I have a 2001 maxima that broke down on my wife tonight on the way back.
she mentioned on the way to work she saw the TCS brake and airbag lights came on.

when she wanted to come back after couple of hours the same lights came on again but this time the windows would move down very slow but would not come up, the radio would not turn on and everything was acting weird
the car started to drive slowly but when she would brake all the dashboard lights would flash and the car would not drive smoothly.
when the car was turned off at a gas station it did not turn on again till she got jump start and even then the car would barely move.

so it is being towed to mechanic
can someone give me some idea on what is wrong

it sounds like battery and brake problems but no idea how
I know that the front brakes needed to be changed soon

 

Dead alternator?

 

Gotta be the alternator. Not bad. Will set you $150~$200. May need a new battery if it failed too. Good luck. Typical Max problem on our 00~01's.

 

There would have been tell tale signs that pointed to the alternator failing, but oo late now. Dimming lights, squeeking sound, Brake and Charge light lit together.

 

That's what happened to me and when I did my charging voltage check, it failed.

 

I just got back from towing the car and ...
yup sounds like the alternator is gone
after 110K miles is time for things to go wrong I guess.

I will check some prices online to see if I can get it much cheaper than the mechanic the rest I will find out tomorrow.

thanks guys

 

is it worth it to get a used alternator ?
it goes for 30$-100$ in car-part.com

 

I would buy a remanufactured one instead. Shop around and compare prices, even online. I replaced mine last week after having the same issues you were having. Pep Boys was the least expensive at $146 (I got Autozone to match that price because of some perks I get there).

 

last problem I had with this car was almost a year ago
the ecu and throttle body went bad and cost me around 3K$
I think I have 118K on this car
what else should I expect to go bad soon.

 

battery replacement is a regular maintenance items that one can expect to have to replace given the age of these cars, replacing the alternator once in the cars life span is also normal ... spark plugs most likely will need replacing in a bit and of course there are the coil packs, mine are still fine at 186,000km then of course there are the array of sensors that the cars has 02 sensors - MAF sensor ... some guys have had to replace things while others have not you simply deal with them as them come up.

TCS - ABS - SES/CEL coming on at the same time general means problem with the charging system ie batery and alternator

 

Re-manufactured ones go for $170, lifetime warranty though. Do not get a used one. You do not know how many hours-miles it has put in.

 

OEM is like $350 or higher. Re-manufac are also Nissan but refurbished to specs.