On May 29, 2016 11:12 AM, "Mark C" wrote:
While just driving along the highway Thursday my 2011 Subaru Outback made
some odd noises and suddenly lit up what looked like every warning light
on
the control panel. I pulled over and wound up getting it towed to the
nearest dealership. On Friday they gave me the bad news - at just 78,000
miles the CVT transmission was shot. Needs a complete replacement.
The shop that has the car quoted me $11,000 to replace the CVT with a new
unit and just under $10,000 for a factory re-manufactured one. My local
shop quoted me $7,700 for a Subaru remanufactured CVT. It might be more
since I don't know if that includes the 6% sale tax on CVT itself. A
local
independent shop gave me a rough estimate of $4,400 for a used
one,installed. All of the places figure about $1000 labor, everything
else
is the cost of parts plus sales tax on the parts.
The only firm estimates I have are the ones from the first place. I got
the news from them at 3 PM Friday, before the holiday weekend. The local
places are quoting typical rates, they have not even seen the car yet to
give me a firm estimate. I don't know the warranty on the used
transmission at this point either, just that it has 25K on it.
I do have a call into Subaru customer service and they have agreed to do
a
review of this under their goodwill program, so maybe there will be some
relief there, but the car is out of warranty and no extended coverage.
My concern with a used CVT, though, is that they seem to be pretty
complex
and high tech devices. I have heard that they are actually built in clean
rooms. So I'm wondering if pulling one off a wreck would be a good idea.
Any reason NOT to do a used CVT? Thoughts would be appreciated. My first
task is getting the car towed back here next week.
Mark
