2015 SUBARU FORESTER — Complaint #1558434
Open-data reference.
NHTSA Complaint about POWER TRAIN filed April 16, 2019
NHTSA complaint #1558434 (ODI reference 11196736) concerns a 2015 SUBARU FORESTER and was filed on April 16, 2019. The owner reports the failure occurred on April 5, 2016. The vehicle had 3,774 miles on the odometer at the time of the incident. The report was geocoded to New York based on the filer's self-reported location. The affected component is categorized as power train, one of NHTSA's standardized taxonomy codes used to group defect patterns across make, model, and year.
The filer flagged the following severity indicators: crash: yes, fire: no, injuries: 0, fatalities: 0. A complaint that flags a crash, fire, or fatality is escalated on NHTSA's internal review queue and factors more heavily into any Preliminary Evaluation decision on this make and model. Because a VIN was supplied, this complaint is tied to a specific vehicle and not just a model-year cohort.
Individual complaints are consumer-submitted and unverified by NHTSA engineers — the agency's role at this stage is to collect, index, and make them searchable. What matters for federal action is the pattern: when many owners of the same SUBARU FORESTER cohort independently describe similar power train failures, defect investigators have grounds to open a PE and request manufacturer data. Related filings for the same vehicle and component appear below, and the detail page for the full 2015 SUBARU FORESTER shows the complete component-level complaint distribution alongside any active investigations or recalls.
Complaint Description
WHEN STOPPED IN TRAFFIC CAR HESITATES, STALLS AND STUMBLES TO ACCELERATE FOR A FEW SECONDS. UNABLE TO SHIFT FROM 1ST TO 2ND SMOOTHLY (STUCK IN 1ST GEAR?). WAS REAR ENDED WHEN UNABLE TO ACCELERATE AT LIGHT. DEALER DID SOFTWARE UPDATE THAT DID NOT FIX PROBLEM, STILL ONGOING
Complaint Details
| NHTSA Complaint ID | 1558434 |
| ODI Number | 11196736 |
| Date Filed | April 16, 2019 |
| Failure Date | April 5, 2016 |
| VIN | JF2SJAKC7FH |
Similar POWER TRAIN Complaints for 2015 SUBARU FORESTER
I bought a used 2015 subaru forester with 117,000 miles from an auto shop/used car dealer in March of 2024. In September of 2025, 11,000 miles of driving later, a bunch of lights came on my dash. Chec
REPORT OF FAILED RECALL REMEDY (RECALL 19V-149 / WUE-90) My 2015 Subaru Forester experienced a total recurrence of the defect addressed in 2019. The vehicle became trapped in 'Park' intermittently on
Sounds like the differential in the transmission is making a horrendous noise
The Vehicle was sold to me by a local dealership not SUBARU Manufacturer themselves with the conditions marked above and more, the wheels when purchased as i turned any corners it would sound like the
My clutch fork was nearly broken in two.(pics available). I asked the mechanic to save the old parts. My 6MT was never modified; the vehicle was neither raced, taken off-road nor used for towing. A
Source: NHTSA Vehicle Complaints Database. Component taxonomy and severity codes are standardized by NHTSA Office of Defects Investigation.
Read our methodology — how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.