Never experienced transmission issues until I left work an hour ago, felt some lag on the highway, power was still there but definitely laggy when I hit the gas. Thought it was odd for sure. Ran into a store quick, fired it up and had an awful whining sound, parked it again now no reverse! Crazy, how quick it just **** out on me, no lights on the dash, nothing, all in a matter of 15 minutes, pretty crazy. Anyone else deal with this? I hope it's covered under the warranty I have.

 

What year car do you have and the mileage?

 

2011 with 73k

 

Your warranty ran out 13K miles ago. Only 9's and 10's were extended past that. You may get some love from the Nissan dealer as they may get some love further up the line.

 

I actually tacked on a better warranty than I even thought, bought it with 30k and grabbed a 4 year /60k warranty so I should be straight depending on what exactly it is.

 

From your description of what is going on looks like your cvt has failed and will have to be replaced. That extended warranty you bought may have just paid for itself many times over.

 

Yeah your cvt is toast my friend. Sorry for your luck as losing your transmission around the holidays sucks more than any other time. Hopefully, you can get it replaced under your extended warranty. Be vigilant with the dealer and stand firm of the give you the run around! Best of luck to you!

 

Just wondering did you ever perform the tranny service in it's lifetime?

 

Wow, the description you gave of how it just suddenly failed is weird. Has anyone else heard or know of another failure similar to his description? Just curious because the wife and I are considering giving my 2010 to my son in college and he is not the best for maintenance.

 

I am dealing with the same crap right now. 2010 Nissan with 76k miles driving home from visiting my grandchild and make a stop and then the whine and NOTHING! I just had my CVT FLUID DRAINED AND FILLED back in September. My warranty is expired....does anyone think i ave a claim since i recently had fluid service done by them?

 

2009-2010 models have a 10year/120k warranty for the cvt.

 

You should be covered as previously mentioned. I have a 2009 and my cvt crapped out on me at 56k miles. It was replaced free of charge! The car shifts much better now.

 

Thanks! Ghost and ThinBlue I hope I don't have one of the many horror stories I have read about throughout the internet. I will keep everyone updated on the status. I am (Williams) by the way I had to use FB to log in last night.
I have owned and driven nothing but a Max for almost 20years and this was my dream model ever since the design came out in 09. I have owned 83', 87',95',2000 and 04' and loved them all even the 04' even though it had tranny issues but it never put me down.
Last night I had my wife and son after doing some shopping only 50+ miles from home. So you can imagine our smiles got turned upside down. Snow White is at the dealer that I normally get my car serviced at so come Monday morning we will see what happens.
Thanks Again for the tips.

 

UPDATE!
The tranny is toast of course and thanks to everyone's input my baby will be getting a new transmission thanks to the 10/120k CVT warranty. I hopefully will have her back tomorrow or Thursday. Shout out to my dealership
(Leith Nissan) for making this smooth as butter. They put me in a loaner vehicle 2015 Altima at no cost.


My next concern would be she I worry that this will happen again? Should I sell my car? Thanks for the feedback.

 

No, the new cvt is pretty good. I've put out 25k miles on my new cvt with no issues whatsoever.

 

Sometimes things break and other times not. I have 312,000 on my 09 with no CVT issues at all. Great that your dealer is taking such good care of you. I don't think you will have another issue with your replacement (unless you are just keeping your foot in it all the time.) I am very pleased with my 09 and will see just how far I can get on it before going to the 8th (or dare I dream of making it to the 9th gen? )

 

Nice mileage there, I'm guessing mostly highway right?

 

Yes, and a light foot!

 

I think of your mileage all the time when hoping my car hangs in there. 312k is BIG!!!

 

All these transmission issues are scary I think Ima trade my in when my lease is up next year instead of buy it out 😞

 

My opinion that is an over reaction. For every CVT problem reported here I bet there are a thousand that will never have an issue.

 

Got my baby back Monday and she is awesome. I never realized how BAD my tranny was compared to the way it drives now. Leith Nissan in Cary, NC really took care of me as well as NISSAN USA.
Thin Blue I am going to keep a close eye on my tranny's performance and hopefully it will join the list of Maxima's I have drove 200k plus before selling or trading in.
I can only aspire to be like Lt Leary

 

Just got her back yesterday. 100$ deductible, new tranny, smooth as butta. Actually feels way better than before which is cool. Anyone going used is almost better off going with an 09-10 just for the 10yr/120mi, had I known, I prolly woulda went that route myself.

@Homerun, lucky you!

@zoemayne, I never had the tranny serviced, and started to worry thinking they were gonna make up some bs about me not replacing the fluid or some ****, but they were cool and gave me an altima with 500 miles on it in the meantime which was pretty sweet.

 

They cannot deny you the warranty because that is suggested service for tranny which is very stupid if you ask me. I have had friends with Maximas that were bought used and never changed the tranny fluid ever. The tranny in my opinion if driven normally should outlast the life of the car. But that is just my wishful thinking.

 

JaCqEeZ I think we both made out ok! You saved money it cost $128 to have my car towed but it could have been worse if it wasn't for my State Farm policy. I just have to chill on the gas pedal but those Mazdas and Hondas be provoking me...lol!

 

+1
You should not have to "baby" a well designed and well built transmission. Talk of taking it easy on the gas pedal or changing the trans fluid every 30K is BS. Doing some "spirited" driving should not cause any transmission to fail. As long as you are not abusing the transmission or ignoring the manufacturers scheduled maintenance it should easily last the life of the car.

 

Agreed.

 

Funny, I was just talking about this today and I didn't even see these posts, etc.

Regarding the maintenance, yes, you follow the manufacturer recommended schedule, but when it comes to the CVT specifically, it's hard to know what's the right thing to do for yourself when you see all these different scenarios.

Some never do anything and the car lasts forever, some drain/fill at whatever interval (30k, 40k, 50k, etc) and start to see the Christmas tree effect on the instrument cluster shortly thereafter.

At the end of the day it comes down to you and you want to do the right thing, but, for me, it's situations like this where too much information can be a MF'er when you're trying to make up your mind.

 

I recently purchased my 2012 Maxima SV from Leith Mitsubishi. Im just over 40k miles, hopefully I dont have any issues.

 

If you don't have the knock now then you are good-to-go. Luckily, I don't have it. All you have to do is start the car up and let it run for a while or drive it around for a bit to get it up to normal operating temperature, leave the car running, put it in park, pop the hood and listen closely; you'll see videos in previous posts in this thread of those who were effected by the knock so you'll know what to listen for.

 

Turn it in!

 

I agree you should not have to baby it. The fluid is a good idea even on conventional trannys.

 

On June 9th last year, my 2010 Maxima with 145K mi on it spontaneously died. I was at my family's motorcycle shop, had a 3 mile drive home and within 1/2 mile after leaving, I had a CEL and total intermittent loss of power - i.e., I had to floor it and it would do nothing, then all of a sudden, take off like normal. By the time I made it the 3 miles home, it would not make it up my driveway (minimal incline). I found out later that when the ECM encounters a fluid pressure related trouble code from the transmission, it goes into failsafe mode, which limits throttle to essentially nothing...and I do mean nothing. Located an identical used transmission from a junkyard from another 2010 Maxima with 40,000 miles and had it replaced. I made it 5000 miles and it started to die as well (shift into D or R and engine would die...most likely a torque converter clutch lockup problem). At any rate, it was traded for a 2015 Honda Accord EX-L V6 coupe. I'll never have another CVT, Nissan or otherwise. My Maxima spent 90% of it's time with highway driving. It was a great car but it gave no warning whatsoever - ran beautifully and then BAM! Dead...

I pulled the transmission pan on the original tranny thinking it was a valve body issue or perhaps a filter clogged and lots of metal shavings fell out of it. I.e., it was burnt toast.

 

You hinted you abused the tranny CorollaULEV.... You even abused the one you got from the junkyard... You said you redlined it.....

 

The good old 200k tranny days are gone I see...people complaining about abuse lol, I'm at 200K almost on my 16 year old 2K and beat it everyday at least once lol.....Nissan needs to replace that crap tranny for free IMO.

 

And you would WANT to own a vehicle that redlining it causes transmission failure? That's okay? No one has any issues with that? Either baby the hell out of it or else you'll have a 3800lb paperweight. To produce a vehicle that self-destructs if you actually need the passing power and NEED to use the power the manufacturer gave the vehicle is just fine? I did not do neutral-drops or street racing or jackrabbit starts and barking the tires, burnouts all the while never changing fluids and filters, etc. That is abusive. If I was actually abusive, I would still be driving it because it would have grenaded long before it did and it would have been covered under warranty.

I've learned not to be brand loyal, but so far really like my Honda - for that matter, I really liked the Nissan's I have owned. It's also odd that it's a car that weighs 200lbs more than the Maxima, has 12 less hp and achieves 3-6mpg better fuel economy. You would think the opposite would be true. I blame the design of the CVT for being inefficient and in the end, causing more friction and wear on parts internally over time.

 

I agree that it is inefficient but I disagree that they have poor reliability. Initially the pathfinder had poor reliability cvt's(recall level/class action cvt's). But now there aren't that many failures. If they were than it would be stickied on this site and a lot more complaints online.

 

In a few articles it was stated that Nissan sacrificed some aerodynamic efficiency for the sake of exterior styling which may have a little to do with the hwy fuel economy but I too, still owning a '93 Altima 2.4 with 347,000 miles that runs like a tank, will not be buying another Nissan due to the CVT unpredictability. Too bad because I still think the 7th gen is one of the best/toughest looking (especially from the rear) sedans out there.