2006 Subaru B9 Tribeca Limited

2006 Subaru B9 Tribeca Limited - Then, when Subaru decided to climb onto the bandwagon by jacking up a wagon and calling it an SUV (the Outback), we thought nobody would fall for that one. Guess again. Subaru has sold far more Outbacks than Legacys. Now Subaru has introduced a real SUV in the B9 Tribeca, and we like it a lot. Let's hope we're not wrong with this one.

With a full-time all-wheel-drive mechanism lifted from the flat-six Legacy and Outback models, the Tribeca has all the ingredients of a competitive SUV, taking on comparable rivals from Honda, Lexus, BMW, and others at a price that starts at just over 30 grand for the five-passenger model. In seven-passenger Limited form (which adds leather upholstery, heated front seats, and a 160-watt, nine-speaker stereo) and optioned up with navigation and DVD-entertainment equipment, our test Tribeca rang the register to the tune of $38,320.

Clearly, Subaru plans to offer compelling value along with the interesting styling that sets this new SUV sharply apart from its rivals. When the car made its debut at the Detroit auto show last January, it created mixed responses. Most criticism was centered on the car's prominent nose.

He was chiefly responsible, they said, for the interior design. Yeah, maybe, but it wouldn't have taken more than slight tweaking of the grille and taillights to get that Alfa look, and we suspect that's how it went. Either way, we like the man's designs, particularly the interior. Viewed from above, the dashboard forms a large M shape as it flows from the doors to the center console.

In any event, the driver's seat is a good place to be. Although not aggressively bolstered, the seats are firmly supportive and produced no discomfort during an intensive drive from San Francisco to Los Angeles. The steering wheel is a tidy three-spoke design with integrated radio controls, and the optional navigation system proved simple and intuitive in use.

The 250-hp flat-six engine feels pretty torquey and responsive in normal use, spinning to a 7000-rpm redline with a characteristic flat-six purr. The five-speed automatic shifts smoothly if somewhat slowly in response to kickdown, and it has reasonably tightly stacked ratios between first and fourth. Fifth is a long strider, and it has the gearbox hunting rather intrusively when trying to hold a high cruising speed on a gradient.

But that's at the track, where we encountered a problem with the manumatic system, which was shifting prematurely, so we reverted to full automatic.