ive had my 00 se 5spd for about three months so far and it doesntseem worth it anymore, it pulls really hard to the right, just need an lignment so not a biggy, it makes some creaks that make my SHO look good. it really seems like im dragging something because it runs really slow and always seems to have some grinding or something when driving, as if something were rubbing. and it seems the ride is bouncy. is that normal. and has anybody else seen thier front end go up a bit when a stb is installed?

 

Well, what can we say. Get the alignment. Have the brakes checked (for the 'dragging' feel) to make sure all is well, especially the e-brake adjustment. Check out the bearings as well. Bouncy: this one could be worn/wearing struts/shocks or possibly tires. Since you have a 2000 SE and they came with both 16" and 17" tire/wheel combos, which do you have? Are you comparing to the SHO? What did it have?

As for the FSTB, are you sure you installed it properly and not overly tightened anything, especially the bar adjustment itself? It should be snug, but not so tight as to possibly distort the towers inward or outward, depending on the adjustment.

As for the general attitude toward the car, did you not take it for a test before you bought it and notice these things? Pulling, dragging, and rattles should show up in any 5-10 minute test.

 

thanks for being a voice of reason... since my friend rode in my 2k2 now he's embarrassed to let me ride in his. There is no way you can compare a max to a SHO (imo).

ColdSHO, don't tell us you know there are things wrong with your car then complain about not liking the car because of those things. Get them checked/fixed and then see how much you like it.

 

No problem.

 

Check the e-brake...might be frozen up.

 

brakes check out all right e-brakes good, tires are new and balanced correctly, made three trips for that. think bouncing is just the roads, i dont have it all the time. i hit a big bump about a week after i got the car maybe that did something. if so aany ideas what i could have bent/broken? i really think thats the problem. i have 17s and the car rode perfect on the test drive. lasted a week or so b4 the coilpacks all had to be replaced, what luck. sure glad the warrity doesnt cover things like engines, that would have made things far too easy. besides these little problems i really enjoy the car, soon as i start modding ill enjoy it more, just gotta sell my SHO . btw how can i change my sn, i am no longe one of the SHO people, i have been reborn!

 

How can you claim to be reborn when all you do is COMPLAIN about the 2k2. When you say that you 'hit a big bump' well, hello, wouldn't that be a crying factor in a potential problem? If you are having problems with it, take it to a dealer that you know is good (check the place out first... look at the service bay, talk to the service manager... if they are willing to talk to you and don't talk down to you, then go there)... let them find out what is wrong with it.

I just bought a Max last week... my first one... I had an Intrepid, will never go back. I'm not reborn, man... I'm now newly born into the Maxima crowd!

-R

p.s. Not all Nissan dealers are cool. My g/f's '00 Max had a check engine light... we had it looked at by M'Lady Nissan and they tried to claim it was the vacuum canister and wanted to charge $300. We didn't have them fix it (wanted a second opinion). But then the check engine light never went on again, and no problem. We took it to Woodfield Nissan, and they didn't find any problem with the vacuum canister (go figure). They just found the 'normal' service items (microfilter, etc).

 

Tis true. The SHO was doing 14's back in the 80's Glad to Nissan is finally catching up

 

Yeah but look at the fact that Ford had to supercharge that weak @$$ engine just to be able to put out the kinda power that Nissan has in a normally aspirated VQ engine.

If you wanna make this a fair argument, let's supercharge the VQ in any Max, then we'll show that SHO what a real supercharged car should be like.

 

uhh, not only that, how many of the SHO of the 80's do you see on the streets, or should I say junk yard?

 

Ummm, Ford never supercharged a SHO. There are plenty of guys that have done this aftermarket, but in stock NA form, the SHO put out 220hp, 73.3 hp/L (versus 72.7 hp/L for the VQ). The boosted cars routinely put down over 400hp to the wheels (475+ at the crank), with the big dogs putting down a lot more. You must be thinking of the GTP and it's eaton supercharged 3.8.

 

Perhaps you're thinking of the Thunderbird SC???

 

You're porbably right - it is probably not worth what you paid for it.

At least you had an opportunity to investigate the poor quality of the 2000 Maxima before you bought it.

Sell it now while you still can and save yourself the hassle of making the Service Manager at your Nissan dealership your new best friend and dependent (he will suck every dollar you have out of you just like a kid).

 

Disagree with your POS statement, I have over 114k on my 2k Max and it is performing flawlessly, maybe that individual car has a few problems but overall I can't see how you can validate that as a POS.

My POS still runs and looks good and gets over 25mpg in the city and 31mpg on the highway, the engine is ultra-quiet and other than Nissan's POS auto tranny I haven't had any problems with my car.

So if having one or two problems with a car classifies it as a POS, then I guess we all will be driving a POS sooner or later.

 

OOps my fault, your mistake, jk. Actually I was thinking of the T-bird and thanks for catching that.

 

Check any other car in its class - see if you can find one with more problems.

Nissan claims it is worth $30K brand new - I would think for $30K they could do better than they have done.

Probably every owner has had a problem with a major component very early on in ownership - maybe the car itself is not a POS, but the components or the assembly are not up to the standard of a $30K automobile.

 

You mentioned that you hit a big bumb and the car is riding bouncy, if you blew a strut that could definatly cause a bouncy ride... might have knocked the allignment off a bit also.

 

Which Max are you talking about? You must be talking about the 2k2/2k3, because that is the only Max besides the 04 which isn't out yet that has ever even came close to that price. This thread was about a 2k, which to my knowledge has never stickered for 30k or even close.

Besides that, all the TSB's or problems that you may be thinking about, none has happened to my car, except the tranny problem other than that ditto. I'm certain that there are other org members that can vouch for the reliability of their 2k's as well.

I agree with some components used in the Max are not up to snuff but that doesn't make the car a POS as you've stated. Assembly wise Nissan doesn't do the best job in their cars but I suspect that that is changing and will continue to get better now that Nissan is having a lot of sales success with their products.

In the early 2002 to 2003 Nissan used a lot of cost cutting measures to get their products out to be able to maintain the high sales that they received from the 2k/2k1 model line up, I think those measures showed up in some of the quality issues you may be referring to.

Overall it is still a good car, btw what kinda car do you drive?

 

I drive a 2000 GLE.

The actual sticker on my car was $29,900 - I only paid $26, but still - Nissan seems think it was work nearly 30K.

Just based on my review of the Nissan Maxima and Altima (3.5) using the NHSTA site with cars like the Accord, Camry, etc. I noticed the Maxima and the Altima have quite a few more TSBs than those other makes.

In general - I should probably agree with you that it is a good car - but in the last 3 months all of these problem have just started piling up.

I did not drive my car a lot the first 18 months of ownership, but I drove almost twice as much over the last 12 months and all of a sudden - problems.

I'm concerned that over the long term this is not a very good car - I'm going to go back and try to get this transmission thing corrected for good - I'm just concerened that this will be one of those cars that the nagging problems will continue and almost always overshadow any enjoyment the car provides.

I have read enough posts here and at other sites and in general I think the Nissan quality recently (last 3 years or so) is not the same as what it was.

I think the original post of this thread compared the 2000 SE to a Ford SHO. Don't know much about the SHO, but it does not surprise me that this driver is disappointed in his Max.

I have also noticed a number of people trading in the 2000 for a 02/03 - but it does not seem to me the quality has improved as this model aged - and now they have a new Gen Maxima - no doubt it will carry its own set of problems.

I think Nissan is probably not alone in this regard - I know Honda and Toyota have recently been receiving some bad press for a drop in quality - I think some of it has to do with them wanting to push buyers into their luxury brands.

Hopefully after another trip to the dealer I will finally have something good to say about the Maxima - but if anyone were to ask me today (in fact, a friend asked me about a month ago and I told him to buy an Acura TL) I would not recommend a Maxima.

 

I know that we've gotten a lil OT but I'm sorry that you are having so many problems with your GLE, like I said, I haven't had any problems except the tranny.

Are you still under warranty? The Acura is a nice vehicle and I probably would've opted for that when I first bought my Max but it was too much (price wise) for my account.

Even still maybe you ought to look into trading for a G35 since you like the luxury models, I think you'll find it a great car, plus it has rwd and the VQ engine.

Good Luck with the car and I would say don't blame your particular make but rather Nissan for their cost cutting measures.

 

well its new brake time already, had to panicbrake from like 60 or so, barely stopped and i was grinding the whole time, car didnt have any probs braking before. and il get my springs put in soon, ill see then if everything is the way it should.

i havent had a good chance to race my max vs my SHO on a fair plane yet, last time my SHO had a problem with its secondaries working, so i had no torque. and its auto, and the SHO was about a 2 car lengths ahead of me by 60 and kept on puling away, love to see a race betwen them now, now that the SHO is runnin good again

as far as handeling goes, the SHO has eibachs, tokicos , fstb, new bushing, sway bar endlinks, and other minor suspension ungrades, so the differance between my two cars is amazing, as long as you dont get sick from the rough ride, hopeing with some suspension upgrades my max will have a chance of coming close to the abilities of the SHO, shouldn't be to hard.

i still attend SHO meetings, iasked the guys if i could bring my Max to oneof the meets to see what it would run agaist them, they seemed less than thrilled. I'd really enjoy a friendly battle of sorts between the two, could be intresting.

 

Um, didn't Yamaha make their engines, not ford?

Great engines, my brother had a SHO. Couldn't say much about the rest of the car... Now it's a dented, rusty heap (ouch)

 

Built by Ford and assembled by Yamaha "I think"...but I don't know for sure. Would be fun to play with one.

 

Wasn't it ABS working? If you put R4S pads or similar you can brake as many times as you pleased from that speed, no probs here ...

Mike.

 

Originally posted by zoner
Um, didn't Yamaha make their engines, not ford?

If memory serves me correct-the short block by Ford,the heads and intake by Yamaha.I do believe Yamaha also assembled the engines in Japan and shipped them back to the states.
I owned a 1990 SHO and I gotta tell ya, as far as bang for the buck, this car was in a similar league with the Max. Great engine,so,so tranny/shifter, better handling and braking than the Max, similar build quality and that was 13 years ago. It was certainly ahead of it's time!!!

 

As far as quality goes, I can understand peeps being unhappy with their 5Th gen Max. I'm probably one of the biggest complainers about my 2K Max that you'll find on the org. I paid $22.5 nearly two years ago for a 222HP car with 17' wheels, sport suspension, leather, sunroof, sport suspension, spoiler, well I think you get my drift. The car had been used for one year and had 17K on it. If you guys are barely buying 2K cars, what happened when you did your research? Did you not get any red flags on our supposedly POS cars? Try using the internet, it's FREE at your local library if you don't have a PC at home. I've been researching the G35 coupe for three months now and will settle for a 2K4 next Winter. I've done extensive research and have found that, just like my Max, it's the best bang for the buck in what I can afford. It's no 2K3 E500, but, for the next three years it'll do. And please you guys, don't compare a Japanese car to a POS American car with a Yamaha engine, don't even go there. When was the last time you didn't hear major squeaks and rattles coming from the inside of an American car, even after only 10K?

 

Well, about 3 minutes ago I would say. Now, I am not on here saying the Taurus build quality is up to some of the Japanese cars, but please don't buy into the anti-american car crap and become all disallusioned. My well taken care of 90 with 100k on it has nary a wrinkle, scratch, squeak or rattle. The turbo 90, well, it has lived a hard and fast life. Either way, none of my SHO's (and I have owned and still own many), have been POS's.

 

my SHO is an amazing car but i needed a change, since my auto trans died on me at 100k i just got a fps one, just being able to rip second gear at 55 in an automatic taurus is just fun when onlookers are present. it was actually a coworker that had a slightly modded 4th gen that got me into maxs, i just wanted one better than his, just a guy thing i suppose. besides the trans my SHO has been great, no matter how i drive it or anything, my max feels as though i take a turn to fast its gonna fall apart. im slightly paranoid im aware, but for how much i paid for this thing it shouldnt feel so cheap. i understand cars have bad brakes, but having Max brakes be worse than my little warping SHO ones. i dont ever brake hard, or drive stupid, ill have to see how it is when i get new pads/rotors, i think im just gonna do the frints for now, backs seem fine.

one more problem ive noticed is than the first time i get to about 30ish my car starts like jerking and pulsating, doesnt matter what gears its in, and it only does it once, its very violent at times, any ideas what that is?

oh yeah one more, my car runs very poorly under 2k rpm, it like chugs and such, but if im accelerating, even just a little its fine, im thinking it has to do with the intake being so restrictive, ill get a coldair as soon as i can anyways, any thoughts on that could help.

and the SHO engine, well the 3.0/3.2 were designed and built in japan and sent here, where supposedly ford detuned them from 300hp to 220hp. the 3.4SHO engine was more ford/yamaha design and built.

i have found information on a specific type of taurus/sable thats very special, its a prototype standard body with a 350+hp duratech/yamaha, i think engine and a differant trany, i believe 6spd, with a lightened body, around 2400lbs, there were very few made and i read that most were destroyed, i would love to get my hands on one of those, sorry for my lack of knowledge on the subjuct, i have found very little about these, and some is just rumors.

Knowledge is power, know your enemy

btw how much do 5spd/auto gen 5's wieght?