Because I had the best financial leverage, I traded my Z33 into Infiniti for my V35 (G35 Coupe). Others have had feathering issues with their V35 but very few I know of. I have not. I took a hit of about $6000 for having the car 14 months, that's all. The Nissans Z33's here lose value very quickly relative to Infiniti V35, ironic and stupid if you ask me.

Having taken delivery in Nov 2002 on the Z, I felt after 14 months I simply was having too many issues with the car and the tires were the nail in the coffin. No fix, and worse, no explanation from Nissan. My tires had been swapped once side to side, and still were pretty much all used up at 11k miles. So were the brakes. My compromise was also driven by changes that required I have a back seat in my daily driver. 3 years later I am pretty happy with the Coupe. Because the parent company was the same for both dealers here, I was able to work a good deal - basically they gave me slightly better than their wholesale cost for the Z in trade-in credit, took my car and sold it on their other lot.

The Michelin Pilot Sports are not as soft as the Bridgestone Potenza RE040's, and I managed to hit 30k miles (with about 8,000 on my Pirelli Snowsports instead during Winter). Not bad for a pretty sticky tire, OEM at that. There is about 2-3k miles of wear left at most.

I was just looking at a 2006 Z in the lot this morning; it has the newer pattern RE040 tires where the blocks don't have the line all the way to the first rain groove, clearly an effort to stiffen up the pattern. Reached inside, feel the inner edge, and the cupping is there. All I had to do was run my hand along the tire and you can feel the raised edges on the blocks.

If Nissan hasn't fixed this problem in 4 years, I seriously doubt they will anytime soon. I am amazed by the number of Z owners who have this problem but are completely unaware of it. I just talked to the owner of another 2005, asked him if he's had any problems, "Nope", but his tires are wearing the same (2005 Track).

If I had the Z, I would take all 189 pages of this post and sit down to discuss with my lawyer, lemon law or not.

Good luck.

 

Nissan has been replacing them up to this point therefore I had no choice in the matter. Otherwise I definitely would not have put these tires on this car. 1st there too soft of a compound and 2nd there too expensive if all I can get out of them is 14 000 km. But Nissan keeps telling everyone the alignment is the problem. I think at this point all of us agree this is not the case. Nissan will not deal with me now that my warranty is past.

 

Hello Z drivers,

My 03` with 217xx miles has started to roar on decel around 25mph-20mph. Hmmm....sounds like tire issues, again.

I looked into feathering threads for almost an hour this am, but didn`t find the specifics on the Nissan tire replacement. A year or so ago I remember reading something about 21000 miles and then pro-rating.

Can anyone lead me to the details of the tire replacement procedure?

*This am I did learn about the `new` Re040`. I will know what to look for.

Thanks!
Jack

 

I should`ve added this to the post above regarding my warranty question:

I had the front tires replaced about 18 months ago (5000-7000) miles ago at this same dealership. Stock track rims and tires.

 

Wasn't the recall time limited, like expired as of October, 2006 or the like?

 

Sigh... it was NOT a recall.

To answer teacher's question, see http://www.nissanhelp.com/Ownership/.../NTB04-043.htm.

 

So did Nissan fix this problem after 03? Is it a simple aliment problem that can be fixed with a different spec?

 

I just scheduled my car for an alignment, and hopefully some replacement tires. The road noise is SO UNBEARABLE... I really hope something good comes from this!

Wish me luck

 

My wife's Murano is feathering.

 

No. No recall, either.

 

If my appointment next week doesnt seem to solve any issues... I'm trading the damn thing in on a Dodge Nitro

 

If you can't live with the noise get rid of the car. Nissan will never fix your car so live with it or dump it. I dumped my 2003 Z and moved on to an STI and will never look back. No more tire noise, window lift failures, clutch problems, oil leaks or all the other problems.

 

they replaced both front tires and re-aligned the frontend at 9k miles, my 03 has no more tire feathering issues afterwards now at 24k. Looks like the alignment works.

i recently replace my 17" oem wheels tires with 18" oem wheels and tires from an 06. Looks like nissan finally fixed the front tire issues with the 06 models.

 

Since Canada has no Lemon Law and I couldn't waste the money getting a laywer, I went to arbitration using CAMVAP to get Nissan to replace my front tires with the RE040's with the new tread design. This is the fourth set of front tires in less than 45, 000 km (and 5 alignments; all of which showed there was no alignment problem). After I presented my case to the arbitrator, Nissan's rep just gave me the same old rhetoric; alignment, driving habits, etc. but agreed I should get another set of tires. To this day I still have no idea what the problem is (and Lord knows I've spent way too much time researching it) but once these tires are gone (and hopefully they last longer than the last three sets with the old tread pattern) I'm simply going to put on a tire with a harder compound. You'll note that the new Z,s have RE050's on them. If anyone in Canada wants to know how I got some satisfaction from Nissan email me. dave@newandused.ca I feel for anyone who has gone through this tire feathering issue. It's been four years for me and I've finally thrown the file in the bottom drawer. As other 350Z owners have stated "I love my car but I can't stand constantly replacing the front tires" or "I love my car, it's Nissan I can't stand". THE END (no matter what happens to these tires; I'm burnt out).

 

You'll need it. Make sure you at least get the tires with the new tread disign. They have a stronger inner tread. But don't get your hopes up. Sorry.

 

Driving style? That's bogus. One of the earliest worst cases I know of was a friend's wife who commuted about 20 miles each way on freeway to and from work. If anything the best my tires ever looked was after a track day when they were pretty well scuffed flat, basically like shaving the tires. "Normal" use seemed to be the worst driving style, i.e. lots of pedestrian driving and straight line freeway.

I would not put much stock in the RE050's, the idea of using a harder compound has been tried and failed, all it usually does is increase ride harshness and when the wear comes, makes it much louder and pronounced. I personally know someone who against my advice took Michelin P/S All Season tires, sure they have more than twice the wear rating, but for 20,000 miles you get a markedly inferior ride both in performance and ultimately safety, the tires don't stick, braking distance increases, and that's probably not why you bought the car. I feel that a stock Z is heavy enough that the high wear rate but reasonable traction of the first RE040's wasn't a bad compromise, I was 75% through mine at 11-12k miles. At least they performed well until the problems started (5k miles or so). The car wasn't made for tires that don't stick (hint: search on "swapped ends today" or "crashed my Z today" in this forum).

They did feather, they cupped, they were swapped, etc. I walked from the car, break-even or close enough to my G-Coupe. The Pilot Sports on the V35 (2004) have not had this problem after 32k miles; the front dampers and springs are identical to my Z, the rear springs may have been a little softer, not sure if by 2004 they went to the ~425 ft-lb springs like the Z. Some people have had this problem with the Coupes, too.

The RE050 is no Michie PS AS tire, but you may want to ensure that Nissan has not gone with different dampers or spring rates on the front especially; it fixing an '03 350Z was this easy I would have done so. They may have made changes to the front end not in geometry as much as springs/dampers, I cannot imagine running a lot harder compound. I'd not be surprised if in going to a longer wearing compound changes were made somewhere else, they have to keep the balance of the car either through tread design or other suspension changes which your car may not have. The newer RE040's were a step in the right direction with their tread pattern and the blocks not cut to the edge. A nice idea that will maybe get people out of warranty by their second set of fronts vs. the first. But don't assume what's good for the newer Z is good for you, it will likely just be another expensive fix that will last for a bit longer.

I spent the better part of 2 years talking to a lot of people on this and never really figured it out, either. Alignment isn't the issue, although it can make things worse. If newer Z's truly are statistically better and not suffering this problem as much, then I would look at what's changed - spring rates, damper construction, etc. as not much else has really changed.

If you want to PM me feel free, not much of a story to tell, but if I can help I would at least tell you what I "know". The attached is how badly shot mine RE040's were at ~5k when I took the car in because it was skipping under moderately hard braking, the ABS would go nuts - skipping off the tops of the cupped tread. Also had the compression rod pass side replaced same time under TSB. All the swap did was feed the beast fresh meat...by 10k both sides looked like that.

HTH

 

Yes I dumpled my P.O.S. '03 Z in '04 with 14,xxx miles for my third NSX. Never felt better, get rid of this worthless car that Nissan doesn't seem to care.

 

In four years of dealing with this tire problem I have never heard of anything but 'maybe it could be this, possibly it could be that' explanations. NO SOLUTIONS. When I dealt directly with the Nissan rep from Vancouver and an arbitrator from Calgary they could not disagree with me that the abnormal tire wear was in no way due to any of the explanations put forward by Nissan (No matter what the circumstances). Thus I received a FOURTH set of tires (less than 45 K) without being asked a single question by NIissan after I presented my case to the Canadian Motor Vehicle Arbitration Plan. As far as I was concerned Nissan just didn't think I would pursue this problem to this degree and i would just go away. Just by reading through some of this thread it is obvious that there isn't a person out there; owner, mechanic, Nissan rep, etc. who can DEFINITELY explain or solve the 'premature and abnormal' tire wear. And if these REO40s are so great why has Nissan gone to REO50s? When I ask any service manager in western Canada what have they done to the newer models to rectify this situation, they have no answer. If there is no problem then why is this the longest running thread on this site. Sure the tires will wear out way sooner than ordinary passenger tires. That's a given. BUT THIS DOESN'T EXPLAIN THE FEATHURING, CUPPING OR WHAT EVER YOU WANT TO CALL IT. The tires should still wear evenly so that you don't wind up with a multi-sided polygon that becomes an A/T tire. I'm sure I'll never know.

 

By the way. I'm now using my last set of tires as a coffee table stand. I might as well make some use out of them.

 

I've had four alignments. Everyone showed that the vehicle was never out of alignment. Yet the tires kept wearing out with the abnormal wear pattern. I believe that either Nissan better reconsider their specs or maybe alignments aren't the issue. If they really know what the problem is, they're keeping it to themselves.