It happened out of the blue the other day, and now it happens every other time i start the car.
It sounded like a crunch and grind sound, then the CEL came on. code 0407-crankshaft position sensor.

The noise went away for a few days so I reset my CEL. Now I still get the hard start, but the CEL doesn't come on.

Hard starts only when the motor is cold.

How much in parts and labor to fix this? I think I might get stranded without repairing it soon.

 

You can easily do this yourself.... there are two Crankshaft position sensors - the POS and the REF - both are easy to replace. The POS sensor affects starting. You may want to pull and cleanout that sensor (metal shavings) and attach it again and see if that fixes your problem.

 

Replacing them takes 10 mins at most.

 

Where are the sensors located? Which is which?

 

things that go BUMP in the night.

 

i am guessing it is in the haynes manual or in the fsm which you can dl if you look in general maxima discussion forum