Chris Alexander

To put the Maxima back at the top and the Altima back in it's place you have to do one of two things: Make the Altima only available in a 4 cylinder option or make the Maxima a bit larger. Until you do one of those two things the Altima is going to have its advantage over the Maxima. The problem is the Altima has grown too large. Before it became a V6 option prior to 2002 It was just fine. But when Nissan made the Altima larger after 2002 that's where the Maxima began to loose it's way. 2004 the Maxima grew in every direction all of a sudden size luxury. It became more than a Maxima you almost had a 7 series BMW. So the 8th gen Maxima has to be ahead of the Altima in everyway. Size Space Class and refinement If so there wont be any problems. The 7th gen as it is now is neck and neck with the Altima its too close of a tie the cars are too much alike. The 6th gen Maxima when it came out you clearly knew what the large and in charge car was. The Altima was in it's place for a bit.

FastnFuriousMax

iTrader: (1)

please go on.

Chris Alexander

Lol in other words the 6th gen Maxima was near luxury not literally a 7 series but was moving in that direction.

Hokie350Z

iTrader: (1)

Any hope that the 8th Gen Maxima would be a 2014 model is dead. 7th Gen soldiers on for 2014 with minor changes:

2014 Nissan Lineup

mojotaker

lol lol lol lol. Lets just say, the stars aligned up for once in my life, and only had a small opening to use such luck.

Yup My 06 maxima is gone now. Was a big money pit for me.

I will still be following the Maximas and the q50's I have always been routing for infinity.

I did another search for 2014 maxima, nothing came up, i am getting the feeling that maybe the maxmia line now is ended.

Chris Alexander

mojotaker Lol what happened to your 6th gen and how was it a money pit?

mojotaker

Loong story, but here it goes

Well i bought my 6th gen used about 30k miles , test drove it checked the carfax , everything looked good.

2 weeks after i got it, the well known symptoms of the fualty transmission reared its ugly head. Took it to diffrent shops, they said nothing was wrong with it, but pointed out other things.

Well finally the slipage and the miss firings became so bad it was embarrassing driving by myslef or having a passenger in the car.

I took it to the nissan dealership and they gave me a quote of 12K to fix up the entire car, of course i refused. I did more research and found maxima.org, people suggested i get the tranny part, that there is probablynothing wrong per se, with the transmission other than a faulty manufacturer defect.

I orderd the part, and took it to the shop to have it installed. They charged me a bunch for the labor. The symptoms seemed to clear up for about a day, and immediately, back to square one.

Moving on finally saved up 5k for a transmission rebuild and blaze blaza, the tech at the tranny shop said they would do. The rebuild was supposed to be a better option because they were going through the bits and pieces of the whole thing to make sure everything was good.

skip skip skip skip 2 months later after rebuild cars back to giving the symptoms, also like if i put the car in reverse, it takes 1 minute for it to engage and when it does, it does it with a massive kick....... etc. very very embarrassing and uncomfortable. My dating life suffered a bit lol.

I swore i wont spend a dime on that car anymore. Winshield cracked. horn went out, steering wheel buttons stopped working, sunshade holder broke. the horn stopped working. The car was falling apart.

Decided it was time to get a new car ....... new maxima model year, nobody knows when... Q50 taking forever to come out.... you know



Ok so lastly when i went to go trade in my car.. the dealer checked the car fax, and on it, showed the car was a total loss. Basically, My previous dealer sold me a rubbish car he pretty much fixed the damages and what not before the accident was reported to the government, hence my title was clean, and nothing showed up in the carfax when i checked it.

That Explains a whole lot. I bought the car for 12k cash, ended up spending close to another 9 k in useless repairs. traded it in for 3k

Sorry for my grammatical errors and stuff, its 3 am in the morning. I will come back to clean this up.

Chris Alexander

Dont worry about grammar errors were not here to judge you i'm sorry you went thru all of that stuff. This car was wrecked before your purchased and fixed it seems like. I went thru 5000 dollars worth of repairs from 2011 when I bought my SL used with less than 65000 on it but just now got it to the point where it's working right. I went through this period of time where I angry and infuriated with owning this car, but finally got thru it and just keep knocking on wood I don't have to fix anything else. The breaking point for me was when the CV joint was leaking in February.

Chris Alexander

And to make matters worse I had a dream night before last that I was going down the street and all 4 of my shocks were squeaking. It sounded like rat squeaks. I've done 5000 dollars in repairs I can't do no more I planned on keeping this car at least 10 to 15 more years from now. I don't wanna have to go get me a Lexus.

mojotaker

Sweet ride, you see, thats the thing right there. If you were lucky to either get a good one or were able to fix it, the car is awesome. The 6gen is really a marvelous car. It had tech in it that most others didnt have at the time. Very gorgeous looking too.

Its just a shame that i had a very short time to enjoy mine.

Thats why i was looking forward to getting a new one. Oh well.

Thanks alot buddy.


Oh, the more i think about it, i think Nissan has made a terrible decision, almost all the other competition has come out with a redesign, and now are stealing would be maxima fans, plus how good the altima is i hear. I hope the 8th gen Maxima blows every car out of the water. If and when it does come out. If it fails to do that, we will be looking at an extinct race.

I just went car shopping, the cars that are out there man........ The toyota Avalon, was pretty much the only real competition for the 6th gen maxima. Go look at it now. Its a completely new car that they slapped the name avalon on it.

I dont know if there is such a thing as a rwd cvt car. if so Maxima needs to either do that or get rid of the cvt. and upgrade the cars tech

Chris Alexander

Thanks alot man you know what I noticed I did two things and all the problems started going away: one I stopped going to the dealership for service two I added those 22 inch wheels. The rims improved the ride quality 80% before it was ponderous(mushy and soft) now it has a more slick smooth feel it's a glide very Lexus like. People ride in it and they go omg this thing is smooth!!!! I think the bigger wheels solved alot of problems. With the stock wheels my tires were always wearing out fast and uneven. Eventually my bearing would have went bad. I've had the rims and tires 3 years and no problems. The dealership its like they sabotage these cars I stopped going dude and its funny because everything stopped happening. It took me 5000 dollars in the warranty from timing chain, to the mounts, the shimmy to the CV joints. Now it's like all that stuff is replaced it just feels and rides like a brand new car I wish you had yours still. There were days where this car had me feeling punked and defeated and angry. But somehow or another I just got through it and now the car is just to the point where it's like new. It's in way better shape than it was when I bought it.

Right now the competition you've got cars with alot more to offer than the current Maxima. The 7th gen is nice I like it but it doesn't give more to offer than good handling and power. Nissan needs to build a Maxima that's ahead in many more directions. You need a car with more power,more refinement,sharper sleeker sexier. This 7th gen is a beautiful car right but its like Kim Kardashian in a long nap just waking up and it needs that beauty treatment to walk the red carpet.

With the 6th gen you had an advantage with the competition because you had a car with alot of space and alot of features, but Nissan Maxima owners wanted more sport. When the 6th gen came out in 04 everybody started copying Toyota with the Avalon,Lexus with the GS, Chevy with the Impala. The all favor it

Chris Alexander

Mine aint the best Max around here but I definetly hope to achieve that Status one day it's a work in progress.

Hokie350Z

iTrader: (1)

Did you not read my post above yours or goto the link? The 2014 Maxima is basically carryover from 2013 with only minor changes.

http://nissannews.com/en-US/nissan/u...ng-the-changes

nissan's finest

It is quite clear that you don't work in the automotive industry because if you did you would know that companies show unfinished products to their employees quite often that are strongly based off of what will eventually make it to production. I never said that the car was complete. Why would it be complete if there is clearly two years left to launch the vehicle? There is still research and development taking place. Being shown the car this early only served the purpose to let the corporate employees as well as the dealer executives get a clear vision of where the company is heading design wise. Let me just give you one little crumb...Model year 14 will run extremely long until the new model is released. I will actually be waiting on the day when it does launch to imagine the dumb look on your face!

nissan's finest

It's funny to me how you guys are so quick to criticize when you guys clearly DO NOT WORK IN THE AUTOMOTIVE INDUSTRY!!! Why would I take a picture of the car when my managers and national executives are in the room? I can speak freely about what I saw as much as I want, but actually taking a picture and posting it is blatantly crossing the line and you should know that just as well as I do!

Chris Alexander

Nissan was at it's prime in the early 90s their products were impeccable. When Carlos Ghosn became the CEO right around 2000-2001 from that point on everything changed. 2004 when production shifted to the US I never saw the same Nissan again as we did in the 90s. Then CEO Yoshifumi Tsuji back around the time of the 3rd generation Maxima the company was on point. It would be good to see Nissan as it once was. I remember that 3rd gen Maxima being solid ours went 19 years and never had an issue we sold it last year. IMO the 3rd gen and the 5th gen Maxima's have been the most solid hopefully will see that thru the 8th gen.
1993-2012. I grew up as a child with this one.

MaxFiyah

i had a 00 maxima which was my first car and i went through a few other cars and i went back to a 03 maxima 6 speed and the way nissan is doing things this will be my last nissan unless they bring back manual transmissions i dont want no automatic and def no cvt i test drove the 04 07 and 09 all cvt they were smooth but no fun. i got to drive them over a 100mph tho lol only other nissan i may consider next is a 07-08 350z might move onto a s2000 soon or maybe get a subaru wrx

Chris Alexander

MaxFiyah I bet your 00 was nice looking post a picture so we can see it. As a 6th gen owner I can definetly attest that the ride quality is way up there. Sometimes i'm like is this really a Nissan that glides thru the city like this!!!!!!

L36

iTrader: (4)

95-99 is best maxima
00-01 is ok
02-03 is alright but has minor issues
04-06 only mad men buy this
07-present boring

Maxima lost its heart long time ago, do not expect that to change with the new gen.

FastnFuriousMax

iTrader: (1)

3rd gen ftw you forgot that one. IRS, 190hp for a v6 from 1992 w/ lsd 5spd. It was far ahead of it's time. Nissan realized this and then dumbed down the 4th gen.

97-99 are very good.

the 02-03 6 spds are nice but the oil burning issue kills them.


8th gen maxima just another fwd auto 4 door sedan. no fi, no awd, no manual, no care

Chris Alexander

Not to throw salt but I would agree to above statement 95-99 is the best Maxima except for only one problem. Poor crash test scores. You get in a head on collision in a 95-97 Maxima you're done. 95-99 their good cars but you dont wanna get hit in one! they're widely known for this

5th gen comes out for 2000-2003 much improved over the 4th only known for ingition coil problems but real nice cars. These were built quite solid and refined!

6th gen comes out 2004-2006 shoots way upscale in looks refinement power at the time but a poorly designed component in the transmission known as the valve body ruins it for everybody. This truly stopped it from being the success that it could have been

6.5 improved but IMO adding 10-15HP rather than reducing set it back a bit at this time you've got the flagship sedan with 255 and the midsized with 270. The Maxima is the 4 door sports sedan so adding an additional bit of HP to the 265HP may have boosted it sales. (This is just my opinion dont throw any apples at me)

7th they're good and nice but something's missing and well all just cant figure it out!

It's not really just the Maxima Nissan needs a whole new change and refresh The Pathfinder Xterra bigger problems than the 6th Gen Maxima so Nissan's gotta pull thru on the 8th gen Maxima.

Chris Alexander

I've said this before but my hope for the 8th gen is this with four doors.

Amerikaner83

iTrader: (17)

That would be

Or styled like the current M...as had been mentioned before

Chris Alexander

Take the next gen 370Z or the next GTR and give it 4 doors and the Maxima will be back in the game.

626maximus

We need a V8 maxima with twin turbos.

dauntlessmax

Don't mean to be a broken record but that's basically a G37, as G37 & 370z share the FM platform.

Chris Alexander

To keep the Maxima in it's place you have to build it in between the size of a G(now the Q50) and the Infiniti M. If you build it out of either one of those cars then you get a car thats too big or too small. People said the 6th gen was too big so then the 7th gen went more like the G now it's too small. It looks like the new Q50 was built off the Maxima so the 8th gen is gonna be something different. The Maxima is tricky you build a car with too much luxury and no sport you have a problem. You build with two much sport and not enough luxury then you have a problem. You have to balance sport and luxury you can't have one without the other. From to 4th gen to the 6th you see luxury make a steady increase and sport slowly trickle away. The 7th you see sport increase and luxury start to dwindle a bit. We all seem to like the sport and can do without the luxury it would have worked in the 7th but the car being sort of cramped seem to take the goodness out of something that was almost great. Because now long time Maxima people who have families with growing kids are going to want a car that's a little bit bigger.

zoemayne

iTrader: (4)

I'll take this as it is w 2 doors! I think they can go for this.. they would prob have a 4 door model of course.

We can all blame the altima for Maximas state. Nissan is for profit and would rather sale a millions of altimas instead of a couple thousand maximas.

Chris Alexander

The root of the problem is because back in 2002 the Altima become a large car all of a sudden. From that point on the Maxima has been on the backburner. As CEO of Nissan this would be my plan some of you guys probably heard me say this before. Just leave the Altima with a 4 cylinder option only. The majority of Altima buyers get the 4 while some by the 6. If you do this the Maxima can be short on size but will still have the advantage of being an only V6 option. Until you do this then the Altima and the Maxima are gonna be neck and neck. from 2nd gen up to the 6th gen the Maxima's grew in size every generation. All of a sudden you hit the 7th and it shrinks. Hey these are just my opinions not to say they are right but If I was nissan CEO that would be my plan!

When Nissan gave the Altima a V6 in 2002 and made it a big car what that did was gave long time Maxima buyers an alternative because now they could get something similar that was a little larger and cheaper so thats what needs to be fixed.

zoemayne

iTrader: (4)

I like the smaller 7th gen the only thing i don't like is the small trunk. I dont think people skipped out on buying the max because of the smaller size. I dont think its such a big deal. I disagree. Most max owners are not family's so that really doesnt matter. People that buy the max are not comparing it to the altima. Unless maybe you have a family. But having a bigger body is just more weight. They cant make the altima 4cyl thats kinda silly to do that just to make the max more appealing.. They just have to set the max apart from the altima with some major feature ie RWD would be simple.

Chris Alexander

zoemayne Thanks for your input you got people out there who own Maxima's with family's who are loyal buyers and you dont wanna loose that chunk of the puzzle that's what I meant by Maxima people with families. Smaller can be good some ways and bad in others. If you do make a Maxima too small then what about the talls. You have some people who will be like gosh the Max is nice but I need more room. You dont wanna say most Maxima owners out there are not family because you have people who own Maximas that are single who have riders with them. When I say family that doesn't mean soccer mom and kids but the word family branches out in many directions riders,company,bosses,co workers I am sorry I should have been more specific in that regard.

The 4 cylinder only option for the Altima t just depends on what buyers want with supply and demand There has to be a market for it. Right now with the state of the economy and the fluctuation in gas prices some would agree it could work!

4drsportscarenthusiest

The maxima has always been a naturaly aspirated car. And I love the power they make of it. But for this new modle they need to do a few things.... 1 BRING BACK A MANUEL option. 2. They need to have 3 different modles like they used too. One for each type of driver. 3. For the se edition its time to go with a turbo and bump this thing up too a minimum 350 hp but 365-370 would be nice too see (give that ford SHO a run for its money) keep the lower base models naturally aspirated and pushing 315 hp 4.its time for awd for the se and that much power.obviously the se would be more for the maxima enthusiast and real drivers and produced at about half of the other models. If they did this then it will open up there sales massively. People have been needing somthing like this for years from the maxima. The maxima used to be the best of the best and its lost its touch that made us love it be for. Its time to bring the love back.

Chris Alexander

4drsportscarenthusiest OUTSTANDING POST DUDE!!!!! It's all true you just pretty much addressed the issue and brought the solution to the Maxima's problems. I like how you said make different versions. With the 7th it's all just a sport version all the gens of Maxima had sport and luxury option. You had a bit more flexibility with the 6th gen offering a luxury and a sport version. You should contact Nissan's design team and offer that as input again thanks alot.

I like how you said give the Taurus Sho a run for it's money that makes alot of sense I wish the 7th gen was closer to the Taurus sho in size and power(365HP). The only advantage over the Sho the latest Max has is sport and design(style,ergonomics)

mrjasonlyrics

Well said man. I mean my car won't last forever and I don't know what car I'll upgrade to that could compliment my height, give me the power and luxury, easy to mod and cheap to maintain. One of the must of the newer Maxima's need to have is a 6spd or I'll never buy another. CVT just isn't for me and I can't do the automatic anymore

Chris Alexander

Another solution keep the Maxima it's current size and build a larger flagship sedan above the Maxima. Infiniti is working on making a bigger car right now with somewhere in the neighborhood of 550HP.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/...i-q70/2159845/

Amerikaner83

iTrader: (17)

have you seen the M56? That thing is a boat.

MONTE 01&97 SE

iTrader: (1)

Well all 7th gens are not the Sport version, we have the S, SV and SV sport. The SV Sport is equivalent to prior Gen SE's, 1 major difference is that since its an SV its only offered in leather where as prior SE's were available in cloth. Next SV/SV with premium package, this model is the equivalent of prior gen SL's and GLE's. The S is equivalent to the old GXE, 6th gen didn't offer an equivalent, you just had to get a base SE.

Chris Alexander

ooooooh I see what you mean so the base S has a different suspension then the SV are their differences in ride quality handling? My neighor has a pearl white SV she asked me to show her how everything works. From owning a 6th gen I liked the improvement in the turning circle, the handling was a bit tighter, ride quality it felt the same as my 6th gen with a bit more control. Yall gonna think i'm crazy but I actually like that CVT it's a good match for the V6. I just wish under hard acceleration it sounded better I wanna hear muscle car not whining like a sick camel. I noticed alot of people complain about the CVT but the transmission behaves the same as my 6th gen with a SPD AT under normal acceleration. The only difference is when you floor it between the two to me. Nissan needs to offer a 7SPD AT or a CVT as an option for the 8th.

MONTE 01&97 SE

iTrader: (1)

No the S has the same suspension as the SV and ride quality is the same, just like prior gens the SL/GLE had the same suspension setup as the GXE. Now the SV sport mimics just what SE's had prior; stiffer springs, retuned struts/shocks, larger stabilizer bars.

Chris Alexander

I'm glad you mentioned differences with us owning an SE and a SL 6th gen both alot of people say there's not much of a difference in the two but neither one of them ride or handle the same. I feel more road imperfections in the SE and barely feel any in the SL. The SE feels slightly more connected to the road but you pay the price in ride quality. The SL with the big 22s the suspension still feels pillowy.