Well I posted a few months ago about my ECU problem. What happened was a mouse chewed through the wire connecting my 6th Cylinder to the ECU. This screwed up the ECU and now I am only running on 4 cylinders. To get this fixed, I could not just replace the wire or reconnect it, so I need a new ECU. Before contacting insurance, I went to the local Nissan Parts and service center and they quoted me $754 for the ECU and $200 labor. They did not mention about getting anything else with it. Now after getting in touch with insurance, they say I need a new wire harness all of a sudden, which is going to be about $1500 at least to add on. This will hike the install price up to about $1000. My question is: is it true that I will need a whole new wire harness? I find it kind of odd that once insurance gets involved it shoots up another $2300. I have a 1998 SE, by the way. Also, the insurance may total my car because of the problem. I have just about 150,000 miles on it, which may lead them to think it is a POS and not worth the $3500. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks in advance.

-Rich

 

poor rich

 

I don't think you need a new wire harness.
www.car-part.com
for a ecu
and if needed a ecu wire harness

 

I think to get the ECU I am just going to go with Nissan because they'd charge $200 anyway on install of it and connect everything back. They are the only ones I know of that actually do the install. Also, Nissan told me they wouldn't be too sure about installing an ECU they didn't sell. And, if the ECU ended up not working, most places don't take back an ECU that has been installed. Thanks for the advice though.

 

Installing an ECU is not hard. What are you smoking. Spend the $250 on junkyard ECU and splice the *****. If voltage is critical through that wire then re-run that specific wire, not the whol d@mn harness. Saving $2K and an insurance claim is definitely worth two hours on your back in my opinion.

 

look at hte how to to install/change an ECU. It is very easy. Or find a person in your area that will help you install it.

 

I would get one on my own and install it, but I can't redo all the wiring nor can my mechanic. It's a mess in there right now to have it work on the 4.

The good news is insurance says Nissan Dealership is full of crap, so they are going to work with my mechanic and then get Nissan to just get the ECU.

Thanks for the advice.

 

Go to another dealer.

 

I plan on it if insurance doesn't fix up the mess.

 

good god, just whip out the soldering iron!


There's a guy at work with a Passat 1.8T and almost the same exact thing happened, and dealer quoted some ridiculous price and it was just like ONE wire. So the guy was like, can't you guys just solder it back together? They said no they have to replace the whole thing, but they had a soldering iron sitting like RIGHT THERE. So the guy just said to give him the soldering iron and he'd fix the freakin wires himself because there was NO WAY he was going to pay $2000 out of pocket just to fix like 1 or 2 broken wires!

Well just then the service manager came out and asked what was going on and he got embarassed and just had the techs do it. Total cost. $0.

 

I wish it were that easy. My mechanic tried to get it back together, but it did not work. The wire being bitten shorted out part of the ECU, therefore making it necessary to get a whole new unit. Thanks for the idea tho.

 

If a wire is bitten it's generally broken, and a broken wire is an open, not a short. Unless the bugger just happened to bite a whole bunch of them and managed to bit into a DC rail and a ground line at the same time.

 

If the ECU really is ruined, buy a used ECU for $100 from a junkyard, solder the wires, and you have your problem solved for $100 not $2000. I don't understand the complication.

 

Me either, I think I said that last time you posted the problem. You are making it harder on yourself.