When driving at night over most roads, a slight bump will cause the headlights to jitter appearing to turn-off momentarily. This is a re-occurring incident
Lights
Subaru Solterra Lighting problems by year
4 complaints filed with NHTSA about the Subaru Solterra's lights. Headlights, tail lights, brake lights, turn signals and interior lighting failures.
Lighting complaints by model year
Latest Solterra lighting complaints
There is a major design flaw with the car. The headlights are mounted on the bumper which is plastic. Because there is not enough rigidity in the plastic bumper and the sharp cutoff of the LEDs, the headlights appear to flicker and strobe when going over small bumps or imperfections in the roads. Drivers on the imposing lane will sometimes flash their high beams as they think I'm flashing them.
The low beams headlights, when you go over a bump they visibly shake, it is distracting. I checked forums and other owners are complaining of same problem with this model.
We hit a stationary deer at night. Afterwards, we found an open recall: WRG23-1: Forward recognition camera reprogramming 2023 Subaru Solterra, but Subaru refused to investigate as they claim animals (suddenly appearing) are a carve out on their liability. However, the deer wasn't leaping, it was already frozen in the road. The headlights only illuminated its knees, too late for the driver to stop before impact. It could have just as easily been a person, or other heavy road debris. The incident was on a dark...
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highway bypass, with slight left curve, so poor headlights hampered the driver & automatic systems from stopping in time. The headlights angle down (tilts & dims from brights automatically for oncoming cars) instead of illuminating the road properly, neither the driver nor the braking system can detect an object. The regular lights have an abnormally short distance. Only the brights setting illuminates a sufficient braking distance, & those can't be used with oncoming traffic. The headlights have a hard limit on the top, instead of 2 circles of light. The driver, also an engineer, said that the camera needs a certain level of lighting to detect objects, & they probably didn't test these systems together on a dark country road. Normal illumination could have prevented or lessened the damage/danger, swivel headlights would have been best. A driver needs a certain distance illuminated for braking distance at speed, unless the camera is radar or infrared: it needs light too. The front 1/3 of the car was peeled off, causing over $15k in damages. Several body panels ripped off, the wiring harness was ripped out. There were no warnings before the impact. No automatic braking occured. No airbags were deployed. There is a police report. Road was dark, clear and dry. The driver was sober, attentive and going the speed limit. A camera reprogramming without a headlight fix will not solve this safety issue, & we told Subaru as much. This situation may apply to Toyota.
Source: U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) complaints and recalls, checked daily. Complaints are owners' own reports and are not verified. How we use the data