I just noticed, within the last 6 months or so, a pre-ignition sound when the engine in my 00 is warm and I apply the gas or start to put strain on the engine by heading up hill. There is also a drop in pick up from what I have become used to. The dealer said this is normal and that it is the injectors making that noise. I just don't think so, but I have no proof... How does one argue with the "professionals" with out going broke on second, third opinions and such? I bought the car new and purchased the 7/70 guarantee package and I have always used premium fuel in this car, it now has about 34k on it. Any ideas?

 

Go to a local mechanic and not another dealership to get a second opinion... it won't cost a lot... that's all I can think of...

 

Engine ping is not normal in any way.
I bet your MAF is to blame.

 

Your dealer is a moron. Your ignition coils need to be replaced. I had the exact same problem. Thousands of us have, in fact, with the exact same symptoms (under throttle, especially up hills). It's normal only insofar as bad coils are not unique to these cars. It needs to be fixed though. It looks like your warranty is still good (powertrain won't cover this, but regular bumper to bumper will). If it is, then go for it! If not, and you have to go out of pocket, buy the coils from Dave B and replace them yourself. It's very easy (instructions on this site, or I can send you a how-to) and will cost a bit over $300 for the parts, vs. $600+ that a dealer charges.

 

I kind of thought this might be the case. I really thank you people for taking the time to respond to my post. I will go back to the dealer and be a bit more aggressive with my new found information. Thanks again!

:-)

 

it is not the coils..its bad gas. and it is normal IF you are using bad gas. the ECU "retards" the car so it does not hurt anything. just use 93 octane like it says in the manual and on the fuel door.

**EDIT**
just saw that you use premium gas..i still dont think its the coils..95% sure

 

So how you do you verify that it's indeed bad coils?? Is the engine grounded well enough with the factory harness that might cause this to happen. I've heard that Nissans are known for having weak grounding in the engine compartment that might attribute to some of this.

 

thats why you do a custom grounding and not the overpriced "hyperground" cr@p people are selling.

 

How is the hyperground crap? Im trying to understand this, do they use bad materials or something? I just didnt think there was much difference in a homemade one or a prefabbed one. If your calling it crap just for the reason that you have to pay for the kit, then thats lame. IMO I would rather pay 40 bucks and not have to mess with making my own kit.

 

its crap cause most places (stillen. etc) wanna charge $100+ for wires and connectors you can get THE EXACT SOME STUFF for $35. and its not "messing with making your own kit" its doing it for cheaper, enjoying the fact that you know how to work on your car instead of just paying for everything (cause thats lame)

 

12345

 

too...

 

Oh my God!!! There is so much bad information in this thread its pathetic. YOU HAVE BAD COILS. There is a TSB for this. Bad Gas is an excuse used by the stealership. Hyperground kits ain't gonna do **** for your problem.

I had a 00 GXE with bad coils. It had the EXACT same symptoms as what you are describing. I visited the dealer twice complaining about it. They claimed "I don't hear anything the first time" and "You got bad gas" the second time. On the third trip, I was armed with the Bad Coil TSB. They had no excuses. Replaced all six coils. Afterwards the car had much more power with silky smooth acceleration.

 

i thought a little ping under heavy load was fine, but then again you guys know best

 

If you're already using 93, then print the TSB or maybe even this thread and give it to your dealer. Better yet, ask another dealer (if possible, hopefully won't screw you) and take the printout(s) just in case.

Get your warranty work, come back on here and donate to show your thanks.

 

No. It is fine. It even says so in the owner's manual. People shouldn't be so quick to diagnos a little problem as something severe. Pinging will happen under a load and when going up a hill.

 

Again, the car has always had premium fuel and the pinging just started recently. If it had done it since the day I bought it that would be different, but it did not. This leads me to believe that something is not right and that it should be fixed.

I had to Google "TSB" but I found out what it was! (I am not completely helpless!) Anyway, I need to dig through those and find one regarding this issue and go from there.

Again, thank you all for the help!

 

heres a good collection of TSBs for maximas:

http://maxima.theowensfamily.com/tsb...=2000&tsb=none

credit:Studman

btw i think its ur coils, i had the same problem with my car, changed the coils and never heard the noise again

 

1. its your coils 2. Nissan will try to get out of paying this any way they can 3. print out the TSB on the engine knock 4. Take it to the moron that told you it was normal 5. Shove that up his a$$. 6. Take him for a test ride (he should be very willing to comply at this time) 7. Make sure you get the car to knock with him and even better, his master mechanic with the two of you. 8. Demand it be fixed under warranty. 9 Don't take any $h!t off of them either, they'll try to give you all they can. Trust me I am speaking from experience on this one.

 

Yeah seriously. I'm surprised nobody has told him to clean his throttle body (you know, cause that fixes EVERYTHING). Bad coils on the 00 is notorious, and well documented. There's even one of those silly online petitions about it. His symptoms are 100% exactly the same as mine, when my coils were bad. I even took pics of my engine bay two weeks ago to help another guy change his coils on his 00 for the same problem, and replacing the coils fixed it.

Sure it COULD be other things, like it could be junk gas, or it could be a buggared spark plug or whatever else, but 98% chance it's his coils.

 

Engine ping is NOT normal -- one really does not know the long term health of the engine under detonation (I guess on the web there would be enough documentation of premature detonation etc, check that out).

Now, I replaced all my coils and plugs (bought from DaveB) for ~$400 -- this was a great deal when the dealership quoted $85 for a coil (would have been $550). Keep in mind you should go for the 2K1 coils, there were folks in the forum confirm that it is of a better construction and lasts longer (I pray it lasts for atleast 60K, that was what the 2K coils lasted).

 

DO THIS ^^^^

then 10. thank the ORG with a nice fat donation b/c you saved a lot of $$$ with the free advice and warranty work.

 

I vote coils. The stealership loves to beat around the bush to avoid warranty work

 

Any word on if this occurs in the 03 as well? I have no pinging under heavy load, just at 1700-2000 under moderate load. I read a thread awhile back where this was common and pretty much dismissed as not really a problem. I've always used 93 octane.

 

To add -- engine pinging on VQ35's at least is quite normal from my experience, due to high compression ratio, aluminium motor, and crappy gas that's being sold these days. Even on 93 mine sounds like a ball bearing factory explosion if i load up the car with 3 or 4 people and go up some good sized hills.

 

Okay, finally got into the dealer today. Managed to talk to the Service Manager. Showed him the TSB. He was not able to "talk" to me at the time, but said he would call me. I got a voice mail from him stating:

"I have a set of coils in stock and can change them out under your Gold service contract. Also, I want to retard the timing a couple of degrees."

I am not sure how I feel about him wanting to set my timing back at all... Any thoughts? I know I will be googling the heck out of this subject here shortly. Loss of power and gas milage due to setting timing back? No thanks!!

These forums rock! After submitting this, I am donating $, thanks again...

 

Aww the pinging thing again. I have an 03 and this thing has pinged since day one using 91. Took it back 2 times already, gonna take it back again. Its not right, period, someone is gonna hear ****.

 

dude what you hear is pinging---the maximas vq30 motor is so sentive to the type of fuel used--ive tried putting all of them and at times i do hear it--but i have been using the 91 octane from chevron and it seems to have gone away but i have noticed it only when going under 20 miles an hour. if I find anything else out Ill let you know.

 

I only notice it when the engine is warm and under a small strain. If I floor it, I notice that it does not have the power it used to have, but due to engine working so hard, it is hard to detect the ping. But, with the windows up, warm engine, give it a bit of pedal up hill, it sounds like a desiel! (Almost)

Time will tell, and so will I.

 

You don't need to retard timing if the coils are the culprit. That's going to make your car slightly more sluggish...

 

I just bought a 2000 GXE with 65,xxx miles. I notice pionging as well, especially under a load.

Pinging/detonation, or pre-ignition is caused when two flame fronts meet in the combustion chamber. You have two flame fronts because you have one created from the spark plug which of course is normal, but the other one is caused form a hot spot on the piston or in the combustion chamber. Using a higher octane fuel which is LESS volatile than a lower octane fuel will help because the hot spot will not ignite the higher octane less volatile fuel, and there will not be two flame fronts colliding.

So how does a weak/bad coils cause this? A weak coil would seem to not have enough spark, causing a rich condition which would also cool the combustion chamber, less chance of a hot spot. But if it fixes the problem, it fixes the problem, i've only owned a Maxima for 2 weeks.

It seems like there are a lot of knock sensor issues in researching on this site. You should not even here pre-ignition if the knock sensor is functioning properly. You may be able to see it on a scanner, but audibly hearing it is bad. And I do not know what the max retard in the programming is.

I guess I would listen to the people here about what to do, but it seems as though a knock sensor would be a cheaper fix. If you never heard knock since the car was new, and the power is still there I would suspect you have always had knock. You could not here it before because your computer was sensing it properly (before audibly hearing it) and retarding the timing.

If you are in an area with oxygenated gas this will be more of an issue as well, but the knock sensor should compensate. Have your mechanic ride with you while having a scanner connected, and simply look at knock retard, and see how much timing it's pulling out, if it's pulling more than 5 degrees out it's obvious it has a problem. If it's not pulling any timing out, and you can audibly here it, then the knock sensor is not working. A knock sensor is simple it has piezo crystals in it that sense vibration, the more vibration the more these crystals move which changes the resistance and the computer pulls timing depending on the resistance it sees from the knock sensor. If it's a gas problem a computer tuned for the gas you want to run would be the best fix.

 

WOW!! Here it is, May 2006 and I am now finally getting time and more importantly, over my fear of being screwed over and taking the car in to another Nissan dealer. I have but 20 days left on my "gold protection plan"... The car is going into Jim Click Nissan here in Tucson on the 26th of May. Wish me luck.

Again, I want to thank everyone here for taking time to post with respect to my challenge. This has been the one place I have felt folks are being open and honest with me regarding my 00 Maxima.

P.S. In Tucson? Thinking about buying a Nissan? Don't go to, wait, am I allowed to mention the name of the Dealer who told me, "the pinging is normal"?

 

Wow, this thread got brought up again. My car still pings. With the stereo up I cant hear a thing.

 

Can someone clarify what the sound of pinging is? I just posted something on a rattle when the engine has some load on it (when accelerating)..