Check the posts earlier in this thread, one owner got his new tires from Nissan anyway w/a used car. You may wish to follow his lead.

 

I have tried at 3 diffferent dealers to get new tires and no dice, they didnt even know I bought it used. The question is if I get the LL in action having a used car?

 

Going in this afternoon. I advised the service mgr that I have a list... I told the NNA rep that I was trying to "over-look" the little things - well since al they do is waste my damn time, no more will I "over-look" the little things...


So let the list begin.

This just sucks nuts.

sorry - I'm at work and want to kick something....

 

wow i cant believe this thread is still going... longest forum topic ever ? and absolutely no resolution ?

i went with aftermarket springs and tires.. no feathering yet but i will keep you updated..

 

How much did your new set-up cost you?

 

What kind of setup did you go with? Im thinking about Nsimo S-Tune and sway bars.

 

Your Office of the Atty General shows "not likely" - also note the "altered or modified" vehicles (!) I'd love to see what they consider "modified"...

"In order to be covered by the Illinois Lemon Law, a vehicle must:
have a nonconformity that both substantially impairs the use , market value or safety of the vehicle and is not repairable by the dealer or manufacturer in at least four attempts for the same repair, or be out of service for a total of 30 or more business days.

The Lemon Law DOES Cover: New Cars (purchased or leased)
Light Trucks and vans under 8,000 pounds
Recreational vehicles (excluding trailers)
Vehicles in their first 12 months or 12,000 miles, whichever occurs first
Vehicles purchased in Illinois

The Lemon Law DOES NOT Cover: Used Cars
Altered or modified vehicles
Motorcycles and boats"

 

There is also a TSB on Rear Brake Clicking Noise (Right Rear) - had something to do with the rear end loosening up. One of the mags had this (Automobile, R&T, or C&D) and were told the "plate" behind the rear rotor had become loose...sorry I do not have more specific reference, this was awhile ago.

To have it happen more than once is just not reasonable - it's not something even a good shop would check from the factory, but once loose it should be a no-brainer to keep it "loc-tight" - duh. Maybe you should lend them a torque wrench?

 

I told them to take all day to turn that wrench if necessary.... No hurry, I'm stranded at work anyways. lovely.

 

So I have been waiting for my arbitration hearing for the tire feathering coming up soon. I think it is going to go well. Nissan has already blinked.

Last week, before the hearing, they offered me $1200 to settle my case and for me to go away. Of course if I took the money it would be up to me to fix the car and hope it works properly. Nissan would not be responsible for feathering any more.

Now I know some of you would say, damn $1200 and you have not even gone to hearing yet -- TAKE IT. But it would cost me about $1800-2000 to fix it (new coil overs and tires).

My thinking is that they know their screwed and trying to get out of it cheap. I told them I would need them to do better then this. I wanted them to install the S-Tune suspension and replace the front tires AND take responsibility if the tires are feathered 6 months later. No reponse from them on this -so off to arbitration we go. And man do I have lots of pictures and research to present.

I am looking at this from a $$$ perspective. I do not want to spend one red cent of my money to fix the problem. Nissan will need to fix it for me to keep the car. Here is the $$$ breakdown for Nissan and why I think they will settle:

1. Nissan replaces suspension and front tires. Retail cost about $2000. (S-tune and new S03's for front -which is what I have now)

2. I force Nissan to buy back the car. Nissan eats the price I paid/ resale difference which for me would be about $4000.

3. I goto lemon law hearing and force them to buy back the car. Not only would Nissan lose about $4k, but the car gets labled as a lemon thereby screwing them for trying to sell it to someone else.

More to follow as the story unfolds....

 

Damn they offered you $1200!!!! I was only offered $950 - of course turned it down.... Nissan was trying to low ball me.... lol

 

Sounds like #1 to me, unless they are trying not to set a precedent. The S-Tune should have been the stock suspension from the beginning. Keep on sticking to your current strategy, it looks like win-win for you. Good luck and keep us informed.

 

I think we pretty much all agree that's the real solution to this problem. I bet Nissan knows it too, just doesn't want to shell out the $$$. I bet economies of scale would make their costs pretty low, well worth the goodwill they would gain, if they ordered a big enough quantity to make one for all of us! Are you listening, Nissan????

 

The negative publicity they will, have and continue to incur will prove the old adage,"penny-wise and pound foolish". They are saving money on the short run and will end up losing far more in the long run, utter stupidity.

 

i totally agree with that statement, however we as owners need to be proactive and make sure that we are heard publicly. best way to do that is through email's to "people who matter", such as the autoweek magazine request. if you havent already i urge you to do so. see the post a page or so back. or actually i believe it even has its own thread now.

 

I totally agree with both of you except that I already sent a couple of e-mails to AutoWeek and to the man who wrote the article, Mac Morrison, pointing out that Nissan had already changed the nominal toe specification from 1mm to 2mm before the article was released. So for AutoWeek to say "Here’s what we know: A yet-to-be-determined number of the 39,000 2003 model year Z cars sold in America left Nissan’s Oppama (Japan) factory with incorrect front suspension toe settings." was in error. They even make reference to the TSB in the article. "Nissan issued its dealers a technical service bulletin (NTB03-006A) that instructs them to adjust the front-end toe, as well as swapping the “cupped” front tires side-to-side (different tire sizes front-to-rear mean Z rubber can’t be rotated in the traditional sense)." This contradicts Nissan's first TSB (NTB03-006). If Nissan changed the specs, informally through the TSB at least, then all of the cars left the plant with incorrect toe settings. The Article makes it sound like it was just a production clitch when we were already seeing Nissan's attempt to put a bandaid on a major design problem. I also cannot even begin to understand why Autoweek chose to include this tidbit "Previously announced changes to 2004 350Z suspension tuning (AW, Nov. 24) were adopted for improved ride and handling, and should have no effect on the tire wear issue." How could they (AutoWeek) possibly know one way or the other? This article almost sounds like it is a public relations message prepared by Nissan. In any case, neither Autoweek or the Author chose to respond to my e-mail let alone correct their article.

 

Does Nissan pay for advertising in Autoweek? Just curious...

 

All car mags have to maintain a friendly relationship with the manufacturers to a degree to have access to the products they sell and advertising too. The only car mag that I've found tells all is CAR, but they're in the U.K., but they'll bash any brand. However, the competition is getting wind of this and will be telling potential buyers of their cars about it soon, if not already.

Nissan has to move on this soon, as we and others keep bombarding them with dissatisfaction of their product and the word spreads about their "bandaids" instead of honest repairs. The one thing we really need to do is support our good dealers, because they will have the greatest impact on NNA.

Don't fight with your dealer, report them to NNA and find a more customer-oriented one to do your work, repairs, maintenance, whatever you may need, if you can.

There may be more good dealers out there who need support from us with NNA. Let's make them responsive to us, and through them, make NNA more responsive to their dealers, and ultimately to their customers. Remember, Nissan was sinking in 1999 and went outside the company to get the administrative help it needed to put the new products out that they had on their drawing boards. Between 1995-1999, Nissan lost its cohesion as a company for awhile and we are witnesses to its re-birth, but that re-birth isn't all love and kisses. They need to prove that they have cohesion again and it always starts with improving the products and maintaining the products by repairing or replacing parts that are faulty. If they can focus on a product to demonstrate their new cohesion, it should be the Z!!

Boomer babble--use it or lose it, I do care a lot in this instance.

 

And that was some of the best "Boomer babble" I've read to date. Nissan should consider offering you a position. Honestly, it was a very good post.

 

Took a little coaxing and constant reminding for me to get my alignment specs printout faxed to me, they should be printing them out and filing them as they are required to do so for legal/insurance reasons to the best of my knowledge.