you decide to replace yours yourself.  

The Filter

The Subaru part number I found for the 2015 Impreza cabin filter is:  72880FG000 

I purchased a brand called ECOGUARD and they had the part number listed as XC36115. Here is a picture of it below. I also did see a Impreza HEPA filter available from another brand (Bosch). I chose this one this time, but might try the HEPA filter next. It was only slightly more expensive.

The installation

Basically the filter is located behind the glovebox. To get to it you need to do the following.

1. Open your passenger side glovebox.

2. On the right side you need to pull off the glove box stop from the clip. (I have no idea what this is called so here is a picture)

3. Release the clip on each side of the glove box to be able to lower it. I did this by pushing on each side.

4. Once your glovebox is out you will see the Filter behind it. You just pull it out and swap it with the new one. Make sure your new one does not get put in upside down.

5. After swapping out the filter, I put the glovebox back.  A job well done and I saved about 40 bucks.

Summary

Here you can see my old cabin filter after I pulled it out. Yikes it looks bad. This is such an easy change I should have done this a while ago when we first purchased this car.

Now that I know its there, and that easy to swap out, I will probably do this every time I swap out the engine air filter. The engine air filter still looks new since my last change.  If you want to see a video of the Impreza cabin filter change, you can see it at this link here : Video cabin filter change.  

The main tips I can think of are make sure you look at the cabin filter as you remove it to make sure you out the new one back in in the correct orientation. I could see where people wonder what direction does the cabin filter go.

As for the Subaru cabin filter interval, My Subaru manual mentions to replace the Air Cleaner element every 30,000 miles.

Again ,while I went cheap with this filter this time. I think next time I will go ahead and spend the extra 10 bucks and see if the Subaru Impreza HEPA filter works any better. Allergy season is just starting and i wonder if that might help keep more pollen out of the car.

If you are hearing a weird road noise, like a growl of sorts that starts when hitting speeds of around 30+ MPG. You may want to check out this post of the issue we had LINK.

The post change impreza cabin filter 2015 appeared first on MyRandomTechBlog.com.

I had been hearing this light noise while driving my 2015 Impreza. It would usually start up around 30 mph. It was not that loud at first, and barley noticeable. Since it started the family and I have been driving the car just mainly around town and I had not driven it on the freeway in a while. But when I drove it last weekend on a long trip it was really noticeable on the freeway. I would hear it especially loud when I hit a patch of pavement that was quiet. It was kind of a low growl that would change tone with my speed. My first fear was it was the CVT transmission starting to have an issue. I went ahead and scheduled an appointment to have it looked at. I decided to post this as they found what was causing my Subaru Impreza Road growl noise.

The Fix

I scheduled an appointment at the shop and they checked it out. Turns out it was a bad drivers side wheel bearing. I was pretty relived it wasn’t the CVT transmission, as I hear they are pretty expensive to have replaced.  This wheel bearing was not cheap like an older cars wheel bearings. It ended up running close to 600 dollars to fix once you included labor. But that being said I am happy with the result. I just got the car back tonight and it is super quiet on the road now.   

The Cost

I probably should not have let it go this long, and had it looked at when I first heard the noise. But am glad it was finally fixed/replaced. I checked the price of the part they listed on the receipt and it was around $250 dollars if I ordered it from Subaru. The part number listed was 28373FL010A Wheel Brg/Hub Front . They also replaced a 902170049 Axle Nut. So it was roughly about $300 labor.  I did not look up how hard this was to replace myself. But am still pleased with the result as I did not really have time to tackle it myself. Too bad it was out of warranty.

Here are the parts they listed they replaced:

• 902170049   AXLE NUT
• 28373FL010A  Wheel Brg/Hub Front

This is a snapshot from the receipt.

Summary

The drive home sounded great. I had done a quick search of the internet looking for info on this before taking it in and did not find much. Maybe it was my search just terms. I and am not sure how widespread this might be on Subaru’s. Mine has around 70,000 miles. So thought I would post this on my blog just in case someone else has the same issue and might wonder what it could be.

Also if you are looking for a new set of tires, Just wanted to say I am really pleased with this set of OHTSU’s I purchased from Discount tire. I think they are a great deal and basically rebranded Falken’s. Here is my review on them.-  LINK

The post Subaru Impreza road growl noise appeared first on MyRandomTechBlog.com.

The Flat:

I had 48,000 miles on my Subaru Impreza when I hit a screw and got a flat. While the screw was in the center, with this many miles and being close to needing tires anyways I decided to just get a new set. These were the original tires on the car and they were pretty worn.

OHTSU:

Now this is just my daily driver and not used for autocross or anything, so performance is not first on my mind. I am really just looking for a good tire that’s not noisy, has good all season traction and has a decent life span. This got me looking at some of the cheaper brands out there. One of the brands I found was Ohtsu which I have not heard of before. After some searching around on the web I found that Ohtsu and Falken appear to both be brands owned by the Sumitomo Rubber Factory. Falken is a pretty popular brand that I feel has a good reputation. I am hoping that Ohtsu will be as good.

PRICE:

I was looking to spend as little as possible, but still wanted to get a decent tire. Here are the OHTSU FP0612 A/S I ended up deciding to buy. I needed them in a 205/50/R17 size. When I was there to pick them up they were asking $59.00 a tire. I had seen them online the night before for $49.00 a tire and they matched my price. (NOTE: I see these online now as I write this for $46 so don’t be afraid to ask them to match if your decide to try these.) The online price I was checking was for the store I was in (Discount Tire). So the price does fluctuate.

Tread:

Here is a closeup of the tread. In the past when I would go through tires fast on some sports cars I had owned, I had bought blemished tires for a discount. These would be tires that would have some surface imperfection and they would give you a discount. Looking at the tread on this one kinda reminded me of that. I think this has something to do with how they mold the tires. It just did not look as perfect as some other more expensive tires I have looked at. This did not bother me at all, as it would be smooth soon, and for the price I was paying it wasn’t a big deal. Also the sidewalls looked perfect. I am guessing they spend a little less time on the final finish of the tread portion to cut costs. 

Inside:

Here is a shot of the inside in case you were curious.

Here you can see the sidewall, looks good.

Is this a re-branded Falken ziex ZE612?

Now this is where it gets kinda interesting. If you look at the pattern for the OHTSU FP0612 A/S below and compare it to the Falken ziex ZE612 you will see they look almost identical. (They do look the same to me). You can just google the Falken ziex ZE612 and you will see what I mean. I wonder if this might be just be a rebranded version of that tire since they are owned by the same parent company? Anyone know? Hit me up on facebook link at top if you do, I am really curious. Maybe they use different rubber now or something?  But it appears the ZE612 is no longer produced by Falken from what I could tell online. I wonder if they just decided to rebrand it under the Ohtsu name?

[UPDATE] I was hit up on Facebook and it was suggested I just call Falken and inquire with their technical department about the tires. Great Idea! So I gave them a call and they were super helpful. I was told the OHTSU FP0612 is just a rebrand of the discontinued Falken ZE612. This is being produced for Discount tire and it uses the same specs and compound as the original. I thought this was great news and confirmed my suspicions.  For the great price of these, I don’t really care if it says Ohtsu or Falken on the side.

Here is the car on the lift with new rubber all the way around. I am almost ready to roll.

They look good on the car, and for the price I am glad I purchased these. So far they are quiet and ride nice.

OHTSU FP0612 A/S review [TREAD WEAR]:

I plan to update this section as I add more miles to the tires. They are rated for 40,000 miles per the website from the place I purchased them.

8/1/2018 – DAY 0 : 48,150 miles on ODO – TIRES Brand New ~ 2 miles. Starting out at 7mm. I read a lot of tires start at 10mm?  All the spots I checked were ~7mm. I am sure the tire size and type will determine how much initial tread you get.  It seemed like a normal new tire tread depth to me.

[Update 9/8/19] Car has 60,361 miles on it. So the tires have been used for 12,211 miles. Here is the current tread depth. ~6mm. 

OHTSU FP0612 A/S review [TIRE NOISE]:

8/3/2018 : I am really happy with how quiet these are so far. The OHTSU are quieter then my OEM tires, but the OEM are pretty worn.  I will update as these wear down.

11/20/18 : Update , We have a new patch of road by my house and its super smooth and quiet to drive on. When driving I notice that as I hit around 30 mph I do get some tire noise (kinda a low growl) . I do not think my original tires had this noise, and probably would not have noticed if this new patch of road wasn’t put in.  I don’t notice it much otherwise, but will update if it gets worse as the tread wears down more.  Just seems kinda odd and wanted to note it. Still very happy with the tires though. Waiting to see how they do once it gets icy.

OHTSU FP0612 A/S review [TRACTION]:

8/3/2018 : Summer right now and warm and hot. So far great traction. waiting for some rain and snow this winter to see how they do.  Will update this periodically.

3/11/2019: Well I wished for snow and we sure did get it this winter. The tires are doing great, and I am very happy with the traction they provided. We had some deep snow and ice and it did well in both. My wife was actually running family members around in the snow to their jobs as they had 2 wheel drive vehicles. The AWD in the Subaru was great and I had no complaints with these tires.  Here is a pic..

OHTSU FP0612 A/S review [SUMMARY]:

I bought these OHTSU FP 0612 A/S at a local discount wheel and tire. The store price was $59.00 but they had the price listed online on their website the night before for $49.00 and they matched that price. Interestingly when I look now they are at $46, so it pays to keep an eye on the website. Or if your at the store just ask them to match the lowest price you can find. I have had really good luck with Discount Tire and always seem to go back to them over others.

My final price after adding Installation, Disposal and tax was $313.35 for a set of four.  I am rolling the dice and declining the replacement warranty to get out the door for as cheap as possible. Plus the replacement warranty for all 4 tires ran about the price of a single new tire. I will update this post if that was a bad decision, and will post any issues I have with the tires.

I am really happy with the Ohtsu FP0612 so far. The price for a full set of these tires is very reasonable in my opinion and they are quiet and I have had no issues so far. I will update this post with the tread wear, as I am curious how long they will last.

I just found the link to the OHTSU website. Here it is if you want more info… https://ohtsu-tires.com/

The post OHTSU FP0612 A/S Tire review. appeared first on MyRandomTechBlog.com.

My Subaru is a 2015 Impreza with a 2.0L engine.

Anyways I have had it in to be looked at a couple times by Subaru under warranty and they did find something each time. Once they had found a slight seep from EGR cooler and replaced it, then another time they found some coolant seeping by the coolant hose for the transmission cooler by the crossover pipe. I have not noticed the smell as much lately ( it has been colder out), but when I was just changing my oil, I noticed it was a little low again. So I filled it back up to the middle of the low and high marks while cold.

Does anyone else have this issue? I have no other problems, but it just seems odd to be topping off the coolant every 4-6 months. Even though its not much. My other cars never need this done.  The jug of coolant should last me many years, but I still wonder where its going.

This is my first Subaru and if you have any insight on it please let me know.  I have googled and found others with the same issue on a few different Subaru models. But did not find anything definitive.

Thanks

The post Coolant smell after driving your Subaru? appeared first on MyRandomTechBlog.com.

I was almost at the recommended 6k miles between oil changes on my Subaru Impreza so decided to change the oil this weekend. I tend to change it every 5k to 6k miles ( My Subaru recommends 6k per the manual under normal conditions). This is a little longer between changes over my other vehicles as the Subaru uses synthetic oil and my others use standard oil.  Since I was changing the oil I decided to snap a few pictures and mention a couple things I do to save a little money with my oil changes.

[Note: This post is kind of a test. While I don’t like those articles that make you page through 40 pages of stuff. I also have broken up articles if they get to long and added more pages to make them hopefully load faster. This time I thought I would try just making one LONG post with lots of pictures. Maybe it will take way to long to load and be a pain. If so sorry in advance 🙂 But thought I would try it. ]

Disclaimer: This post is for entertainment purposes only. I am not a mechanic. I am not responsible if you injure yourself, or damage your vehicle. This is not an instructional post. I am just documenting myself working on my vehicle. 

Ok, back to my oil change post. I hope the page is not stuck loading.. … .. .. There are LOTS of pictures.

Saving money on oil…

One of the things I do to save money is to buy motor oil when its on sale. For the Subaru I tend to use the 3 brands below. (All 3 are Full synthetic which costs more then regular oil. )

Pennzoil Platinum 0W-20 – 5 qt Jug – BEST DEAL – I buy this on Amazon and while the Price varies, I also try to combine with the Pennzoil 10 Dollar rebate when available. My last purchase was on sale for $22.97 on Amazon, plus the $10 rebate ( I did get the rebate back by check in mail) Final price 5qt for $12.97. GREAT DEAL! Pennzoil has another 10 dollar rebate available on their website right now for January 1 – June 30th 2018. Limit two per person. I am keeping an eye on Amazon for a price drop and will grab a couple jug’s. It was at $27 right now. I may just buy it at that price as 17 dollars would still be a great final price. But I have a little time and plenty of oil still on hand for the next couple changes, so will wait hoping to see it drop to $22 again.

Castrol EDGE 0W-20   – 5 qt jug I purchased this recently for $19 on sale at Amazon. No rebate needed. Was just a great price. The price was back up last I checked. But a good one to keep an eye on.

Mobile 1  0W-20 –   (I buy this by the case at Costco when they have the 10 dollar instant rebate. I get the 6 qt case for $27.00 after instant rebate) I purchase this when I don’t have any oil around that I have purchased previously on sale. They have this sale frequently. 

One of the jugs above will do the oil change, but they are 5qt. The manual says a full change (oil/filter) is 5.1 qt. When I checked after adding  5qt my dipstick read oil at the halfway mark. I have an open single qt and do top it off to the correct amount.

(For my other vehicles that use conventional oil, I tend to buy it locally at a Costco, Walmart or someplace. I guess I should try to get the price down on those oil changes as well. But I usually end up spending under 15 bucks an oil change for those vehicle. Its just the Synthetic oil is so pricy I try to bring the price down on it as well to be in the same ballpark as conventional oil.)

Saving on filters.

I just buy a case of filters for each of my cars. Then I always have one on hand. You can tend to get a cheaper price if you buy by the case. ( I do not change cars frequently (Buy or sell), so I do not worry about not using them up. )  For the Subaru I just bought a case at the dealership, I paid $59.40 for a case of 12. So it ended up being $4.95 each Part # 15208AA15A. For each of my Toyota’s I have bought the filters online. I got a great deal for a case of Toyota filters on ebay, which is a great place to check. I think it was around 3 bucks a filter. For the 4runner I think I got them on Amazon. One thing I have found also is my local dealerships will usually match price with Amazon. So if you are at the dealership and want something right away its worth looking at the price online and asking them if they will match it. I have yet to have them say no. I also bought a few drain plug crush washers for the Subaru while I was buying the oil filters (Part number 803916010 But I cant seem to find them in the garage at the moment).  They must be hiding with all my missing 10mm sockets I can’t find.

The Oil change….

Not much exciting here. Just the oil change. But I will throw in some pictures. The warning : I am not responsible if you try to change your oil in your car and injure yourself or damage your car. This is not how you should do it, its just how I changed my oil. This is not a guide. I may have missed an important step when writing this. I wish I didn’t have to say stuff like that, but sometimes feel like its needed. If I did miss a step feel free to let me know 🙂

Things everyone should have if you like to work on cars: RhinoRamps. I just drive right up them so I can get underneath to the drain plug. Of course I made sure my vehicle was in park and the e-brake was on and that there is no way it can fall and crush me when I was under it. If you have a truck or SUV you might not need them (I don’t need them when changing oil on my 4runner.)

Popping the hood and it looks like this.

I put my container underneath and remove the drain plug to drain out all the old oil. Here is my oil drain plug, it uses a 17mm socket. My engine had been running previously and the oil was a little hot when I drained it.

Here is the old oil after I drained it. I drain it into this green pan. That is a puddle of water not oil on the left 🙂

Removing the oil filter. This is one thing I love about this Subaru boxer engine. Is the oil filter is on top. It makes it nice and easy to remove. (Compared to my 4runner in which I have to go through a flap inside the fender well.)

I like to clean up the filter area after removing the old one..

It’s now Nice and shiny

Next I apply a little oil to the new filter gasket

Then I put on the new filter and tighten it to 7/8 of a turn after it comes in contact with the gasket. Since this was the first time taking pictures of an oil change I noticed the filter had instructions and it said 7/8 of a turn. I was taught 3/4 of a turn after contact.  Interesting, maybe I have been doing it wrong for years…I also noticed it also has torque specs which was pretty cool. In addition to English Subaru even prints the instructions on the filter in what appears to be Japanese. ( I can’t read it to be sure, maybe someone else can).

Ok, new filter is on.

Next I put the drain plug back in.. I do not want to forget this step before adding oil. That would leave a big mess on the floor.  There is a correct torque value for this that I should probably know. But I just did it the same as I always do. [Note: Add Torque Value]

Getting ready to add the new oil…

This time its Castrol Edge

A nice closeup. You can almost smell it. I like the smell of oil for some reason.

I put the oil filler cap on and that was about it for the oil change portion. I also like to label the filter with the mileage I changed the oil and date for reference.  Who stole my black sharpie! I also save receipts and have a log book of all work done on car.

I checked for leaks, and I verified the oil level. The oil level should be between the two holes on the dipstick. Hard to see but it was right in the middle. I added just a little more oil to put it at the top hole.

Here is the final picture.

Thanks for stopping by the blog. Feel free to comment below.

I am learning a lot with this blog by trial and error. Plus let me know if you don’t like the long post and prefer the load time of maybe splitting posts into a few pages. This post had 19 decent quality pictures. It appears Google takes load time into it calculations when choosing the order for its search engine. Maybe that’s why so many people split it up into multiple pages.

The post Subaru Impreza oil change appeared first on MyRandomTechBlog.com.

Is your Subaru ABS light stuck on, along with your Traction control and Hill incline? I was on my way home the other night and hit my brakes going down a hill in my 2015 Subaru Impreza and all of a sudden the ABS, Hill Incline and Traction control Impreza trouble lights came on for my dash and stayed on. I ended up stopping at a store and turned the ignition off then back on and the lights went away when I did a test restart of the car. After I went in to the store to do some shopping and after restarting the car, this time they came back on again and never went away.

When I got home I did a quick google search and found others that had this issue, and that it appeared to be an easy fix.  The part needed was a “stop switch” and it is located under the dash behind the brake pedal.

The stop switch:

Here is an amazon link to the part I used to fix the issue. The final price for me was around 25 dollars. You should be able to get this at your local Subaru dealer as well.

Genuine Subaru 83311FJ001 Switch – Stop Lamp for Bulb, 1 Pack  [update , see bottom of post, there was a recall for this switch and you can probably get it replaced for free]

DISCLAIMER: I am not  a professional mechanic. This is not advice for what to do in your situation. This is just explaining how I fixed the issue on my car.  I will not be held responsible for any issues that may arise if you decide to replace yours yourself. There is now a recall on this part from Subaru. This post is for entertainment purposes only. 

Here is what my new one looks like.

Replacing the old stop switch.

It is located behind the brake pedal under the dashboard. you have to be a bit of a contortionist to twist around to see it.

I watched a video on YouTube I found it looked to be an easy replacement. It just needed to be twisted counter clockwise and pulled out, then unplugged from the harness. I went ahead and inserted my new one and adjusted to about the same depth as the old one and plugged it into the harness. (They made a point of not seating it all the way in on the youtube video, so I followed that advice).  I put it in at the same depth as the old one. I did not need to use any tools to replace the old switch which was nice. If you want to see how to install it just search for that part number in YouTube. There are a few videos on it, you will probably see the same ones I see.

Examining the broken stop switch

I took apart my bad switch after replacing it with the new one. Not really much to it,  and I could not see why this one stopped working. I am going to save it in case the new one goes out. I may try putting this one back in. Maybe it wasn’t adjusted correctly or was just stuck.  In hindsight I wish I would have played around and tried to adjust it before buying a new one. Might have saved myself 25 bucks.

I fixed my Subaru ABS light, Hill Incline and Traction control trouble lights and the dash is now clear.

That’s it for my post on this issue. I hope you find this useful if you have your Subaru ABS light, traction control and hill assist lights stuck and wondered what the cause might be.

If your interested in saving money and on your next Oil change check out this post.

UPDATE: Subaru Recall for “Brake Lamp Switch Replacement”

[Update 5/16/19] I just got notice in the mail that Subaru is doing a recall for this “Brake Lamp Switch Replacement”. It was about a year late for me. The recall includes some Crosstreks, Forester, Impreza and WRX models as far back as 2008. My 2015 Impreza was included. Reading another site on the net it mentioned it had something to do with some silicone that could emit a gas that could seep into the brake lamp switch and cut off electrical contact. Not sure how accurate that is, but wish this recall was a year ago. So if your having this issue it may be worth checking to see if your vehicle is on the recall list. 

The post Subaru ABS light, Hill Incline and Traction control trouble lights stuck on fix. appeared first on MyRandomTechBlog.com.