In December last year I traded in my diesel Outback for a newly released Forester E-Boxer. Then came the lockdown and "not going out". After one week my battery was flat and I needed a jump start. I was able to drive around to charge the battery again and used it occasionally (every 2 - 3 days) when it started fine. However, a flat battery every 7 days is really not acceptable (particularly for a car which also has another huge battery sitting under the floor). The only help the dealer could provide was to say that "new cars are like that, you need to drive it more". This is not acceptable. If I leave my car at the airport for a week or two, I should not expect to come back to a flat battery and the need to make a call to the AA or RAC, or to find someone to give me a jump start.
However, a bigger problem occurs if I leave my car for longer than about 7 days. As anticipated the car is totally flat. However when I try to jump start it, as soon as I connect the jump leads to the battery, all hell breaks loose - the alarm goes off incessantly and every light on the dash comes on, including all the fault lights. Even worse the only thing that does not work is the starter - there is no sign of the motor turning over let alone starting. The first time this happened I had to call out the AA who couldn't fix it either and had to get a recovery vehicle to take it back to the dealer. The dealer said it was "just a flat battery" and that as soon as they charged it up it was fine. I don't know how they managed that with all the lights and alarms going off as soon as any charging lead is connected to the battery.
This happened again yesterday after the car had been standing about 8 days. I had invested in a small "powerpack" that should start the car 3 or 4 times on a full charge. However, that does not work at all because as I said, the starter seems to be disabled when the car goes into it's frantic flashing mode.
So I have two important questions:
1. Can anyone tell me how to start my car, or recharge the battery when it goes into this "frantic" mode?
2. When is Subaru going to fix this problem so that I can leave my car at home, at the airport or anywhere else for over a week and come back to a car that I am sure will start? This must be a possible fix - otherwise the car is not really fit for purpose.
Anyone?
