I got to drive a first-gen Subaru Legacy a handful of times. A company I worked for owned one, and we were supposed to use it on local Official Business. I remember not enjoying driving it – which is rare for me, as I’m easy to please in the driver’s seat. The steering felt rubbery and numb to me. Or at least that’s what I think it was; after something like 28 years memories do grow dim.
Am I the only one who the first-gen Legacy’s side view reminds a little of the 1962 Plymouth? It’s the one-eye-squinting look, at least in profile. And the Subie echoed it in the window behind the C pillar. Below the window ledge, of course, the two cars have nothing stylistic in common.
I knew that this was a ’93 – the last of the first generation, by the way – because of this sticker in that window behind the C pillar.
Subaru fanbois could probably accurately date this car by looking at the grille, or some other styling detail that eludes the rest of us. What eludes no one, however, is that this poor car has been plagued by the tin worm. It was surprising to see such an old car in such rough condition in Zionsville, a well-to-do suburb of Indianapolis.
Was this one built in Lafayette? You have to consider that it may be locally built, and while out of place in a well-to-do suburb, the ties to the area are strong enough to keep it alive and in the hands of someone (or kid, or grandchild) who may have had a part in its construction.
Geeze…y’know, I always liked the ’92-’94 Legacy’s styling, but I never really pondered why. You’ve nailed it with the comparison to the ’62 Plymouth, which is a longtime favourite of mine.
(Before I hit the link to read the article, the headline made me wonder if you were maybe going to compare the Citroën XM.)
I had a 93 Legacy wagon quite nice to drive though with the 1800 carb motor (NZ assembly) it was gutless and used a lot of fuel, however it had over 340,000kms racked up when I got it so I guess the reliability was proven it used no oil for the year that I drove it and once I sorted the carb out started easily and ran smoothly, local assembly cars had a sticker on the rear window extolling the virtues of side intrusion bars as a great safety feature the ex JDM models now so common here had none of these safety features.
I think you could look closer to the Subaru’s home with the circa 1980 Nissan Cedric.
Studie’s ’53 to ’56 station wagon was the first thing I thought of. Seen here on the unlikely and probably unreal cop version, allegedly used by South Bend.
(Vince Gardner smoothed out the hiccup in ’57.)
It’s funny how it takes being featured on CC to realize how nonexistent a once common car is these days. I can’t remember the last time I saw any Legacy variant of this generation, but it was easily close to a decade ago.
I always thought these were handsome cars, sort of space-age and futuristic without being weird. The kick-up on the rear quarter windows does look somewhat out of place, but it could be a result of the frame-less door glass on the rear doors.
I always wondered how Subaru got away with the front sidemarker/amber reflector being *behind* the front wheelwell where the ECE turn signal repeater is rather than *ahead* of it like every other vehicle built to FMVSS 108 standards since 1968.
Good catch. This looks like any Euro spec model of a car. Clear signals and fenders markers
Could it be because they started to allow amber bulbs instead of colored glass/plastic?
No, it’s a US car—US, that is, not Canadian—and the North American requirements are still the same as they have been since 1/1/70: sidemarker lights and reflectors, yellow front and red rear. The light can be produced however you want, so you can have a colourless-when-unlit appearance if you want it. Reflectors must reflect yellow in front and red in back, so an all-colourless front-side setup is not possible.
The North American regs do not dimensionally specify where most exterior lights are to be placed. Front sidemarker lights and reflectors are required by Federal (US) and Canada Motor Vehicle Safety Standard № 108 to be “as close as practicable to the front” of the car. That’s it. It’s fully up to the maker what that means for any given car. There is no governmental approval required before the car goes on sale; the maker is fully responsible.
In this case Subaru decided to save money by installing the US sidemarker light/reflector in the same hole used in other markets for the side turn signal repeater, thereby declaring that was as close as practicable to the front of the car. NHTSA, the US regulator, raised an eyebrow and said something to the effect of “We’re not sure we agree with you. Be advised to think about not doing it again, because we’ll keep an eye on it.” Guess they must’ve had such an eye kept on Subaru that they didn’t notice Toyota doing exactly the same thing a few years later with the RAV4.
Transport Canada, the Canadian regulator, took a different tone in their communication to Subaru: “Sorry, those cars may not enter Canada until they comply in full with Canada Motor Vehicle Safety Standard № 108. Make it snappy or they’ll rust on the dock, but they ain’t comin’ in, eh!”
Subaru came back and said “Oh, no, uh-uh, there’s no other place to put the sidemarker”.
Transport Canada said “Sorry, here’s the engineering study proving you could easily have integrated the sidemarker light and reflector into the corner lamp—exactly the way you did on this car’s dimensionally very similar pre-facelift version last year, eh!”
There was some backing and forthing, and finally the agreement was that Subaru would retrofit all the cars with yellow front side reflex reflectors in the sidewall of the corner park/turn lamp. They did not redesign the lamp units to incorporate an amber reflector. Instead they bought peel-and-stick yellow retroreflective sheeting die-cut to look almost like it kinda belonged on the lamp, and affixed it. There was still no front sidemarker lamp except the one behind the wheel, but there was a reflector. This was good enough to satisfy the relevant regulator’s priority in terms of the safety performance of the system: sidemarker lights are very nice, good to have, but he was mostly concerned what happens if you’re in a crash of some kind and you wind up stopped blocking the road, positioned across it. Your car is electrically disabled; you have no lights. It’s dark out. The only thing giving drivers coming along the road an inkling of your presence is those sidemarker reflectors, and if drivers are to avoid hitting you, they have to be able to accurately judge the length and position of your car.
As those cars grew older, it started becoming common to see cars in Canada repaired with a US-spec unit (no side reflector sticker). Now one seldom sees a Subaru of this vintage any more. This is the only picture I could find at the moment.
(Toyota wound up having to put stick-on reflector film discs on that RAV4 in Canada, too!)
Wow. That’s a great explanation. Thanks!
If you want to be able to see better at night, especially on an older car, check out his website. I got some Cibie headlights from him at least 15 years ago that are still on my dad’s old Corvette.
Fascinating explanation as always!
It is same with the turn signal indicators being as far apart as possible’. Ford Focus (US version, 2000-2003) has them less than two feet apart on the nose, making it hard to tell apart from distance.
That’s the problem with NHTSA and FMVSS as I have pointed out in the comment under other article. It’s like left hand doesn’t know what the right hand does. Some regulations are so stringent and clear while others are feeble and idiotic. Take the turn signal indicators doubling as daytime running lamps on GM vehicles (Buick Century, for instance) in the 1990s as an example of the latter.
I’ve always been boggled that in our regulation-heavy environment, red turn signals and turn signals sharing a lens with the brake lights remains legal. Both strike me as pointlessly allowing ambiguity in a place where ambiguity is especially problematic.
It’s not really accurate to say America has a regulation-heavy environment with respect to car lights. The UN/Euro regs are actually more prescriptive and restrictive, because they operate on the basis that anything not explicitly permitted is forbidden. The US regs are opposite: anything not explicitly forbidden is allowed.
That said, red rear turn signals are one of the bigger deficiencies of the American regs, and are a major peeve of mine. Read more about that here. When yellow (“amber”) rear turn signals are required in America, I can die happy; I expect to live a long and cranky life.
It’s not “as ______ as possible”, it’s “as _______ as practicable“. The difference matters; here’s a NHTSA letter describing why (and mentioning an even worse case of those crammed-together Ford turn signals: the ’96+ Mercury Sable). Another NHTSA interpretation showing their thinking on this issue is here (guess they finally decided enough was enough after the Subaru Legacy and then the Toyota RAV4).
It’s a mistake to think the American lighting regulations are categorically inferior to the UN (ECE, “European”) regs, or vice-versa. Both systems have roughly the same relative amounts of strength and weakness. They both have inadequacy, blind spots, loopholes, shortcomings, etc. That’s true no matter what angle we look at them from: what lights and reflectors are and aren’t required, the performance standards and technical prescriptions for the various functions, compliance and enforcement mechanisms, etc. The specific deficiencies differ, but that’s all. For every shortcoming we can name in the American lighting regs, we can name one in the UN lighting regs.
It would be nice if the longrunning, ongoing efforts toward a worldwide set of lighting standards were more integrative and less of a popularity contest. Yes, the UN regs are the world’s most popular by number of countries, but that shouldn’t be dispositive when the question is how to have one worldwide standard acceptable to everyone. The Japanese standard (JIS D-5500) had a lot to recommend it, but it got steamrollered and bulldozed by the UN regs. And there are things about the UN regs that are legitimately just not acceptable to countries like the US and Canada.
The turn signal DRLs you mention as “feeble and idiotic” are actually neither of those things. They’re actually pretty good, definitely better than some other kinds of DRLs (high beam…) and not worthy of scorn. Given the choice I’d rather have a performant functionally-dedicated white LED DRL, but if it’s a choice between a good turn signal DRL and a poor dedicated DRL, I’ll take the turn signal DRLs every time. If it’s a choice between a crummy turn signal DRL and a crummy dedicated DRL, then I’m going to bіtch and squawk!
Oops, I guess we’re not really talking about Subarus any more…
I always look forward to Daniel Stern’s comments. Always, and I mean always, an insightful and deep dive into some of the most mundane aspects of automotive design, manufacturing, and marketing; presented in a fascinating and fun to read manner. You have a gift, sir.
Hey, thanks very kindly for that, Frankster! »doffs cap«
FWIW, Dan wrote a good essay on amber vs red turn signals, too… It’s at -> https://www.acarplace.com/2018/01/index/
To me, this was Peak Subaru. As long as you could hold the body together.
We inherited my mom’s 92 Legacy wagon and drove it for a couple years, until the trans gave way because the fluid leaked out and our son, who had it while in college, was still learning about keeping the fluids topped.
It always intrigued me that the station wagon didn’t have a kick-up. Instead, the window line continued in an unbroken line to the D-Pillar (hidden by the wrap-around tailgate), where there was a kick-down to the tailgate glass. See pretty pic below.
Back in the ’90s my parents traded their Ford Telstar station wagon on a gen-1 Legacy – a 1989 2.0 GT wagon. The first turbo vehicle we’d had in the family and boy was it phenomenally quick! Sure, there was bucketloads of turbo-lag, but even so it was an absolute hoot to drive, albeit with slightly lifeless steering.
That omission could be due to the wagon offering two differing roof heights; I could see an upward kink working with the tall roof version, but not the low version pictured. Better to have one set of equally good looking rear glass windows seems logical.
A Liberty (Legacy) RS Turbo was the third car I owned. Very fast, fun to drive and very easy to drive extremely fast too with neutral predictable handling. Along with my current Golf R, the best car I’ve even owned.
My dream car was the 2nd generation Legacy RS-B sedan (no kink in the waistline on that one! ) which was probably peak Subaru but the idiots at Subaru Australia didn’t import them whilst our lucky NZ cousins got loads of them.
Loved the Gen 1 Subaru 2.2 estate I had for a few years. Great air suspension. Planned to keep it forever but – when I loaned it to someone he managed to total it. Later I bought a 3.0 Outback which was a nice car but it did not move me as much as the old Legacy. Sold it – now have an AWD Jaguar X-type 3.0.
Wow, what a find! My dad had a 1993 Subaru Legacy wagon rustier than this that had a rear shock tower break due to rust in 2008. It spent all 343K Miles in Central New York, was on its second engine and second transmission. I found his Legacy to be a bit small since riding shotgun could get a bit cramped and practicing stick shift I kept hitting the kick panrl with my knees.
I still see a few of these in Oregon and since the rust does not kill them I am not sure what does.
I used to see a RHD gen I Legacy wagon around here doing rural mail delivery, but it’s been at least 10 years since I’ve seen it. It was the maroon metallic color that so many of these were and didn’t look the least out of place anywhere other than the location of the wheel. For a while I saw a couple of ex-Japan RHD Cherokees, too, which could be spotted by their tall rear headrests and external spare tire.
The other one that comes straight to me is the Austin Montego, albeit with a definitive C pillar ahead of the jump. The estate was straight through though, just like the Subaru.
On a mostly related note, we recently visited Jackson Hole – gloriously beautiful and apparently the highest density of Subaru wagons outside of their factory. Naturally as a proud 2nd gen Legacy wagon owner, I had to document it:
http://davesanborn.blogspot.com/2016/09/the-infinite-subaru-wagons-of-jackson.html