AUTOMOTIVE
NOVEMBER 2, 2021
The Brief Subaru History
The brief Subaru history, from an aircraft maker company to automobile maker producing high quality cars for many decades globally.
Subaru is the automobile manufacturer of Subaru Corporation, a Japanese transportation conglomerate. Subaru is the Japanese name for the Pleiades star cluster M45. The star cluster is commonly known as the “Seven Sisters”, one of it is invisible therefore there are only six in the Subaru logo.
Subaru started on July 15, 1953 in Tokyo, Japan when a group of Japanese companies joined to form the Fuji Heavy Industries Ltd. The automotive division became known as “Subaru” meaning “unite” in Japanese language. The logo represents Fuji Heavy Industries as a constellation of companies united together.
According to Wikipedia, the group of Japanese companies were five companies that some of them originated from Nakajima Aircraft Company (1932) that manufactured aircraft for Japan during World War II.
The first Subaru car, the Subaru 1500 was unveiled in 1954 and only twenty were manufactured. Followed by other models, the Subaru 360 (1958), the Subaru Sambar (1961) and the Subaru 1000 (1965) with the first Subaru boxer engine. This engine type becoming the engines for all their models in their future cars.
Subaru now has five manufacturing facilities, Four of them are in Japan while the other one is in Lafayette, Indiana, United States. They are best known for making popular models including Forester and Outback SUV as well as the Legacy and Impreza.
The Japan factories produced the Subaru BRZ, XV Crosstek, Impreza, WRX, STi and Forester models while the American site manufactures the Legacy sedan and the Outback and Tribeca crossovers.
The Subaru cars have a lot of advantages over other cars. Features like flat engines, symmetric AWD system, low cost of maintenance and safety features are all included in every car they produced. But these technology also raises the price for each unit of the car.
The reliability of Subaru rating is 3.5 out of 5.0 which ranks at 14th of 32 of all car brands. This makes Subaru a well known company for building reliable vehicles with high quality. Most of their vehicles could last about 150.000 miles and up to 200.000 miles. The cars are relatively cheap in terms of repair and maintenance cost.
According to the Kelley Blue Book list, three 2021 Subaru models in sit on the top spots for their value. They are Subaru Crosstek, Subaru Forester and Subaru Outback. These cars retain what they are worth.
In the racing world, Subaru has built a strong name for their reputations. The modified Impreza WRX and WRX STi have been competing successfully on rallying in World Rally Championship (WRC). and won the manufacturers’ title three years in a row from 1995 to 1997. Subaru resigned from the WRC competition on December 16, 2008.
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