Brake pads OEM Subaru or Hawk Performance
If your just daily driving the car, with some spirited back road runs, Hawk HPS 5.0 should do the trick. Low dust, low noise, good bite, and consistent performance.
I put hawk street 5.0 pads on mine a few months ago. They are good, def better than oem.
Hawk HPS pads are a massive performance improvement over stock pads, with a more linear break feel (aka less initial bite). low dust, low noise, highly reliable.
I have the Hawk HPS and they're a little less initially bitey but seem to stop just as well when I put the brakes on, which is nice for a daily.
I was hugely disappointed, because the pads are great. TBH, it's basically a low- to mid-tier race pad, so the price is not that ridiculous. I put quite a few track days on them and after trying out some other aftermarket pads, I actually went back to the OEM pads for 3-season street use.
My favorite autocross pad is Hawk HP+, but they dust like crazy and some sets are extremely squeaky for some reason. But they are mad consistent in all temps (except track where they fade at high speeds like any street pad) and the bite is absolutely fantastic and easy to modulate.
I've been using Hawk 5.0 They're marketed as a "high performance street" pad. I've done track days with them and theyve held up but they're "street" enough that they don't take forever to get warm. Maybe it's my lack of experience with other pads but they are kinda dusty.
Always had good luck in the past with Hawk HPS pads.
I had an 2017 Outback 2.5, had it since April of 2017 until last week, during that time I put on 93k km on it. I wish I had gotten the 3.6, I got the 2.5 hoping to save fuel, my average was around 25mpg for lifetime, and I drive a lot on hwy and country road, I never once was able to hit the 30mpg even if it's just me in the car and driving 50mph on the country road, this part I really feel like Subaru should correct their mpg reading, in winter it can get as bad as 18mpg in the freezing weather, as when it's cold the transmission will make the engine constantly rev at higher to warm it up, the 2.5 is also not a smooth engine when at idle, I had a vibration issue that was deemed normal. Overall, it's a reliable car, but its not a durable car, another thing is, when taking off quickly from a stop, it can really bog down, most people are used to first gear and just boot, but these CVT don't have first gear and it can be rather unexpected, I've almost got hit from behind a couple times from that. The eyesight is a good feature, the lane departure can be annoying at times but I was ok with it, these cars have an issue with windshield chipping, and if the car has eyesight, the windshield need to be a specific one and then the eyesight needs to be re-calibrated, this happened to me TWICE, and it got expensive very quick. OEM tires are lousy, by lousy I mean it doesn't even get good mpg, doesn't get good grip in ANY condition and puncture easily if you take it to any sort of gravel road, I had puncture the tire within 1200km, I just got some decent A/T tires after, no problem for the last 90k. The brakes are soft, so first thing I did was changed the pads.
How were the brakes? My concern with towing is the brakes. I have not towed anything mainly for this reason. I find the brakes to be a weak point of the car and the rear pads wear out very quickly, on the 2013 version anyway. I am not a heavy footed driver, no fast starts, no slamming of brakes at lights and stop signs. Keep things nice and smooth, no riding of brakes, no fast corners which would engage the rear brakes more due to the vector control system (whatever they call it). Rear brakes wear fast and overall braking is fair. Your thoughts from a trailer perspective? Thx!!!
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