Hey,

This is possibly a weird question, and I'm taking my car Monday to the dealership to get a look at it (I still have warranty) but I'm just wondering if anyone has any insight on this:

Just today when I turned my car on, I noticed that my muffler was a little bit louder than usual, it has a low growl/deep whine type of sound similar to the G35, but not as clean sounding. I shrugged it off thinking whatever, and started driving. When I hit 3rd gear, there was a weird growling sound, like something was vibrating or grinding against something. This happened from 1600-2000 rpm. Kept driving, and noticed it through all my gears around that RPM, but not every single time, sometimes it would be in 3rd and 4th, sometimes only in 1st, sometimes not at all. I put my hand on the shifter when the sound happened, and I felt mild vibrations. It sounds like it's coming from either right between the pass/drivers seat, or right behind passenger seat.

I parked my car, put the car in neutral and tried to rev it up again, the vibrating noise didn't happen, same thing in park. I had my gf rev up my car, and I was outside, and it sounded like a growl was coming from the tailpipe right behind the passenger rear wheel where the exhaust piping is, but still, there was no vibrating noise/growl on the inside of the car.

My car is an 03 Auto with 49k miles on it and I never beat up the tranny.

I'm thinking that it could be either my exhaust rotting out and the sound vibrates something in my car, but that doesn't explain why it only does it while i'm driving, not in nuetral or park.

Or my worst case scenario is that it's my transmission crapping out because it does it while moving and only at certain RPM. But it doesn't make sense because I never beat the car up, and the car is still shifting smoothly.

My check engine light is not on, and the car still drives fine, it's just the random grinding/vibrating/growling noise at 1600-2000 RPM.

Anyone know what this could be, so i expect the dealer to not load me with bull****.

 

well, it seems like one of my friends answered my question, i went somewhere with my friends, and one of them was like "wtf, my butt is vibrating" and no one else had the problem, so it seems like at 1600-2000 rpm the exhuast tone causes a rattle/vibrating noise that i guess got transferred to the body hence i felt the vibration on the shifter.

whatever, anyone know if exhaust is covered by warranty? (stock exhaust)

 

It could be the flange on your muffler is starting to separate and causing the noise. The weld between the flange and the pipe on the muffler almost always break. Nissan is going to say it isn't covered but it should be covered since they are known to fail where it will last just about forever on other vehicles. It is a known problem that they done nothing to correct in the 5th generations. I would fight it.

 

got a SES light yesterday, did the key-dance to pull the code, got 0456 whih according to the stickies is:

P0456 - EVAP Emission Control System Very Small Leak (Negative Pressure Check)


So I guess that explains the noise and the butt vibrations in the back seat.

 

Warranties tend to stay far far far away from anything dealing with emissions or exhaust for these reasons, but it is always worth a try