P2682 Engine overheating and engine gauge flashing red due to a recall related to the engine coolant bypass valve. The vehicle stopped and required a tow for $417 to the nearest Subaru dealership to repair. After towing to the dealership they charged 31% of parts to labor and would not eliminate or discount the invoice.

- Westminster, CO, USA

Within one month the same thing happened. I turn on the car and the eyesight warning light is on (eyesight feature disabled), flashing "S" drive is on, "break" light is on, and check engine light is on. Due to this cruise control isn't working. My plan was to take it to a mechanic/dealership that Monday. By Monday morning, after about 15 minutes of driving, all warning signs disappeared. This exact thing happened a few weeks later (this morning). I started googling issues and seems like this is an issue for many customers and is just a malfunctioning Thermo Control Valve, no actual problem. What do I do about this? This is much less important - but also seems like a quality issue, at drivers side, the seat cover is starting to crack, looking like this is car is over 10 years old, we've had it for less than 4 years and this shouldn't be happening on a car of this caliber. Photos attached

- Larchmont, NY, USA

The contact owns a 2020 Subaru Forester. The contact stated while driving at 60 MPH, a deer jumped in the roadway causing damage to the front driver-side engine compartment. No air bags had deployed. The contact had managed to pull onto the side of the road. The contact stated she and the front passenger exited the vehicle safely when shortly afterward a fire started in the front driver-side engine compartment. No injury was sustained. A police report was filed but was unavailable. The local dealer was not contacted, and the vehicle was not diagnosed or repaired. The vehicle was towed to a tow lot where it was then taken by the insurance company. The contact stated the insurance company had the vehicle in their possession for an investigation. The origin of the fire was unknown. The manufacturer was made aware of the failure. The failure mileage was approximately 23,000.

- Dallas, OR, USA

2020 Subaru Forester just had a check engine light appear. The engine malfunction code is P26A3, which is a defective thermostatic control valve. This malfunction also affects the vehicle manufacturers advanced driver assitance systems such as: "eyesight" blind spot monitoring, lane keep assist, etc. Vehicle only has 51,000 miles on it.

- Independence , OH, USA

The thermo valve leaked into connector, causing engine to shut down abruptly to prevent overheating. This happened at 70 mph on interstate highway in traffic. Part was replaced with modified thermo valve later. Barely able to coast to narrow shoulder flanked by deep ditch, with vehicle very close to interstate traffic, so much so that exit from vehicle ill-advised. After towing, vehicle was serviced by Subaru dealer. At time of part failure many warning lights & messages appeared, but not before the event.

- Middleton, WI, USA

I was driving to work and many of my warning lights suddenly came on. This includes my check engine light, my lane assist light, my auto collision braking, my eye sight disabled and my cool engine light keeps going on and off. My cabin heating also isn-??t working. There is no reason for this happening other than my thermo control valve failing.

- Woods Cross, UT, USA

The Thermo Control Valve is faulty and renders the vehicle non-operative. There have been numerous instances in Subaru Foresters in the same make and year.

- Los Angeles, CA, USA

The Thermal Control Valve failed on my car and it-??s only 3 years old. This is a common issue and is widely known within the forums. Subaru should recall these valves as they are failing prematurely.

- South Glastonbury , CT, USA

I was at a red light when the engine shut off and the check engine and several other warning lights came on. After multiple tries I was finally able to restart the vehicle and drive it off the road. After taking it to the dealership the confirmed issue is the Thermal Control Valve. The dealership is requesting about $1600 to replace the faulty part.

- Albuquerque, NM, USA

I stopped at a red light. The car's auto shutoff feature turned the car off for the fuel savings. When the light turned green and I went to go, the car tried to start and failed. I had to put it in park and start the car manually.

- Mantua, OH, USA

On Sunday, [XXX] we were traveling in our 2020 Subaru Forester on a trip from Minnesota to Florida for a vacation. Not long into cross country trip we found ourselves stranded on the side of the highway uncertain about the ability of our vehicle to continue to due to a defective Thermo Control Valve failure. About 200 miles into our trip, while driving at highway speeds south of Rochester, MN the dashboard lit up. The check engine light was on, and other safety features were lit up on the dash as disabled (Eye-sight technology, lane assist, automatic vehicle collision braking). The heat would not work after this incident. We checked the owners manual, and then drove to an Auto-parts store to have a scan done to determine the error code. The code "P26A3 - Engine coolant bypass valve A Range/Performance" was indicated. In checking online we discovered that a Thermo Control Valve replacement was needed ASAP and to continue driving the vehicle could risk severe engine damage. Since it was a Sunday, and we were essentially stranded if we couldn't use the vehicle. We continued on, stopping and checking the engine periodically for overheating. We were able to get an appointment at Lou Fusz Subaru in St. Peters, MO on Monday afternoon and they replaced the Thermo Control Valve at a cost of $1,961.51. We were told that this wasn't under warranty due to the mileage on the vehicle (76,358 miles). In researching this issue online, we found that the Thermo Control Valve failure to be a common issue and certain year/model vehicles and Subaru should have recalled this part a long time ago (in our opinion). INFORMATION REDACTED PURSUANT TO THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT (FOIA), 5 U.S.C. 552(B)(6)

- Saint Cloud, MN, USA

Thermo control valve is bad. Ask subaru to issue recall on 2019-2020 models.

- Lebanon, NH, USA

Started engine after parking and check engine light came on, eyesight disabled, and flashing -??s-??. Stopped driving and took vehicle to dealer. Diagnosed as thermo control unit. Told they didn-??t have a loaner and was safe to drive for a few days. Has no heat and engine would not warm up. No safety systems. Retained 3 days later to dealer when loaner was available. Repaired under powertrain warranty.

- Spring, TX, USA

My thermo value went bad on my 2020 Forrester with no symptoms or warning causing me to become stranded in the middle of an extremely busy road. This is seemingly known problem and I'm unsure why Subaru has not been more proactive with this knowledge, not allowing others to end up in the same dangerous situation I was left in. Also, even after having the thermo value replaced, I have no way of knowing if any permanent damage was caused to my engine.

- Virginia Beach, VA, USA

The thermal control valve stopped working. The car has <50K miles on it. The error also results in many/all of the safety systems being deactivated (no adaptive cruise control, no lane centering, no rear braking, etc.)

- San Francisco, CA, USA

Driving my 2020 Subaru Forrester on 1/26/24, at night. Stopped at traffic light. Car started shaking, dash lights system lights came on. Turned off car and restarted. Car would not accelerate. Had towed to mechanic. Diagnosed as probable thermo regulator. Could not repair because part only available from Subaru. Called dealer who was not sympathetic or helpful. Told to bring in and leave. Would get to it when they could.

- Orlando, FL, USA

Check Engine light came on along with EyeSight, traction control and flashing [S] lights. Dealer confirmed that the thermo control valve failed.

- Keithville, LA, USA

The contact owns a 2020 Subaru Forester. The contact stated while driving 75 MPH, the Forward Collision Avoidance Automatic Emergency Braking system activated and applied the brakes. The contact was able to pull to the shoulder of the roadway, where he smelled a burnt smell in the interior of the vehicle. The vehicle returned to normal functionality, but the failure became a regular occurrence. The check engine and brake warning lights were illuminated. The vehicle was taken to the dealer, who diagnosed a failure with the throttle body. The vehicle was repaired, but the failure reoccurred. The manufacturer was notified of the failure, and a case was opened. The failure mileage was 35,600.

- Portland, OR, USA

Got warning P2A63 that the Thermo Control Valve is shot around 63k miles. Apparently this is happening very often in Subaru's made between 2019 and 2022.

- Glendale, CA, USA

When I am idling at a stop sign or sitting in traffic and I have come to a full stop, the car's engine shuts down as a gas-saving feature. This is not the problem! The problem is that sometimes when this feature engages, when I lift my foot off the brake to start driving again, a shrill constant ringing sound starts and the engine won't power back on. There is an error message that comes on that says "eyesight disabled." When this happens, none of these factors (the ringing, the error message, the dead engine) stop until I put the car in park and power it down completely, then restart the engine. Then none of the symptoms are there anymore and the car drives normally. I have not noticed any consistency about when this problem does or does not happen - it occurs in all weather types, temperatures, times of day, slopes/flat roads. I sometimes go months without it happening, and other times it happens twice in several days. The only consistent thing is that it only happens when the car is at a full stop and the engine has shuddered off to save gas. I live in Chicago and almost exclusively drive short distances in the city, I hardly do any highway driving. This has happened maybe 20 times since I bought the car in February, 2023.

- Chicago, IL, USA