Yesterday, bunch of dash lights came on while driving. Pulled over to stop and restart, and hte car would not start (battery type not starting). Figured battery or alternator (after doing the diligence here) and replaced the battery to start there? Still batterh light, and faint BRAKE light. Lights would go out with acceleration. Took to autozone, no reading whatsoever out of alternator.

Expecting mechanic to replace today, and was wondering what else while he is there? Belt probbly, but anything else? What about starter...did not currently have any issue with starter, but there seems to be posts on this site linking the two?

How long should this take (rated service hours)? Seen posts where people say anywhere from 45 min to 3 hours.

Also need brakes to pass PA inspection....getting to the point of no return...anything else?

Thanks for the input.

2000 Max SE
Auto...black
230K miles
Stock (I mean stock)

New Radiator and plugs within last 5000k.

 

It's a quick simple job. You should look up some info and do it yourself. It shouldnt take 20 minutes.

 

Starter and alternator are on the opposite side. There are no steps common for the replacement.

 

20 minutes if you're mechanically inclined and have done this before. Sometimes those adjusting fasteners don't move as well as you would like them. For a novice, I say give yourself an hour or so to do it right the first time.

I agree that you should try to tackle it yourself, but sometimes you just don't have the time, opportunity, skills, or a safe area to do it. If you are having a mechanic do the work, replace alternator and belt and get out. There's no further preventative maintenance in that area that justifies paying even more money to a shop.

 

You might need the tension pulley assembly and just for safe measure i would pick up a oil cooler hard line becausr mine was so rusted thru that when i moved my ac compressor it broke and antifreeze was going everywhere.
tension pulley 77.00
oil cooler line 24.00
also look on here for the many post about changing it.its not a hard job but step into it knowing some of the issues others have faced.

 

If your mechanic is reasonable, have him do it.
It is only a 1-hour job if everything goes right, and you have a pretty good ideal of what you are doing. Replace the belts while he has it all off.

The tensioner assmbly is a royal PITA if you have not had it loosened before...

 

Replacement of the alternator? I havent been able to do it in less than 4 hours. if the Mechanic has replaced them before on a Maxima he may be able to do it in less time, but its not as easy as replacing them on most American cars where its still pretty on top and you only have to deal with a couple bolts.
The starter is fairly simple once you get to it. The alt involves removing the right front tire, plastic wheel well liner, unbolting the ac compressor, and the real fun is getting the one alt bolt thats kinda under the header.

 

Helped my buddy today with his 95 he rounded off the tensioner bolt so we had to unbolt the bracket(3 bolts) removed it. Then we realized after rereading the haynes, the a/c compressor had to be unbolted. We fitted new alt only to realize the sleeve wasnt "set" in so after all that confusion we got it buttoned up. Battery was completely dead so we jumped it with my 350z and let it sit about 10-15mins. Big cloud of smoke!!!!! Blew the radiator to pieces!!! Needless to say the battery was so depleted the fans didnt kick on therefore overheating radiator...luckily i was standing 3 feet away and shut the car off before any more damage could be done....not my car but very pi$$ed!!!

 

I'm with this guy, those of you saying this is a 20 minute job? Really? Maybe the 3.5 is different. On the 3.0, with A/C, it's more than 1 hour. Maybe 1 hour if you are prepared for the job and have done it once or twice before.