So far I noticed 2 things that bug me. The first one is that the front and rear window of the car don't have the nissan stamp in the corner of the window as if it was replaced aftermarket. Last trip i took to the dealer i looked at the other maxima's on the lot and it is like this for all the new maxima's. The second thing is that the rear wheel well has some kind of fabric material lining in it instead of what is in the front wheel well the usual plastic. It's rather annoying because dirt and leafs get stuck to it.

 

LOL.....they went cheap years ago but if it's any consolation so did everyone else.

 

yea, i mean cheaper then i have seen in a while. I don't know I have had a few acura's and subaru's in the past few years and it hasn't been THAT bad.. lol

 

suburu is a good car but they are not as cheap as nissans are and acura well if u wanna compare acura then i wouldnt cry because thats infiniti's turf

anyway what u expect from a car that i paid $27,000 for? what u gonna get for that price a 4cylinder honda accord ???? u serious bro....cmon

if you lean on the fender to hard they bend in....lololol

 

BTW the carpet is their for sound reduction. You think carpet is cheaper then plastic?

 

I've been in the new Subaru's and even test driven one but I am sorry, Subaru's interior quality and cheapness is below Nissan's; for people complaining of Nissan being cheap, perhaps some of you forget what Nissan's used to be like pre 2007? Nissan has gone a long way to putting more expensive and better interior materials in their cars compared to where they once were

Now, I'm not saying they don't use some cheap materials still, because there a few areas they do, but they are a lot better looking and feeling then in past years but there is still room for some improvement, especially if they ever want to get up to Honda/Acura and Lexus interior quality and fit/finish

 

My E90 328i had the fenders lined in fabric. Its there for sound. Kinda of suprised its only on the back thou.

 

Most higher end vehicles have the "carpet" type wheel liners.
As already mentioned, it's much better at absorbing road noise.

FYI: Nissan doesn't make glass, they build cars.

 

Getting leaves and stuff off of the fabric wheel well liners is an annoyance but I'll take the annoyance over more road noise any day. As far as the window glass goes, it is made by Carlex. So, there is nothing to worry about. It's not some cheap replacement.

 

I can only speak for the Max and Z regarding interior quality. Not until the 6th gen appeared was the Max interior quality catorgarized as bad (they really cheapened up things for 04 and the dash design was not on par with previous gens). 7th gen good quality and style, 6th gen bad, 5.5 and 5th gen had a nice quality interior and style, 4th gen good, 3rd great and 2nd gen good quality. All Z's except for the 350 had good quality interiors, 370 good quality is back.

 

No, Nissan is not 'cheaping out' on the points you list.

You need to slide a sheet of white paper onto the top of the dash in the corner of the windshield on the driver's side. That will enable you to see the 'Nissan Carlex' etching, as well as DOT ID numbers, etc. All '09 and '10 Maximas I have checked have the Nissan Carlex etching. If the glass has been replaced, the replacement glass may or may not have the 'Nissan' word etched out, but if it is etched out, you will still be able to make out the 'Nissan' if you look closely. The 'Carlex' will always be there, except for a few repair shops who obtain the 'Carlite' version. These are all the same windshield made in the same plant by the same company.

The material used in the rear wheel wells has one purpose only; to reduce road noise in the cabin. It can be problematic in icy weather or muddy conditions, etc, but does reduce cabin noise.

 

wait till you look under the car & see any sloppy welds.

 

Go take a look at the 6th gen and u will realize just how "cheap" your car is

 

I owned a 6th Gen and it was well made and reliable, never left me with any costly repairs, my 09 looks like Lexus built it compared to my 09.

To the OP, your views on cheapness are interesting non the less, my major gripes with the car are: 1) the trunk lid does not align with the passenger side rear fender, 2) the drivers side door is not aligned with the drivers side rear passenger door, and 3) Im not happy with the hole Nissan put in the carpet to hold down the floor mats, looks like it was an after thought, when the floor mat gets pushed down, it's more visible and looks like it's gonna tear.

Those are my issues, so far the car is excellent

 

Monsta most likely is referring to the quality of the materials used, which in the 6th was not as high quality as the 7th gen and prior generations which is highly known.

 

I agree the 09' Maxima has some "very cheap" spots, especially for car that is between $30,000 - $35,000.

Look in the drivers and passengers footwell, you can see the damn cars insulation, and the pastic is barely connected to the underside of dash.

No fog light indicator...

The speed sensitive wipers suck, the wipers themselves are medicore at best.

No midrange adjustment on radio, very limited amount of characters can be displayed for song names and stations.

The sunglasses holder is cheap...just drops down and your glasses nearly fall, not contoured...

 

The sunglasses holder is cheap...just drops down and your glasses nearly fall, not contoured...

Agreed, I didn't notice till after I got the car but the sunglass holder stinks, it is not deep enough to hold sunglasses in securely like on other cars and SUVs that I have had

 

Well I'm glad Nissan spent their R&D dollars on the drive train and other more important areas then the ones you mention. C'mon are you serious the items you mention are lame at best.

 

I have not noticed the insulation of which you speak. But then I don't really see down in the footwell very well.

The speed-sensitive function on my wipers works great, but I am not sure I really need that function, as we have quite a bit of control over the wipers without it.

I am confused about this ongoing wiper situation; several here have complained about the '09 wipers, but mine have been the best I have ever had on a car, and I have owned nothing but Maximas for over 25 years, and drove a Datsun - made by Nissan - prior to my first Maxima. This wiper is very quiet (most of my wipers over the past fifty + years squeaked). This wiper leaves a completely clean path on my windshield with every pass.

I agree many folks are used to a fog light on/off indicator. I personally always know whether mine are on or not, but understand many folks would like that feature, and hope Nissan adds it to the Maxima.

I too was at first stymied by the lack of a midrange adjustment, but overcame it by adjusting the high and low functions simultaneously up and down to bring the midrange where I wanted it. I would have preferred a midrange adjustment.

I won't complain about the limited letters for songs, etc, because if the letters were made smaller to fit on the screen, my poor old eyes would not be able to read them. I remember reading in the Owner's Manual last January that there are several ways to see the rest of song titles; I seem to remember that one way is by just touching the screen where the letters cut off and sliding your finger to the side, but I haven't tried that yet.

I never wear sunglasses, but am sure your complaint there is valid. Hopefully, Nissan will improve on that. My wife used that compartment on our 6th gen, and that one was very roomy.

There are valid complaints with most vehicles, but the '09 Maxima still offers BY FAR the best combination of EVERYTHING for MY money.

 

I couldn't agree more. I think if people are complimenting the styling, the drivetrain, and the performance and complaining about cargo nets, wiper blades, and sunglass holders, the people at Nissan are thinking "Hey, we must have done something right with this car."

 

Those that complain about Nissan's quality never owned a new American car in the 70's and 80's. The quality control was terrible, the paint on the vehicles often did not match, body panels did not match, the interior quality sucked, mucho wind noise, squeeks and rattle galore, and on and on and on. And they had 12 month/12,000 warranties as that is as long as they would go without issues. I changed so many water pumps and alternators that I lost count. Yes Nissan has some issues but I never want to go back to the "good old days" because they were not so good.

 

You must be a young whippersnapper. I had many frustrations with my '49 Studebaker, '53 Chevy, '55 Pontiac, '58 Chevy, '61 Pontiac, '66 Olds, '70 Olds, etc, etc. The predecessor of the alternator was the generator, and I have had four different GM cars catch on fire due to either a faulty generator, or problems with either engine grounding, bad battery or bad voltage regulator that caused the generator to burn itself up.

I found American make dealer service departments were more frustrating than American cars. But please don't get me started on my problems with Detroit. I am just happy that we have an American auto manufacturer (Ford) that did not take the government bailout, and which is finally building fairly reliable vehicles. Maybe there is hope.

 

I agree Nissan did a great job with styling, drivetrain, and overall performance of the new Maxima!

However...this is Nissan's "flagship" sedan and not to have a midrange setting on what they call a "premium sound system" is an oversight.

What i mentioned are a few gripes I have, no car is perfect...however I find too much of the interior asthetics are Sentra like rather than g35 reminiscent.

 

yea but the cloth cover doesnt look dirty even when it is. THe plastic in the front gets filthy and looks weak

 

the front grill plastic doesn't bother me so much as for the ridiculous reason why Nissan decided, like the rest of their products, has no cover for their undercarriage below where the lic plate and lic plate braket reside; that whole thing is open and shows all of the metal and parts underneath! its really makes the car look like its incomplete; even the Camry and Accord have a black piece of plastic that covers that all up giving the car a more finished look! I hope Nissan, on the Maxima mid life freshing does more to cover that up, simliar to what they did with the 2010 Altima refreshing!

 

I was wondering, its probably just me but does anyone think that the OEM HID Xenon in the Maxima are little bit dimmer then in most luxury vehicles, ie TL, G37, ES350, even the Altima etc???

the only reason why I ask is, I have a 08 TL and 05 FX35 besides my 10 Maxima and both my other vehicles HID's seem a tiny bit brighter then the Maxima's and illuminate more area? maybe I'm just being paranoid, or maybe do you think it could have something to do with the headlight housing? unlike my TL and FX, the 7th Gen Maxima's headlight housing is recessed into the front end a little bit more having some body panels in front of the housing creating a shelf? maybe that is not allowing some of the Xenon light from spreading outward completely as it does in my other vehicles where the headlight housing is flushed with the frontend and no body panels surround the housing? just a thought and wanted to see if anyone else might have thought so??

by the way, don't you think, for the Maxima's price range for the SV that we should be getting bi-xenon headlights (low and high beams) instead of just low beam HID and lame *** halogen high beams??

 

The 7th gen low beams (HIDs) have a very sharp cutoff along the top of the beam. If I am driving down a slope, I see absolutely nothing of the rise that begins at the bottom of the hill. But if I flip on the brights (halogens), I see everything on the next hill very clearly.

In support of your thoughts, I have seen two rating reports that listed the headlights as one of the few things not up to par on the 7th gen Maxima.

 

thats probably what it is, it is not that the HIDs are not as bright as other luxury models but that the recessed housing and cutoff limits its area causing what looks like a reduction in brightness when it really is not! can you imagine how lousy the halogen low-beams must be on the base S since they are not as bright or wide as the HIDs???

 

In my old 300zx, I had the halogen bulbs that I later switched to HIDs. Man what a difference. It went from someone pointing a flashlight through a straw infront of me to what appeard to be 6-8 well placed beams of light. I can't imagine was the S is like with the halogens being that I too have notice the cut off is quite drastic on the SV-Sport HIDs. Hopefully most of the S guys live in well lit places!

 

i have had the 09 maxima for about a year now and its funny how the little things are noticeable. the carpeting is for road noise so its actually an upgrade. the stamps in the front windows is not a big deal. i heard that they used a plastic intake in the 09 which helps in the horsepower. thats a bit cheaper than the 6th gen. but overall its great quality. it has more luxury then most infinitis now. i got the panarama roof, heated/cooled seats, heated steering wheel. 3.5 v6, amazing body design, HID lights, fog lights. features that would be found in any 50k-60k car.

 

I didn't know Nissan = Mercedes.

I've no problems with my 5.5 gen. Besides, interior trim is relatively cheap to replace. You should be worrying about the quality of the drivetrain and other moving parts. All of which Nissan has done an excellent job of making pretty damn resilient.

It's also worth noting that when comparing the 02 to other cars in its year and price range, it's been much more comfortable than the others I've ridden in, especially the domestics.