Ok, so heres a little background, I bought my car, a 2000 Max GXE, in May from a local dealer and no problems, Aug. rolls around and the MIL light comes on (the day it came on I was on my lunch brake and got on it a bit, not hard, but I got close to 5k rpms briefly, and 10 maybe 15 minutes later I noticed the MIL light was on) and I took it to the dealer, stupid dealer wants to charge me $100 just to read the codes (which took the autozone guy 30 seconds) unless its covered by warranty (I've just got 45k miles on it so im under the 60k warranty) which is absolutely retarded because there is no reason I should have problem with this car, I baby my car and I wouldnt expect even the worst domestic to act up this early.

So anyway, the light went off, came back on, went off again, came back on a week ago and its been driving REALLY rough lately, but the wierd part is, it will drive rough, then go right back to being fine, light still on, and sometimes it gets so rough I'm afraid to put any gas into it at all, and pulling up to a stoplight it feels about ready to stall.

So I'm merging onto I-55 today (didnt even hit 60mph and was just barely up to 3k rpm) and the light starts flashing, I slow down and I'm about to pull over when the light goes solid again, ok, 2 minutes down the road roughness is gone and its driving fine.

My gas mileage is HORRIBLE, I used to be able to drive 110miles for the same gas I now burn through in, oh say 25, MAYBE 30. I had the StupidZone guy pull the codes and I got this:

P1320 once
P0420 twice
P0302 three times.

Which I'm told two of them are misfire on cyl. 2 and bad cat. converter.
He said there was also a dealer unspecified code that I'd have to get the dealer to read (said it wouldnt even give a code, but as stupid as he was I have no idea, he also said there was only 5 other codes, when there was actually 6).

So moral of the story, any suggestion or comments? When I take it into the dealer Tues. (earliest they can get, how lovely) what should I do? I'll be damned if I'm paying $100 THIS early on the car for 30 seconds of their time just to tell me its some dumb sensor they finagle through a loophole in the warranty.

Any info on anyone who has had similar problem who might know what this is, and if its covered by warranty or how I should go about handling the dealership would be greatly appreciated.


Sorry this is so long, but I figure it might be best to deluge you with info that have 50 catchup post of me filling in blanks.

Thank a bunch guys.

-Paul-

(P.S.: As much as it aggravates me that I'm having troubles I'm hard pressed to say I think Nissan is unreliable, my friends 2k max is fine at over twice the miles. Just irks me that this is their policy.)

 

Sounds like a good possibility of a bad ignition coil or two.

 

P1320 - Ignition Coils.... recommend replacing all 6 of them. I first checked the spark pugs to see which coils are bad, found two rear. Replaced them. Transfered the spark plugs to front. Still I was getting misfire. So I replaced all 6 coils to avoid further troubles.
If not replaced in time, it could have brought yer engine to show other codes too.

If under warranty, dealer will replace them at no cost, but mine wasnt at 43k.
So i just bought all 6 for $300 and replaced them myself. Drives better than ever now.

 

Pick up six coils from DaveB at South Point Nissan (check the sticky parts list thread for his info). They should be just under $310 shipped, and no, they're not covered under the 6/60 powertrain warranty. They're easy to swap out -- all you need is a 10mm socket, 10" extension, and an allen wrench that fits the decorative front engine cover (can't remember the size -- it's either 4mm or 5.5mm). BTW, if your friend has 90K and no coil problems yet, he's one of the lucky few.

 

Hi guys, I recently purchased a 2K1 GLE and have about 57K miles on it. I wanted toknow whether there is a way to check and see whether the coils have been replaced already ?
Is there something onthe coils to tell me if theyare the new ones ??
Thanks Paul

 

Not that I could tell. My new ones looked identical to the old ones.

 

There should be a gray dot on the new coil, whereas its missing on the old ones.

 

Thanks TZapper

 

Your kidding right, the extended warranty doesnt cover coil packs? That is so lame....

I can't afford to drop $310 on replacing all the packs.

I assume from the one post that unlike some cars the Maxima has an individual coil pack for each cylinder? So I should be looking at a little over $50 if its no covered....

This is still retarded. My impression of Nissan is going way down as of late. Between the problems on the Z, the new max, the recalls left and right....I'm really beginning to worry.

 

Yeah it sucks what can you do. A petition has been going on for a recall regarding the coils but I doubt it will get through. Problems occur here and there, but genereally japanese cars are known to be less defective. In fact, Nissan stands on third place in America's top cars (less problems) after Lexus and Infinity.

 

The original coils on my 2K also had the gray dot. Just checked again to make sure (I still have them).

 

If you mean the powertrain (6/60) warranty, no, it doesn't. If you look, the powertrain warranty really doesn't cover parts that fail a lot but at the big-ticket items which probably will last 150K+ miles. But if you purchased an extended warranty, that should cover the coil replacements.

If you don't have the money to replace all six, you can always swap them out one at a time until you find the bad one -- and hope you don't have two bad coils. You'll need to purchase one for the front bank and one for the rear bank though since they're different.

 

Heres the deal with the warranty, I bought the car with just around 32k miles, it came with 5/60 warranty, and the dealers three month warranty (which was of course up just a week or two before the light came on). I dont really care much for this dealership because the warranty information I was given consists of nothing more than the warranty sticker in the window....I walked out of the dealer with two pieces of paper, a temp tag-ish deal and another reciept....they sent the registration paperwork and title to the wrong address as well.

And as far as the packs go, I should just have to pull the plugs and check which ones bad to find out which coil pack it is shouldnt I?

Anyone have a link to some info regarding which packs/plugs go with which cyl.????
I imagine that would come in quiet handy.

Thanks again for all the info.

But I still dont understand why it would go from blinking MIL, to steady MIL and rough, to two minutes later driving absolutely fine....maybe I should check connections and make sure everythings on solid.

Heh I just realized I dont even know where the coil packs are on my car

 

'Cause that's they way they fail. Mine did the same thing. Ran fine one minute, rough running with a solid or flashing SES the next. It's not the connections, it's the circuitry within one or more of the coils. Once you remove a connector from one of the coils you'll realize there's no way they can just come loose.

Your best bet is to get yourself a Haynes manual. Each coil sits on top of the plug and is held in by a single 10mm bolt. The front three are under the plastic decorative cover which is held in place with allen screws. The back three aren't under anything, but the one on cylinder #5 is a pain to get to.

 

The three front are under the cover, very easy to replace, The three rear are somewhat harder, but still doable.

Here are pics, mostly related to replacing the spark plugs, but closely connected to coils.

http://www.nissanx.net/tanman/


And here are the pics of me replacing coils, not much details though:

http://hills.ccsf.edu/~amelen01/coils/

 

Great info guys, I still hope its not a coil though....so aggravating. The longer I have this car the less and less I want it. Funny thing was I traded in my old maxima for one costing three times as much because I didnt want to have to worry about stupid things breaking down on it....good call on that one. I am truly disappointed with Nissan, with their dealers and their wonderfull policies and these flaws that, I mean, the MAF sensor problem, come on, its not that hard to make a reliable MAF sensor, and coil packs, one blowing in a freak occurence, ok, but if that many people are having a problem with it, thats just not acceptable.

BTW, anybody got DaveB's number, I saw the 800 number floating around but search is out so....if anyones got it handy I'd appreciate it (also anyone know if he will sell just one coil?).

Again, thanks a bunch guys!

 

Check your Private Messages Balthazar....