This data is from the NHTSA — the US gov't agency tasked with vehicle safety. Complaints are spread across multiple & redundant categories, & are not organized by problem.
So how do you find out what problems are occurring? For this NHTSA complaint data, the only way is to read through the comments below. Any duplicates or errors? It's not us.
On Monday night, 5 Feb. 2007, when I parked my car in the garage it smelled strongly of gasoline. I checked under the hood and the odor seemed to be coming from the passenger side of the engine compartment. I did not see any gasoline leaking. The strength of the odor seems to be related to the cold weather (15-20 deg. F). that Monday was the first time that I had ever noticed the smell of gasoline emanating from the engine compartment. The odor was so intense that I decided to park the car outside as a precaution. I drove the car Tuesday morning and parked it in the garage and it smelled of gas again. As the outside temperature has increased, the intensity of the smell has decreased. During very cold weather small amounts of gasoline seemed to be leaking from one of the fuel lines or escaping from the engine. On 9 February, I brought the car to dealer (heritage Subaru, owings mills, md) service department and asked them to investigate the cause of the gasoline smell. The dealer replaced three short rubber fuel hoses (P/N 807707130) from the engine compartment. The replaced hoses showed no sign of wear, holes, cuts, abrasions etc., but the dealer service representative indicated that fuel had permeated the hose material allowing fumes and possibly small amounts of fuel to escape. This problem appears to be a defect in material or design since the car is only 3.5 years old and the replaced hoses show no signs of wear (I.e., old and new hoses appear on the outside to be identical). I have the old hoses and can provide them for inspection.
A D V E R T I S E M E N T S
- Baltimore, MD, USA