Wiring harness or short circuit on the 2000 Subaru Outback
Only 3 reports for this mode came with an odometer reading, which is too few for percentiles to mean anything. The page is here because someone linked to it; treat the figures as anecdotes, and see the full report for this year instead.
When wiring harness or short circuit gets reported
There are 4 reports of wiring harness or short circuit on the 2000 Subaru Outback, 3 with a mileage attached. That is too few to place the failure on the odometer with any confidence.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 88,000 miles. It is the 20th most-reported problem on this model year.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| — | — | 110,000 miles | — | — |
Read the 10th percentile as “one report in ten arrived this early”. Exact figures are shown in this table because it is the table of record; everywhere else on the site they are rounded to the precision the sample can carry.
What a percentile can and cannot tell you here
These five numbers describe the readings owners gave, in order. The median is the middle one: half the reports arrived below it. The 10th and 90th are the edges of the bulk of the distribution, and the distance between them is the part worth reading. A tight spread — say 70,000 to 95,000 miles — points at something that wears out on a schedule, and the schedule is knowable. A wide one, 20,000 to 190,000, points at a fault that hits some cars and never troubles others, which means the mileage on the listing in front of you tells you very little about your odds.
What these figures are not is a survival curve. Every reading here comes from a car whose owner filed a complaint, so the sample contains only failures: it cannot say what share of the fleet made it past 150,000 miles untouched, because those owners had nothing to report. Nor is the mileage the moment of failure — it is the odometer reading as recalled at the time of filing, which may be weeks later and is sometimes rounded to the nearest ten thousand by the person typing it.
Percentiles are shown at all only once 8 readings exist for the vehicle and mode. Below that the middle of a handful of numbers is noise wearing a decimal point, so the figures are withheld rather than dressed up.
What happens, and what it costs
Putting it right typically runs $400–$3,500 at an independent US shop. That range is an editorial estimate held in this site's failure-mode catalogue, not a figure from NHTSA, and it is a repair cost rather than a diagnosis cost.
The same failure on other years
The same failure is reported on 8 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2013, at a median of 40,000 miles, and latest on the 2009 at 120,000 miles.
By volume the 2005 carries the most reports, with 12; the 2000 has 4. A mode that appears across most years of a model is usually a design choice rather than a bad batch.
If one year stands out to the left, that is the year to avoid; if the whole line sits at a similar mileage, this is wear rather than a defect in one production run.
Tick median reported mileage Solid middle half of reports Faint 10th to 90th percentile Colour how bad the failure is when it happens
What owners wrote
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint narratives, trimmed for length. The mileage is the one the owner gave.
The tps has been replaced twice, all leads from the wiring harness have been ground and lubricated, but the transmission shift shock remains. The manufacturer's technical department, having made the former guesses on the tps replacement and leads, suggests replacing the ECM and tcm to see if that corrects the problem. The severe shift shock is the most current problem with this egregiously defective vehicle in which all major parts have been replaced since purchasing it new, the repair cost so far equivalent to the purchase price. There is 126,000 miles on the odometer and this vehicle has had only one owner who has always driven it with the utmost care. The vehicle in its current state since july 2010 is dangerous to drive - without following an obvious pattern, the at dashboard light flashes and within seconds there is severe shift shock, on highways at 65mph and in congested traffic at 10mph. The engine has to be turned off immediately so that the computer components can hopefully reset, which resetting does not always happen. If the engine is not switched off, the severe shift shock continues. Having this happen at any speed…
The tps has been replaced twice, all leads from the wiring harness have been ground and lubricated, but the transmission shift shock remains. The manufacturer's technical department, having made the former guesses on the tps replacement and leads, suggests replacing the ECM and tcm to see if that corrects the problem. The severe shift shock is the most current problem with this egregiously defective vehicle in which all major parts have been replaced since purchasing it new, the repair cost so far equivalent to the purchase price. There is 126,000 miles on the odometer and this vehicle has had only one owner who has always driven it with the utmost care. The vehicle in its current state since july 2010 is dangerous to drive - without following an obvious pattern, the at dashboard light flashes and within seconds there is severe shift shock, on highways at 65mph and in congested traffic at 10mph. The engine has to be turned off immediately so that the computer components can hopefully reset, which resetting does not always happen. If the engine is not switched off, the severe shift shock continues. Having this happen at any speed…
Unknown component part/system. Drivers side headlight went out. Checked fuse and bulb which was still good; replaced bulb anyway and it still didn't work. Next day the other headlight also went out. Checked the same things. High beams, fog and parking lights still worked. My son jiggled the bulb socket and wires and the lights came on but now the driver high beam went out. High beam bulb and fuse were both okay. The low beams also now appeared to be yellow. Had to drive at night a few days later (I always drive with my fog lights on unless the high beams are used) and it seemed like I could not see virtually anything ahead of me; the low beams were extremely dim and unsafe to use. Was forced to use my single working high beam. In googling the problems online I came across scores of other people with similar problems. Some replaced the drl module with no change in result. It has to be a socket problem or grounding problem of some sort, or perhaps a wiring problem, though some people replaced the wiring harness to no avail, and replaced pins, clips in the bulb socket assembly. This is dangerous.
Also reported on the 2000 Subaru Outback
Other powertrain problem
Head gasket failure
Other wheel or tire problem
Other suspension problem
Control arm, ball joint or bushing failure
Seat belt or retractor failure
How far this goes
This page is kept out of search results because 4 reports is not enough to publish percentiles from. It stays reachable because somebody looking at this exact car would rather see the reports than be told there are none.
Complaints are voluntary, so 4 is a floor and not a count of affected cars. Mileages are typed in by owners and cluster on round numbers. And the mode itself is assigned by software reading the complaint text, which is reliable in bulk and fallible one report at a time.
Questions this page answers
At what mileage does wiring harness or short circuit happen on the 2000 Subaru Outback?
Across 3 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 110,000 miles. A quarter were filed before — and a quarter after —. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is wiring harness or short circuit on the 2000 Subaru Outback?
4 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.2 per 1,000 vehicles. Complaints are voluntary, so this is a floor rather than a count of affected cars.
What this is and is not. These are the mileages at which owners chose to complain to a federal agency, which is not the same as the mileage at which the part fails on every car. It skews toward failures that happened outside warranty, cost real money, or frightened someone. It is still the only public dataset that carries failure mileage at all, and the shape of a few hundred readings is informative even when a single one is not. Methodology · JSON · this failure on other cars
Source Owner complaints and recall records published by the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, model years 1996–2027 Figures rebuilt Published by AtWhatMileage How every figure is computed