How did you have your car fixed?

 

F-Nissan. Never buying their cars or trucks again. Some of the worst customer service I've ever experienced. This feathering issue is ridiculous.

 

I will never buy another Nissan, sad too because other than the tire feathering issue the car is great.


Matt

 

I had all of my work done at Bankston Dallas. The final fix was aligning the car to the April 04 alignment specs and installing the new tread pattern Bridgestone (RE040). Since I am a big man (6'1 - 270) the service advisor also suggested that the car be aligned with someone of equal weight in the drivers seat. He had stated that the car was designed for a smaller person and weight may play a factor in an alignment. He had stated that other small sports cars (Porsche, etc) reccomend weighting the drivers seat before performing an alignment.

Since the alignment has been performed (16,000 miles ago) I have not expereinced any abnormal wear or noise whatsoever. i have driven the car about 75% of the time and my business partner has driven it about 25%. Even with swapping drivers and driving it agressively at times the car is rock solid. This car is driven on substandard roads (Farm to markets) gravel roads, some are pretty rough... not babied by anyone's standards.

I disagree with those who say the Bridgestones are not good for any more than 15K. My current tires are about 50% with only 16k miles on them.

D

 

I got the April 04 alignment at Courtesy Nissan and my feathering came back after 5k miles. When I took it back they made me get a rental car(******** since I paid 1800 bucks for the gold warranty) only to tell me my tires were feathered, but not enough for them to replace them. So I waited a couple months to a take it in again. This time they were feathered so bad it didn't seem safe to drive, and they blamed the problem on me saying there were impact marks on the underside and that must have casued the alignment to go out. Only problem was those impact marks were from when I bottomed it out on a curb when I first got the car, 40k miles earlier.

Maybe I will take it to Bankston and try that.

 

Sounds similar to my story, except I don't have any impact marks. I got red hotchkis sway bars that the dealership claims must have messed up my alignment. It's frustrating being an engineer, and having to hear illogical crap spew out of someone's mouth I responded that it was them who never fixed it correctly 10,000 miles ago.

In the end, it was actually NNA that denied any request for an adjustment to my alignment, not the dealership.

Well, I finally got rid of my roaring, but that due to an aggressive track day that shaved all the raised parts of the tread. Still, principles have been broken by NNA. I kinda liked what that one owner of an Audi TT did years ago...he had huge vinyl stickers made that spelled "lemon", stuck it on his car, and drove it everywhere! The dealership even denied working on his car as he drove up to the lot with those huge stickers on his car. I'm not that bold, but the idea crossed my mind.

 

I have 8K miles on my replacement front tires and they are starting to feather. Not bad, but I was running 32 lbs of air in them. Got a oil/filter change today and when I got in the car and drove off I noticed that they had 39 lbs of air in all of the tires. I lower it to 36 lbs when I got home and the tires had cooled down. Now I should get a new set of fronts for my 2003 before my tire warranty is up.

 

Yesterday I just had my fourth set of tires put on the Z. The tread design is different this time around. The inner and outer treads don't have individual tread blocks...they are connected. Another way of masking a problem!

 

I'm curious, how many times has a dealer replaced your tires for you? Mine is trying to tell me that it is a one-time replacement only.
I call BS, though, and NNA.

Please let me know so i can take it back to the dealer's face, as the next closest is about 35 mi away (this one is 5mi away)

 

This is the fourth set , including the factory set. This last time was a problem because I had just hit 36,000 miles. I was told by a Nisssan rep that the tires are warranteed for 24,000 miles. I only had 9,000 miles on them. Hope this helps

 

They replaced mine twice. The TSB actually says they will keep replacing them for free if they do not make it to 24k without feathering for 2 years, but it seems they are looking for every way possible to get out if that.

 

Oh and my feathering is back again at 46k miles for the sixth time.

 

Ok... thanks for the responses...
I have read the TSB and it says more along the lines of 24 mos, no mileage limits from in-service date... for the alignment. Then goes into some mileage items for the tires (prorating them out after 20K miles or so).

My question is now this...
Have any of you had to pay for all or part of any piece of this, and what were the time after in-service and last repair for the tires if you had to have it done multiple times?

I am getting a call back from Nissan regarding my 1hr on the phone with them just now, and I want all the ammo I can get just in case they try to stonewall me.

Thanks in advance!

 

My feathering is back big time on the second set of fronts with about 10,000 on them, and now at 23,000 the rears are finally dead enough for me to justify getting rid of the RE040s. Lord, what awful tires. I've just given up on the RE040s and ordered Kumho MXs from Tire Rack. 245/40-18 for the front and 275/40-18 for the rears. S03s would be nice, and so would Pilot Sports, but I can't justify the expense, and I don't autocross/race so I think these should be OK.

What I can't figure out, and I've been posting on this thread since it's earliest days, is whether different tires are doing the feathering or not. Anybody have an answer?

 

I put Nittos on this last time and still feathering at the same rate. I'll be all for buying better ones if they will last longer.

 

I thought [read as hoped] that this feathering went away last year, fall 2003, after the tires were replaced and the latest NNA alignment specs done. Had another alignment done this past fall at a different dealer, where I didn't take the printout with me this time around, now the feathering is back again. Coincidence or would this return so quickly if the new dealer didn't use the most recent NNA specs?

If this problem can't be resolved by NNA, even though this is a pre-order car, I'll dump it at lease-end [which is why I hedged and leased it to begin with, instead of doing an outright purchase].

Does the G-35 coupe do this as well?

And what to do about a GT-R [if that ever comes to pass]? I'd be hesitant to bite and get in on the ground floor again.

 

One more thing I forgot:

Does anyone on this thread have a recommendation for an alignment shop in the Newark, Delaware area?

 

All 4 wheel alignment machines have a before and after spec sheet that the dealer has to send into warranty to be paid it will say the starting specs in MM not inch all adjustment should be made to nominal specs not just in the green borderline ok. That is the only way you can get adjustments as good as posible.If no adjustment is available for caster and or camber something must be replaced to get it within factory specs before the last adjustment which is toe can be made.Ask your dealer for the before and after spec printout.

 

I can't believe this thread has gotten this long. It has been almost 3 YEARS and feathering still goes on.

 

It is really TOO bad that NNA hasn't stepped up to the plate and solved this problem.

It is pathetic customer satisfaction! I guarantee that it will cost them in sales in the long run!

I will never, ever buy, lease or drive another Nissan product in my life.

People always come up to me and ask me about my Z. I always, always, always tell them that I am on my 4th set of front tires in 20k miles.

It is a nice car, but thank GOD my other car is a Toyota! NNA could learn something from Toyota if they would open their eyes!!!