The original clutch pedal noise began one day into a major five day cross country trip and rapidly got worse. A dealer on the road did an OK job fixing it I thought until about 8,500 miles later an intermittent squealing started again (getting louder over time) in the transmission area (not petal). I took it in turn to two other Subaru dealers in August then December, who downplayed the noise. One charged $170 to listen to the car and "lubricate" the clutch from the outside. The noise returned within days.

Finally 6/4/15 with 111,434 miles I had the clutch fixed again by an independent mechanic. I was afraid to go to a dealer since it seemed they were just waiting for the 10,000 mile, 1 year (warranty limit) to be up before they would say it was a serious problem that need the clutch opened up again. I no longer trusted them. The independent shop replaced the throw out bearing and the clutch pilot bearing again. That cost was about $600. I consider this one problem because the bill for the dealers original work stated they had already replaced the throwout bearing and pilot bearing using dealer parts.

My mistake, I think ,was telling the second two dealers the problem I had was still under warrant for work done by another dealer. This whole experience made me wonder where the myth of Subaru client loyalty came from. This is my first Subaru after many decades of Honda ownership. I always had manual transmission cars and Honda's never had a transmission problem thought I drove them over 150,000 miles.