The caller’s front brakes were dragging and all the usual causes were considered, except that I believe the Subaru’s parking brake is on the front caliper.
That might have been the case…many years ago, but not in recent memory.
I have owned Subarus beginning with the '97 model year, and the parking brake is most definitely on the rear wheels–on those little drums set into the center of the rear brake rotors.
Had similar, if not same problem. A professional auto mechanic did moonlight work on it - so it was an experience to work with and look over the shoulder of a good, conscientious pro (according his observation and experience though, a good deal of the paid mechanics are not conscientious, and even not very good; but that is a whole other discussion). After much thought, research and examination, he finds a nearly frozen pivot in the hill-holder linkage. Rather than try to repair or replace it, we decide to sever the cable to the linkage thus disabling the hill-holder. We go went about repairing the front brakes; the right front brake was the one that got mostly cooked. As I recall, no brake-line kinks were found. Think the hill-holder only engages the front brakes, but one brake had been dragging more. Of course, after cooking the brakes, the brake fluid must be replaced as well. This fixed the problem, no dragging brakes after that. Forgot the hill-holder; simply used the park brake with the button disengaging the ratchet to hold the car when starting from a stop going uphill.
Was such a drag to have dragging brakes; and I too drove it for quite a while before fixing.