So I started my car earlier to warm it up and I noticed my dash lights were dim, and there was a burning smell. So I pulled over in McDonalds and popped the hood and a flame shot up out of the alternator. Boy that pissed me off. My question is, since I'm the third owner, is this still covered on the Nissan recall of the alternators?

 

im pretty sure youre covered. i purchased my 4th gen 2 years ago making me the second owner and the first thing my mechanic said to me when he saw the car was "warranty/recall alternator" i would just swing by a nissan dealership and check. they should be able to run your vin and tell you from there.

 

Assuming the recall hasn't already been done, yes.

 

was this recall for all 4th gens..?

 

No.

 

the recall, covers maximas within a certain vin number. If your car is in that vin range, you win. If not.... well you get the idea.
I don't know what the range is, but a quick phone call to your dealer will clear that up.

 

Well I lost. Nissan Quoted me at 300 for labor plus the alternator. Hmm, who wants to make some money to fix it for me? In MA

 

yup got that right i used to work for a nissan dealer the servive dept still didnt want to hooked me up, just shop around for youre alternator, and look around for installation prices, when i work there in the part's dept, we mark out parts up to 60% over cost

 

$300 for labor? orly?!

Its about an hour job

 

yup thats how it works, where i as working the labor rate was $98 p/h
thats why service and mechanics went out like bandit's these 30k 60k 100k
services, mechanics would do in less than half an hour,
and remember just cause its a dealer doesnt mean good service

 

if u were in nyc my mechanic would have charged u $75 flat rate, no per hour drama here to put it in, and hes been the family mechanic for 7 long years

 

yea mechanics make me mad sometimes. they are able to charge the the amount of time the manufacture says its supposed to take. even if it takes them 15 minutes they can still charge for 3 hours of labor if that's how long "the book" says it should take.

 

That's a good thing.

Sure, when it takes less than book time to do something, you want to pay actual hours.

But when something takes twice as long as book time, people ***** and moan about how they should only pay book time.

It's one or the other, and quite frankly book time is far better than actual.