on my 90 legacy i have 2 in the front and 1 in the back. how strong are these. are they designed only for when the car is broke down to tow it? or can i put a chain on there and pull someone out of the mud without the risk of breaking them off.

You are mistaking "Tie down points" with "tow hooks".

 

Different thing, different function, I would consider using a rope on one to temporarily pull a "rolling load", not "stuck in the mud", not "stuck in the snow", and not "rolling load" greater than the weight of your car.

I actually got stuck on some frozen snow once with my suby because it is lowered and my dad pulled me off of it...and we only used 1 tow hook in the front..i think there pretty damn strong.

They seem really solid. I pull cars up onto my trailer by them and also use them to tie the cars down. I think they would hold up to pulling a car out of mud.

I have used them to tow a few cars around seem pretty solid to me.

I pulled an 86 mercury cougar (heavy car ) on a tow rope a little more than 20 miles with no problems at all. And it was alot of stop and go. A week later I used same rope to tow same car out of an unshovled, plowed in driveway. Pulled strong with no problems.

i was thinking they would be strong enough i just wanted another opinion. me and a few friends of mine like to go up on the mountain roads sometimes when we get snow and you never know when someone will need pulled or i will need pulled.

Ive towed many a things from those hooks, havnt snapped one off yet. To be honest i cant really see anything else on the front of most cars thats practical to tow them by.

 

And for those of us without a hitch that like pulling non-soobs out of the mud - what else is there? :-\

The recall on my 95 Legacy had the front tow hooks cut off by the dealer. Seems that a few blokes were ramming steep ramps at speed and setting off their airbags. So, if anybody has a 95 Legacy and still has their front tow hooks, slow down when you make your mad lunchtime dash to your local fast food drive-thru entrance...

 

When I still had them, they were wonderful tie down points for oversized stuff I'd load up on my wagon (kayaks, Home Depot & Lowes stuff, etc.). They looked pretty solid but I wasn't able to put them to any towing test.

 

I was really bummed when I found out my local Subie dealer had cut them off during a routine service stop without my knowlege or consent:mad:

hehe...yes my '96 has that tow hook recall open too. Says if you bump a curb or parking curb with the tow hooks the airbag could go off. Mine are still intact. I used these to pull out my max atv from deep snow last winte.r

I had wondered myself why they were missing on my legacy.