Using synthetic oil helps a lot for residual on components between running the engine. But, since Subaru just settled a huge lawsuit not so long ago regarding breakdowns at lower mileages, I guess the engineering factor isn't as comforting as it once was. We traded in an Outback with less than 70,000 miles that had the defect named in the class action settlement. Do you know of a company that produces custom ECM's for Subaru's? My husband is an engineer, also. He owned repair shops most of his life. He has not only had to repair and rebuild engines, transmissions, etc. that failed due to engineering design flaws, but had to re-engineer to prevent a repeat failure - in other words, if you go back with the same mentality that created the problem, you still have the problem. Auto manufacturers will use a teflon seal in a transmission (instead of a metal one as in years gone by) to save a quarter of a quarter of a cent, that causes the whole transmission to fail. This answer doesn't work for someone that's had to correct engineering design flaws for 30 years.... Having an engine with high rpms, like 2K rpms, before the oil has circulated will definitely have an effect on components. No way around it! And, if the engineers were putting out pure quality with no design flaws then there wouldn't be hundreds of TSB's... to correct problems, and there wouldn't have been a class action lawsuit against Subaru! The Subaru service manager told me it was not possible to change the cold-start idle rpms... And, manufacturers have been known to produce components that will "last the length of the warranty." Thanks for your answer....
