My wife's got a 2003 350Z with about 94K miles on it. We bought it used back in April with about 88K miles on it from a car lot. The salesman said it came out of Florida. That's all I know about it.

The day after we got the car I went over it to see if I needed to add any fluids. To my amazement I couldn't find a dipstick for the transmission level. I'm like what the heck? So the owners manual says to take it to the dealer to have the fluid checked.

The other day my wife said the transmission "slipped" and some warning lights kicked on.

So I called a local guy who runs his own shop who specializes in Nissans. He said if I drove it real easy to his shop it and the transmission wasn't slipping it should be OK rather than having it towed.

He said it appeared the transmission had never been serviced because the fluid looked burnt and he would change the fluid and filter and that might save it.

Afterwards I'm coming home and the "SLIP" light flashed three times while going around a curve. I called him back and he said this was normal.

My wife says every now and then the SLIP light will kick on and the transmission will gear itself down and if you press the accelerator the engine will not speed up until the light kicks off.

That sounds to me like the traction control is functioning like it should. Is that the way it's supposed to work?

While driving the car yesterday, I was coming over a hill doing about 30 to 40 and hit a few bumps in the road and saw the light kick on.

She claims that before he serviced the car, it seemed the traction control never engaged even though the traction control was turned on.

Does all this make sense?

Should the traction control suppose to kick in even while driving on dry pavement even in a straight line? It seems to be real sensitive to bumps and shoddy road repairs. Which makes me think because the suspension is stiff, one of the wheels is coming off the ground making the car think one of the wheels is spinning.

I'm still baffled by this car's automatic transmission. I always thought the logic behind an automatic was so you wouldn't have to shift gears. Yet you can manually shift gears if you want. I'm like, why not just buy a stick shift to begin with.

My friend was showing me his BMW a few years back that had the same type of transmission and I'm like, "OK". That's all I said about it.

 

Walk around the car and note the tire sizes. Look at each tire. Post the sizes here.

 

Few points to add:

The tire/wheel size mismatch can bring on the slip light also.
The steering angle sensor [SAS] could also be recalibrated and reset by the dealer.
There is also a gyro near the shifter for VDC equipped models that senses direction and compares with the SAS.
I also had this issue when the air intake was sucking in air ever so slightly.
It put the car in limp mode immediately. Proper tightening of the air intake stopped that.

 

Are the tires bald? Air pressure even?

 

VDC/TCS has nothing to do with transmission - stop looking for a problem there. It's in the tire size or problems with the wheel speed sensors.

The transmission is sealed for a reason. Before you let somebody tear into it, make sure they understand that it's designed to work with Nissan J-Matic fluid ONLY.

When the slip light comes on, it cuts power to the engine to stop the wheels from slipping, it does nothing to gears or the transmission.

Find a copy of the owners manual and read it carefully, there are a lot of useful hints, tricks and details in it that will shed some light on what we're telling you.

 

The car was serviced by a trained Nissan mechanic with 30 years experience who runs his own garage. I'm sure he used Nissan J fluid.

After Nissan burnt me on an $500 alignment job on another car there was no way I was taking this one back to them.

Couple of other points I didn't mention but since it was brought up. Oil pressure guage was pegged out. He said the sensor was bad.

When I drove the car to his garage it stalled on me while going down a hill (not yet at normal operating temperature). After coasting to a parking lot, the car restarted rough and a whole bunch of warning lights kicked on.

He said the code was in relationshiop to a K?? sensor. I think this is the same thing as a MAP or mass air sensor.

He charged me $400 for all the above which I think was fair.

As far as the tires goes, they are in good condition, same brand on all four rims. They are Michelin Pyros or something.

Most shops/dealers will always over inflate the tires. So the next day when the tires are cool I always recheck the tire pressure and set them to what the door sticker says. But I haven't this one.

The local Subaru dealer over inflated my tires to 45 PSI on my Baja when I took it in for it's 30K mile checkup. I was like "WOW this car steers allot easier than it did before".

Sears over inflated the tires on her Cobalt and she said it made the car wander and ride rough. I deflated about 10 PSI out of each tire and she said it was OK afterwards.

There is a possibilty he or one of his workers over inflated the tires (I had him to rotate them at the same time) so if the tires are over inflated that could be a result.

I'll double check the tire pressure and make sure all of the tires are the same (which I'm 99% they are) and if it still does it, I'll take it back and see if he can recalibrate the traction control system.

By the way. Is this the sort of car that can be driven on a daily basis? I mean it is a sportscar but is the running gear the same as a Maxima? In other words is it more expensive to maintain than anything else?

Should we just keep out Cobalt and let her wear that car out and just drive the Z every now and then? She puts 80 miles per day on her Z. She won't drive her Cobalt anymore because she says it's not as fun as the Z which I can understand but it get's worse gas mileage and requires 93 octane.

Dad has a Porsche Boxter he just tools around in every now and then because it's so expensive to maintain.

I put the bulk of my miles on my Yugo in the summer believe it or not because it's so easy to service and cheap to repair. I do all my own work except if I need an alignment. Then my Subaru Baja in the summer.

My 96 Ford Explorer is also cheap to maintain but it has a Mustang GT engine that get's 12/19 MPG so in that aspect it's not something I prefer to use on long trips.

I don't car to tear into the Explorer but this Nissan scares me. The mechanic said it will need a front brake job in about 5K miles and I'm not sure if I want to tackle it.

I've worked on just about everything when it comes to brakes but not sure if I want to attempt a brake job on this Z car.

 

There really isn't a adjustment for TCS. The computer determines "slip" by looking at the relative rotation rate of the front vs rear wheels. Theh OEM tire sizes are staggered, there is a known difference in OD from front to rear. If the tires were replaced, chances are the stagger might have been changed and that could trigger slip.

Please post back with tire sizes from front and rear. That will help eliminate that possibility.

 

Brakes are easy on the Z, just like any other disk brakes. I havent done the rears yet, heard the e brake can be the only tricky part when replacing rear rotors.

 

I wasn't sure if the rotor required a special tool to remove the wheel bearing nut or not. Are the wheel bearings made into the rotor like a typical car? I mean do they use tapered bearings inside the rotor?

That may sound silly but with my Yugo and Fiats, the rotor and hub are independent of one another. Meaning once the caliper bracket is unbolted, the rotor just slides off the hub.

Where is a safe jacking point on this car where you can lift the entire front end off the ground with a floor jack? Or is it even possible?

I did brakework on my wife's 2000 Sunfire and couldn't find a jacking point and had to raise one side, pull the wheel, rotor, put everything back on and do the other side. The pain came from having to bleed the front brakes. Much easier to do with the wheels off rather than trying to squeeze in behind them with the car on the ground.

 

Sorry but cannot help if you do not answer simple questions.

 

I have the same problem with the car in the shop now they are telling me that it is either the rear sensors going bad or the ABS modules. My Transmission fluid is also burnt and they stated that the Transmission will need to be replaced as well.

Any clues if the sensors are bad or the computer going bad. I heard this is an expensive fix.