My Max pulls sleightly to the right when I am on a flat surface. I talked to the dealer, and he said that Nissan in their "infinite wisdom" built the Maxima this way, as a safety precaution and that there was nothing I could do. It sounded like a bunch of crap to me. Any insights?

 

That sounds like a bunch of crap to me. Check your tire pressure and see if they are unevenly worn and if they are that could play a big part in it pulling to one side. Also make sure the wheels are balanced. If none of that works, I'd take it to get the car aligned.

 

Your car may
- need alignment
- have a dragging right front brake (feel both front rotors after a ten-minute drive; they should be equally warm)
- have a defective tire (swap front tires and see if the direction of pull changes)

 

I just had my tires re-balanced (Thanks Daniel for all of your previous steering wheel shake help, this fixed most of that) When I break slowly and take my hands off the wheel, it goes straight for the most part, unless the road isn't flat. So I don't think that it is the break pads. I heard that someone had this problem and it went away when they bought new shocks and struts. Is this what I will have to do?

 

Struts contain shocks, so you would not buy "shocks and struts". However, it is unlikely that struts are causing this problem. Worn struts do not cause pull to one side.

There is a long-shot possibility that you have a weak or broken spring. This would cause one front corner of the car to ride lower than the other and cause the car to drift or pull to one side. A good front-end man checks tire pressure and ride height as the initial steps in an alignment. He would catch this problem.

Again, I urge you to swap front wheels and see if the symptom changes. That test isolates wheel/tire problems from steering/spring/brake problems. It narrows the field of inquiry.

 

Assume something simpler. Does the car only pull to the right, or sometimes pull to the left? Some/most roads are crowned, meaning that they are higher in the middle and sloped on the sides. Sometimes the crown is almost inperceptible. If the road is crowned to any great degree, the car will 'pull' in the direction of the crown. It could be the tires or a suspension component, but always assume something simpler first. BTW, do you have anything in the car ,besides yourself, that weighs alot?

 

Nothing else in the car but me. I'm going to check all of the standard stuff again (tire pressure, check tightness of lugs, and hopefully find a really flat surface.)