Buy a car that’s good at being cheap, buy a car that’s good at being interesting, but don’t buy a car that isn’t good at either. I think this basic approach should lead to satisfying motoring whether you are looking for stable matrimony with a commuter or a torrid, tempestuous affair with an aging exotic. Car ownership becomes unsatisfying when you land in that awkward middle, and I believe a strong case can be made that buyers still do not have adequate information to avoid this in the commuter class of automobile. These vehicles are not very interesting and thus need to be trouble-free for the relationship to work and….oh, well hello there 2012 Nissan Altima 2.5S. Awkward running into you here.
Shall I tell these guys the story of us? Of how I kicked you out of the house when you began following the ruinous habits of your family that were not apparent to me when dating? I think I will, since you are still trolling around the used car scene in alarming numbers and people need to be warned about you. Now get lost.
I apologize for the interruption. But it was well-timed, as that Altima is an example of the awkward middle and there was little to warn me that it would end this way. We met through an acquaintance. Our family of four had just amicably parted ways with a nice little B-segment subcompact that just couldn’t manage the new stress of twin rear-facing car seats. Our friend Consumer Reports recommended that we meet the Altima, figured that we’d hit it off. Good ol’ CR, he’s stable and has his life put together. We trusted him, and he knew we wanted a long term relationship with an affordable and reliable sedan with stretch-out space for our new family, capacious trunk, good fuel economy, controlled road noise for long-distance cruising, and a bit of life in the steering and suspension if possible. CR also knew we found the 2012 Accord and Mazda6 too loud, the Camry too expensive, the Fusion’s transmission hopelessly dim-witted. The 2007-2012 Altima checked all those boxes and CR even rated it best in class at the time due to the high road test score and reliability.
I didn’t take a single picture of our car, but it looked a lot like this one
Our sketchy sometimes-friend Car and Driver, slurring words between hits of Jagermeister and energy drinks, said the Altima even knew how to cut loose once in awhile and have a good time, which surprised me coming from him. “But what of the CVT”, I demurred. “I need long term commitment and low-TCO here, we’re hemorrhaging from child care payments”. C&D was useless here and became distracted smashing the empty Jager bottle against the wall and hooting at a passing car of girls who blasted TLC’s “No Scrubs” on the stereo in response. He’s become such a puerile twit in recent years, knowing he carries the weight of his father’s legacy but utterly incapable of living up to it. CR stepped in with his reliability ratings, and the CVT was aces every year since its 2007 introduction. Surely if this transmission were a bag of bolts it would be evident after six years? Empirical due diligence accomplished, we got hitched to a clean 40,000 mile example and drove off into the sunset of cost effective frugal transportation. The domestic life, secure and worry free. My wife and I suspected a tragic midlife crisis would result in a fling with a sport sedan once the relationship hit 150K miles or so, but Altima didn’t need to know this and for now we were happy.
Plenty of room. Car seats are big.
The Altima performed as-expected over the next four years and did all that midsize sedan stuff very well. Appliance-class cars have really been quite good for some time now. It was roomy and quiet on the freeway and it cost less than the brand names. There was a touch of natural tactility to the steering and firm control in the suspension response, and this was achieved with high profile 60-series tires which preserved ride quality. Impressive. The brakes were excellent in feel and linearity. This was a dark period for Japanese automotive interior quality, yet the Altima was a step nicer, closer to the Fusion and Malibu. The performance of the CVT was spot-on for what this car was. If you tired of the fixed-RPM drone when charging up a mountain road, the manumatic ratio selector turned it into a 6-speed with far crisper shift response than Nissan’s own G37. I’m not kidding. I had a genuinely good time scrubbing tread off the shoulders of the tires on a deserted mountain two-lane. Nissan did a lot right with this car.
Shoves the car well enough, but sounds like a lawnmower
Anyone who has fired up the box-of-rocks QR25DE 2.5L engine and spent extended time in the seats knows that not all was peaches and cream. The engine sounds terrible anywhere above idle and the seats have zero lateral support, so that mountain road required lots of core tensing and a hard grip on the wheel. Cosmetic long-term durability was also questionable, inside and out. All that plastic looked fine but liked to talk and talk and talk, whether you were interested in having a conversation or not. The bland white paint was beginning to flake off the primer under the trunk lid and it wouldn’t be long before it started spreading onto the visible sheet metal. But, relationships are all about compromise and the car was mechanically flawless at nearly 90k miles. Still on the original brake pads. So what if she’s showing some age, it’s not like I’m getting younger either.
This is nicer than an Accord or Camry of the same year
The real problems began one day when climbing a mountain grade on the highway, engine thrashing away at 3500. A distinct mechanical whine began to rise above the background. Load in some more throttle and the whine intensifies, back off and it recedes. Hmm, that’s interesting. I’d been hearing rumors about her family recently, unsettling ones about instability and hostile erratic behavior. But they were just rumors. Months pass of in-town use and nothing comes of it until the next highway mountain grade. The whine is back, recurring on every climb now. Very interesting. I Google “Altima CVT w–” and the search engine autofills “hine” and up pops a very nice selection of YouTube videos, news articles, and forum threads on the matter, like a waiter rolling up the dessert cart. “Would sir care for a video of an identical whine just prior to the transmission exploding? Or perhaps a forum thread discussing abrupt failures, overheating CVTs entering limp mode alongside 18-wheelers at 80 per, and transmission coolers undertaking the futile toil of Sisyphus? If sir’s appetite has failed him, a discussion of replacement costs will ensure it does not return.” This was no longer interesting. The rumors were real, and the behavior was innate and heritable. Counseling would do nothing, she was going to burn this relationship down one way or the other. She had no choice, it’s who she was.
I knew this car would be getting the heave-ho, but for kicks I dropped by the dealer to see if there would be any defensive stonewalling or denial. There wasn’t, the service advisor didn’t even blink at my description. Nice guy, low pressure, said this was common and probably not a great sign, but who knows–let’s wait and see. He recommended the $1000 transmission cooler I’d seen all over the forums, knew the $4300 CVT replacement cost off the top of his head. Just another day ending in Y at the Nissan service department. He recommended shorter fluid change intervals. Dealerships have been shortening this interval over the years, whereas the owner’s manual lists it only “as needed”. Ours had been changed when we bought the car at 40K. The replacement tranny would be a remanufactured unit with a confidence-inspiring 1 year warranty. Nissan would not cover it, as their make-nice extended 10yr/120K warranty stopped at MY2010 vehicles. Because they fixed the issues for 2011, you see. SURE THEY DID.
So we now had a 6-year old car with 85K miles, a $4300 repair looming somewhere in the hazy future, and an internet full of similar stories contradicting the published reliability metrics. Getting rid of the Altima so early required swallowing a big depreciation hit, demonstrating that divorce isn’t cheap. Since we already had a car loan, and were not expecting to replace the paid-off Nissan for years, we ran straight into the arms of the most dependable rebound available. This is exactly how a car company chases off a customer for life. It doesn’t matter what the engineer’s proprietary statistics say about failure rate per 100 cars because I’m not buying 100 cars. I’m buying one. And if it is white goods with surprise Mercedes-Benz repair costs, you’re done. Your vehicle completely failed at its intended mission and you would not stand behind it. Thanks to the hole this Nissan dissolved in our transportation budget, it is going to be quite some time before I get to enjoy a more interesting set of wheels. First World Problems, as they say. My wife likes the Camry far more than the Nissan anyway.
However, it does lead to an interesting question: where did this all go wrong and how do you avoid it in the future? Next time, I’ll use this Nissan to demonstrate how Average Joes like me can be misled by published third-party reliability metrics. And how sometimes, even due diligence results in a roll of the dice.
And people wonder why I just purchased my third Camry?
I think living in the mountains shortens Nissan CVT lifetimes precipitously. The flatter the locale, the easier the driving, and the lower-power and lower weight the application the longer they last. You and I have discussed the story of my sister in law’s 2010 Rogue, that ran up to 186k miles without issue (I don’t know if it started with whining sounds or not) before a sudden and catastrophic CVT failure on the highway at 186k miles. They live in Central PA with a mix of flat and hills, and my sister in law is a pretty easy driver. Since my brother replaced the CVT (quite the job on a Rogue), it’s rolled up to 210k without further issue, thankfully her commute is vastly shorter than it was. The beat-to-death ’09 Altima my other sister in law’s ex bought for lyft driving (don’t get me started) against my advice had 180k at purchase presumably on the original trans, no idea how well it has lasted since then.
I’ve had a few of the next gen Altimas as rentals (2017ish) and generally liked them. Yes the 2.5L is quite unrefined sounding, but aside from that I really can’t think of any complaints. Interior quality is in line with the Korean twins and Honda/Toyota, below Mazda6/Passat. For a renter, the dash and user interfaces are all easy to figure out, everything is where you expect it to be (less so the 2018 Camries and their tiny dash buttons). My last black Altima 2.5S rental even got a compliment from a female acquaintance (“wow nice car!”) for whatever that’s worth.
It’s interesting, I would have thought the strain of moving the car from a stop would be harder on the CVT than keeping momentum up a grade. This car operated on the flats most of the time, it was only the occasional interstate trip that it saw real grades.
I haven’t even sat in a newer Altima, but I think the revised CVT in the 2013 was even worse. Lots of internet buzz about that one.
” I would have thought the strain of moving the car from a stop would be harder on the CVT than keeping momentum up a grade.”
Heat kills a transmission, and any heat created during initial acceleration quickly dissipates once the pedal backs out. In contrast, long grades build and keep heat, then adds some more.
I’ve stated this before, but as it relates to my 2008 Altima I may be the luckiest person on the planet, or my driving and maintenance habits are the reason why I went 90,000 miles without a single thing breaking, and the only repair item out of the ordinary was a set of rear – yes, rear – brake pads. It could be that I changed the transmission fluid religiously at 30,000 miles, or that many of those miles were racked upon I-49 and I-40 between Northwest Arkansas and Little Rock. Not many tall or steep inclines in the Ozark or Boston Mountains, I guess.
Either that, or today’s Nissans are like Chryslers of the past. You might get a really good one, but woe unto you if you got one built on the wrong day.
You’re in NWA? I’m in Van Buren 🙂
Indeed, I do. Enjoyed seeing pictures of Fort Smith in your recent post.
I saw that Citation last night. It was stopped at an intersection and blocking traffic.
My son’s roommate worked in the service dept of a Nissan dealer, one of the older technicians once told him that Nissan was the Japanese Chrysler.
Ultimate bit of irony: My wife’s 2012 Camry SE 4cyl that she’d had since new is right at 85k miles, and they have had some issues with transmission issues in these, have had a TSB to reprogram torque converter lock up early on, and then got an extended warranty notice from Toyota covering us to 150k. The car has treated us very well mechanically aside from having to clean up the rear pad seats of a bit of rust (a minute with a file and then some brake grease to keep it from happening again) to fix some minor dragging after the local Toyota dealer proposed replacing the calipers and rotors entirely to the tune of $1200. She’s taking over driving our newly acquired Town&Country once the kiddo arrives and I’ll be the primary Camry driver. I’m considering selling it privately while it’s still worth quite a bit ($9-10k locally) and buying either a generic new Korean commuting appliance for $17kish, or else something somewhat interesting like a lightly used Charger or Genesis G80.
I remember reading about the torque converter issues on the early model years, it looks like that’s been resolved for awhile. I hope.
Honestly gtem, even as someone who went the safe route on both my current vehicles, if I were in your shoes I’d go for the Charger instead of another appliance. H/K’s grenading 2.4 Theta engines don’t instill a lot of confidence and a RWD Pentastar sedan with non-blob styling sounds way more interesting. If I had your mechanical aptitude, I’d have chosen something more engaging than our Camry.
The biggest Charger negative is interior room: the trunk isn’t as roomy as the Camry’s and more importantly, neither is the rear seat. With a little on in a car seat, it seems wrong to give up utility. Aside from that and somewhat obscured visibility, I absolutely love how they drive, 3.6L+8spd is plenty for me and I’d be able to consolidate on oil change items: can do changes with a vacuum extractor with these things and their top mount cartridge filter.
Keep in mind you have the minivan for maximum utility! If your daily routine will be anything like ours, the Charger would just need to work on the daycare/errand shuttle route. Just two things were critical for us in that use: the trunk can fit the folding twin stroller, and I can keep my driving position in front of a rear-facing infant car seat. I wouldn’t rule the Charger out unless you can’t fit the car seat comfortably. Or maybe I’m just projecting here and should be telling this to myself five years ago 😉
+1 for the Charger.
Another vote for a Charger, theyre pretty stout.
If I can put prisoners in one than you can put a car seat in one. Go for the Hemi though
I’m old enough to remember not depending upon trouble-free car ownership. So when I get new wheels, I instinctively get a vehicle capable of low cost repairs. That eliminates a lot of common vehicles out there. I don’t believe in Japanese vehicle fairy tales justifying higher prices. So – if I have a car, I expect problems.
In the rental car business, I’ve driven many Nissan products. Every one of them had some kind of fatal flaw in their design. Their engines never impressed. We’d have to send them back faster than our US products, because they got a higher resale before falling apart. Their reputation isn’t deserved, in my experienced opinion. Nissan has never been on my short list of potential purchases.
I struggle to understand Nissan’s appeal. But – I’ve always preferred to drive a car that supported our country’s economics, didn’t have to be shipped half way around the Earth polluting it by diesel engines, and kept my neighbors employed.
I’m too old and jaded to believe CR, C/D or any car brochure.
“didn’t have to be shipped half way around the Earth polluting it by diesel engines”
Smyrna Tennessee is halfway around the Earth?
I’m a bit surprised he said “around the earth”, which indicates at least a recognition that the earth is not flat. 🙂
It never fails to amaze me that so many folks don’t realize most Japanese brand cars generally have a higher domestic content than so many Big Three brand cars and trucks.
Yes the Camry is from Kentucky, the Legacy is from Indiana, Altima Tennessee, Accord Ohio, Optima and Sonata from Alabama, Passat from Tennessee as well. Who’d I miss? Oh yeah, Fusion hails from Mexico (not in the US), Charger from Ontario, Canada (also not US), and the Malibu is surprisingly nowadays for a Big3 car built in Kansas City as the lone American while all the “import” competitors are also built in the US.
I get the thing about corporate profits but really the manufacturing plants and surrounding suppliers employ the vast bulk on employees so as far as redistribution of dollars into communities around the country, the assembly portion to me has become far more important than where a supposed HQ is.
I believe VanillaDude’s beautiful Marauder was also built not in the US, but across the northern border.
BMW from South Carolina. Kia from Georgia.
I wonder how big of a deal the corporate profits part is, too. For the most part, these are publicly traded companies we’re talking about. Their owners are their shareholders. I’m no expert on securities law, but as far as I know there’s nothing preventing Americans from owning stock in Toyota, or Japanese from owning stock in GM.
I get the thing about corporate profits
I sure don’t. Could you explain it to me? 🙂
Corporate profits end up in two places. If they are retained, they end up in some bank somewhere in the globe, whoever is paying the highest interest. If they are distributed in the form of dividends, they go in the pockets of those that own the stock. That could anyone anywhere on the globe, as these stocks are readily available for purchase by anyone anywhere. Lots of Americans own Toyota or other Japanese car company stocks.
If the profits go to stock buybacks, then stockholder anywhere also benefit from the higher stock price.
And of course the great majority of these stockholders are large institutional investors. In any case, in the global economy of the past 150 years (yes, it’s been that long at least) I fail to see how it makes the slightest difference in what country profits are retained or spent on dividends.
I believe VanillaDude’s beautiful Marauder was also built not in the US, but across the northern border.
The next time someone sees VD in the flesh, like at the last CC Meet Up, they need to bring this issue up with him directly, because he drops it here in the comments regularly, and has been for as long as I’ve been reading his comments, which is over ten years.
I wasn’t there, but if I had been… 🙂
“I get the thing about corporate profits”
“I sure don’t. Could you explain it to me? 🙂 ”
I suppose I should have phrased that as “I’m sure someone may bring up the argument regarding corporate profits” as in usually it is argued that the profit made is then off-shored. My personal opinion is that much of this is hogwash too as when an item is profitably produced somewhere, a well-run company will reinvest much of that profit in order to generate more at the same location etc. And yes, since these are publicly traded companies, the shareholders, some of which are here (including myself in the case of Toyota actually) eventually benefit from that. I believe part of the argument is that many if not most of the shareholders are actually overseas as well but as we all know that is not the case for every shareholder.
I’ll chime in as well. My 2016 Civic was assembled in Canada with an engine that came from the USA. If you buy a Civic Type R, they come from the UK. Do they even make Civics in Japan anymore? ;o)
My 2007 Mustang came from this country (Dearborn, MI I do believe, but I could be wrong), but the 1997 Grand Prix GTP that preceded it came from Canada.
And Buicks are made in China now, so it just doesn’t matter anymore in today’s global economy.
Disclaimer… you guys are usually quicker with the facts than me, as I learn all this stuff from hanging around here. Feel free to correct/berate me if it’ll help. ;o)
Thanks Paul!
Our S197s (and current Mustangs) were actually built in Flat Rock, Michigan, in a plant originally built in the mid-1980s by…Mazda. To be fair, Ford did own 24.5% of Mazda at that time, and Flat Rock was billed as a “joint venture,” since it built the 626 and the aborted FWD Mustang, the Probe.
By the way, I don’t know if it’s a product of design, materials, or assembly, but in terms of quality my 2012 is light years ahead of my 1980, 1984 and 1990 (all bought new or as demonstrators).
@RetroStang: There’s only one Buick made in China, the Envision. I should remind our readers that Honda was the first to import a Chinese built car to North America, the last generation Fit.
Consider yourself berated.
Yup!
Once again, Paul is correct.
My last two Camrys (2010 and 2019) were assembled in Kentucky and had enough “domestic content” to be considered an American car!
I am finding this out while helping fix my friend’s 1987 Honda Accord. He expects trouble free driving, even though the car is almost as old as he is. I’m slowly teaching him about car maintenance. It’s amazing how just doing simple things like changing oil and spark plugs can save you so much money in the long run. This poor little car has been around the block, and he’s not in a position where he can afford a big repair. I suspect we both will be under the hood quite often. It’s a great learning experience!
NIssan is easily the worst of the Japanese. I’d take a Hyundai or a Kia over a Nissan, especially the Altima.
Altimas are really near the nadir of their class.
“I struggle to understand Nissan’s appeal.”
It is simple. Nissan has taken the place of Mitsubishi in the USA with its easy finance terms which make it easy for folks with horrible credit to finance one.
There are plenty of Nissans around in PG County Maryland for that main reason.
I’ve jokingly referred to Nissans as “Bad Credit Cars” for years. I guess I’m not imagining things.
Not sure if it’s related to creditworthiness, but it seems an awful lot of Altimas are dented and/or missing parts of their bumpers. I don’t know of the folks who buy them tend to have a lot of minor accidents and then can’t afford to get them fixed, but it definitely seems like a pattern to me.
I can speak to this, although I don’t want to offend any upstanding Nissan owning citizens here, but you may not be that far off Eric. Like Leon, I commute in this area; Howard County is right next door to PG County here in the great state of Maryland.
On I-95 every day I see plenty of Nissan drivers doing some really stupid sh!t. WORST. AGGRESSIVE. DRIVERS. EVER.
There is an fairly new Altima right here on the parking lot as I type with a missing front bumper cover, and it’s been like that for almost a year. Um… is your insurance company THAT slow?
Just two days ago a rouge driver, pun intended as he was driving his higher center of gravity vehicle like he was driving a Lamborghini. I guess he didn’t think the 80+ MPH Speed I was maintaining in lane 1 (fast lane in SHA parlance) was fast enough. He proceeded to change lanes five times wildly, cutting of a semi next to me in the process forcing him slam on his brakes just to get past me and the traffic with whom I was maintaining pace. I really expected to see him a few miles up the road on his roof.
I put up with this crap EVERY. DAMNED. DAY.
Sorry for the rant, and again, this is not meant to offend all Nissan owners. It’s just a demographic observation is all.
Hi Rick,
I can relate to your aggravation with bad drivers. I see it every day going into Chicago where I work. That generation of Altimas seems to have taken the place of Pontiac Grand Ams for the “beaten to death early and driven like crap” honors. Not too long ago I thought they might be nice cars because there were so many but most of the ones I see haven’t aged well. Meanwhile, my ’03 Avalon still drives smooth as silk with it’s 256,000 miles and original (almost) everything. Even that was built in Ohio (I think).
Vanilla, you’re speaking to the heart of the issue even if I don’t quite agree with your conclusions. Car buyers only have so much to draw from when making a decision: anecdote, bias, and available data/experience. The first two are wildly unreliable but seems to drive a lot of decisions. The third is trickier to evaluate–reliability data is an attempt to bring empiricism to the public but has flaws. Professional experience such as yours is unevenly distributed (we don’t all work as mechanics or in the rental business), and opinions seem to vary there as well.
Regarding Nissan’s appeal and reputation, I wasn’t aware there really was any since the 1990s anyway. Their reputation seems to be one of lower prices and generous financing. I simply saw it as a useful conveyance that hit all the utilitarian criteria and drove fairly well, with no quantifiable warning signs.
Both the Nissan and the Toyota were built in the US, so their original buyers supported the endemic economy, and I bought both of them second-hand through local dealers, so sales staff and dealership owners in my town benefited from my dollars, so I’m not sure buying a domestic brand would have done much here.
I’m not sure who got hit harder here—the Altima or Car and Driver.
I think I got hit harder. I’m the one who admitted in the public sphere that he liked a CVT Nissan well enough to buy one and expected it to be reliable…
Petrichor – this was a lovely bit of writing which I enjoyed immensely. More please, but ideally with a happier ending next time, okay?
As for Nissan, I’ve never felt they belong in the same pantheon as Toyota and Honda. Well above Mitsubishi and Suzuki certainly, but more on the reliability levels of Hyundai and Kia which are sometimes a great notion…but not always.
It seems to me that while Honda left the path of righteousness after Sochiro passed away, they still continued in the general direction of Bethlehem if not by the most direct path; recently they seem back on track. As for Toyota, they had a fall from grace (a decade or so ago?) where they started chasing market share and moved away from their quality focus, but the Toyoda family stepped in and publicly chased the moneymen out of the temple. Nissan however… well, Nissan gave the moneymen offices and staffed them with Frenchmen. Of course, the French High Priest has recently been cast out and stoned.
It’ll be interesting to see what happens next, although I suspect you personally have zero interest in finding out.
“It’ll be interesting to see what happens next, although I suspect you personally have zero interest in finding out.”
You got that right 🙂 For the bold, Nissan now has a variable compression engine with increased fundamental complexity. If they cannot figure out a simple belt-and-pulley transmission design, I’m not willing to gamble that an experimental engine design will fare any better.
Lokki Toyota is still well on the cost cutting track, as is Honda. My friend’s 2017 Greensburg Indiana-made Civic is a sloppy mess with a number of minor but disappointing issues (wiper linkage broke, some suspension or subframe element rattling around, rubber cowl fitting degraded/failed after just 2 years, very sloppy panel gaps/alignment).
My in laws’ 2013 Rav4 Limited has also had a number of cheap plastic things break in the interior inside of 60k miles: glovebox handle, and center console lid. And these are not folks that abuse their cars (have had a string of Toyotas in the past as well). That Rav4 has every dollar vacuumed up out of the interior anywhere you look. I looked at the glovebox handle element that failed and was appalled at how cheap and chintzy it was. Went looking for a replacement OEM part: only sold as an entire assembly for $300. Look back to previous gen Rav, it still had a locking glovebox as standard, and all individual glovebox components available to buy separately. I suspect Toyota is simplifying by cutting costs and outsourcing whole sub-assemblies to suppliers to save money.
“Our sketchy sometimes-friend Car and Driver, slurring words between hits of Jagermeister and energy drinks,”
It was a good thing I was between sips of coffee when I got to this part. A good belly laugh always improves the morning.
You make me realize that most of my favorite cars have been really good at one thing rather than trying to be a jack-of-all-trades. And you reaffirm my distaste for late-model used cars. When looking at something 10+ years old there is a really good body of data on what the problems are and it is apparent if the particular car you are looking at has been cared for and maintained.
But something in the 3 year/40k territory is a crap-shoot. It is too new for abuse/neglect to show and the real problems have likely not surfaced in real numbers yet. But they cost a lot, so the stakes are high.
Some day I will get over my aversion to CVTs. Today is not that day.
“When looking at something 10+ years old there is a really good body of data on what the problems are and it is apparent if the particular car you are looking at has been cared for and maintained.
But something in the 3 year/40k territory is a crap-shoot. It is too new for abuse/neglect to show and the real problems have likely not surfaced in real numbers yet. But they cost a lot, so the stakes are high.”
I think this is an excellent insight, and one that I wish I had thought of before I bought this car.
I research “C& D” and other car magazines for their opinions; but “I” am the final de-terminator on what car “I” spend my money on.
“Car & Driver” has suffered greatly since the departure of David E. Davis and the staff members he influenced and molded. It reads like a internet website today.
A screaming it’s guts out CVT is not my idea of a refined, long lasting transmission/transaxle either.
CVTs work great in snowmobiles. A machine you typically replace the drive belt on every couple thousand miles or so.
Personally I like their performance. But I’d never want one in a car because I have yet to see one built stong enough to hold up while handling that kind of weight. Some things don’t scale well.
That said, it seems a lot of new 6+ speed transmissions are trouble prone. Perhaps even most.
Seems like Nissan has had the most trouble with their Jatco units. Is it a function of being the most aggressive in their implementation of this tech in terms of early adoption and across their whole lineup (including mating to powerful V6s in heavy crossovers and vans)?
There’s now a ton of Hondas and Subarus and Toyotas running around with these, Subaru since 2010 in their Outback IIRC. I have not heard of too many disasters with these other makes.
With how much my Chrysler floats/flares the torque converter between shifts on my 62TE in the van, it feels CVT-like at times, no idea on what that might mean for longevity. I’m most interested how the CVT in Subaru’s new Ascent does: high torque turbo motor hauling 4000lb+ of AWD three row crossover)
Subaru extended their warranty to 10 years/100K due to problems.
I am not a fan of the 62TE in our T&C, it always feels like it’s in the wrong gear. No mechanical issues so far at 75K.
But there are also lots of reports of major problems out there with the new 8,9, and 10 speeds.
+1, the 62TE is always 2 gears away from where it needs to be. I drive around in town holding it back in 4th and on minor highways in 5th.
One of my uncles has a Caravan for his company car and he does exactly the same thing too. Why can’t they program this thing to drive pleasantly?
I don’t mind that so much, I ‘m a pretty chill driver and like riding the higher gear and letting the torque converter feed in power and smoothly get me up to speed. But I can see why it would be frustrating. But boy does she pick up and go once you put the hammer down and drop a few gears!
@gtemnykh
Last year I met someone in Woodburn, Oregon who commuted to Hillsboro with a 2010 or so Outback. They said the Transmission failed at 180K Miles.
Yeah, it actually works pretty well if you drive aggressively. The van in general is difficult to drive smoothly, a combination of aggressive throttle tip-in and the seemingly always shifting transmission. It would be fine if it was a sports car, but I often wonder what the hell Chrysler was thinking programming a minivan like that.
Not to pick on Chrysler though, we’ve been happy with it overall. It’s just that bad transmission programming seems to be an epidemic these days.
Six-speed Sedona owner whistling contentedly over in the corner . . . . 🙂
For the most part, the 62TE in our Promaster is reasonably ok. Maybe that’s because of the heavier weight and lower (higher numerical) axle ratio. But then I don’t drive it much in the typical commute-type situations.
My two complaints are:
1. 6th gear is way too big of a drop from 5th,like almost 50%. 6th is ok if you drive pretty gently, which I actually do when on a trip. But at higher freeway speeds, it shifts down very often. Once with a big headwind, 6th became unusable. I wish there was a ratio in between.
2. It has very aggressive engine braking on downhills. Way too much so. I prefer to ease up speed some on uphills and take advantage of gravity going downhill. This transmission makes that almost impossible, as it will do everything possible to keep your speed what it was at the top of the grade. I’ve just mostly given up fighting it in that regard and focus on the scenery.
There’s plenty of times I do wish this thing had a European Fiat Ducato drivetrain: a non DEF emission-system diesel and six speed manual. Oh well. For the most part, I don’t find it too objectionable.
I found the 62TE to be very annoying in the 2018 Caravan GT I had as a rental 2 week ago. Never messed with trying the manual mode, which I feel shouldn’t be needed for daily driving in something like a family van.
Really enjoyed this one today. I too have an aversion to CVT, but I’m even one step more suspicious and try for a standard tranny whenever I can. The Focus, VW, and motorcycle are standard. The Caravan is auto, despite being the newest vehicle it is also the only one that’s had the entire transmission replaced 🙁 under warranty. Next time it’s on me. Double 🙁
My neighbor across the street had an Altima. Seemed like a decent car but when it started falling apart and getting hard to trace warning lights he ditched it for an older BMW wagon. It seems to be working well for him.
These are super cheap on craigslist even with lower mileage, not quite Sebring/Avenger cheap… but Fusion/Malibu cheap. Never considered one as I read about the horrendous CVT time bombs on a few car websites and assume their resale value reflects that. They are almost as bad as the Focus/Fiesta automatics in how universal and severe the issues seem to be (two models which also have rock-bottom resale value).
Yes, the Camry is always a safe choice, if you can afford a new(ish) one on a budget. But among 5-10 year old cars, they can run almost double the price of other used sedans of equivalent year and mileage, at least around here. Same with the Accord, and the Civic/Corolla a class down. They are so overpriced on the late model used market that it almost zeros out the superior reliability, even with an early transmission replacement, because the Camry is going to cost $3k to $5k more (or worse) in the first place. You get what you pay for….
As an owner I was astounded and pleased to see that the going price for a 2012-2014 Camry with 80- 100k miles and a clean title is still in the $10k range around here, but as a shopper that is just much too dear. Accords are similarly overpriced. Malibus of this era have serious issues with stretching timing chains on the 2.4L, especially if they have not been fed a steady diet of good quality synthetic oil. Hard to shop this age/price range of sedans and truly find something high value that will deliver another 70-100k of low cost motoring, I’d argue it’d be worth finding something new or almost new and financing the balance if push came to shove. Either that or go the opposite direction: buy a early-mid 2000s Camry/Avalon with 150k miles for $4500 with a clean bill of health and go from there (or a late 90s one for $2500-3000).
I found that too when looking at pickups. 3 year old used ones were so expensive and on older ones there are so many trouble areas that are so expensive to fix that I ended up buying new, the first time in my life I have done so. But I just don’t trust a lot of vehicles from the mid-2000s on up, it seems to me that long term dependability has been on the decline since then as drivetrains and electronics have gotten more sophisticated.
But I also realize 40 some year olds have probably been saying that for decades 😉
No I’d say there had been a very real threshold crossed in the last decade or so with everyone chasing every last bit of fuel economy and sacrificing durability and/or mechanical simplicity along the way (throw in some cost cutting as well). The late 90s-mid 2000s things peaked, and now we certainly have more power/mpg/safety, but I truly don’t believe the newer cars are more reliable, or that they will be as affordable to run long term (20 yrs). A zillion “modules” connected by optical cable controlling things like wipers, headlights, etc (Europeans are the worst offenders)
Yeah so the Camry costs $3-$5k more up front but saves you $4k on transmission replacement and will still probably be worth $1-$2k more in 5 years means that Camry is the better option in my opinion.
But then you are counting on or acknowledging that the trans WILL fail and there is zero possibility of it operating as a buyer would expect/hope without having to pay for a replacement before the end of the ownership period. If it had worked fine as many of them likely do the OP and anyone else who has one would presumably still like and be driving their Altima. I don’t know, that math doesn’t really work either.
Well you also have to consider the other, not necessarily direct financial, costs of what it is like when it does fail.
I’d pay the extra $5k up front for a lower likelihood of the wife being stranded on the side of the road coming home from work one cold, dark and rainy winter evening.
Of course I can afford that extra $5k up front and I do believe that you will get at least some of that back if it is sold in a few years, or just get more years out of it until it is time for the scrap yard.
Scoutdude: My automotive logic also.
Max, I got around the Camry Tax by stumbling on an undervalued one. Patience helped there, but so did luck. Regarding the cost premium zeroing out the reliability benefit, in pure financial terms that may be true. But it is difficult to put a monetary value on not having the transmission shred itself on your family vacation.
You often get what you pay for I suppose, but any car is a bit of a crap shoot especially a used one. Would a new Camry have been better? Maybe, maybe not, if you didn’t ever get the Altima and paid thousands more for a Camry you probably would have been thinking about the extra thousands spent all this time as there wouldn’t have been the unfortunate experience to counterbalance it. As it is you curse the Altima and consider the Camry money well spent. No matter what, generally you gotta pay the Man sooner or later. 🙂
If you’d purchased the Altima new (I know, not necessarily an option nor one I necessarily espouse) and done the maintenance at the dealer etc and had the stack of receipts and then this happened, perhaps there could have been some kind of “goodwill” discount in the offing being that it was out of the covered period, but as a used car purchaser, no, they don’t owe anyone anything and need to draw the line somewhere. There’s still lots of cars that don’t even get anywhere near the mileage yours had before it started making noise (it never actually died though, right? Or did I misread that?). DougD, as he said above, had his trans replaced on his minivan while still under warranty but acknowledges that next time it’s on him. Note the expectation that there WILL be a next time. How does this stuff happen in the 21st century, transmissions are complex but should be well understood by now by everyone.
“DougD, as he said above, had his trans replaced on his minivan while still under warranty but acknowledges that next time it’s on him.” Well some would say that FCA products are right there with the NIssan’s on the do not buy list but I certainly can’t see keeping it around long enough that there would be a chance at a next time. IE sell/trade before the overall warranty or the one on the replacement transmission is up.
I would add the Ford Focus and Fiesta with Powershift automatics to that list. Their terrible depreciation shows that I’m not the only one. The odd thing is that the Focus I rented in Germany a few years back had a 6 speed Asian unit. Worked like a charm.
No denying the Powershift was a miserable thing that should be avoided.
Agreed. I know someone who had nothing but trouble with hers and Ford had to buy the car back.
The strange part is that Ford replaced that lousy automatic in the previous-generation Focus (not sure about the previous-generation Fiesta) in Europe, where the availability of an automatic transmission isn’t as important as it is here in North America.
The upfront extra cost on the Camry is essentially a wash. You will spend more to get one but you will get more for it when you get rid of it.
The lower upfront cost on the Altima brings you little possibility of a total lower cost of ownership. Either the public’s perceived risk of the potential for a CVT failure will depress your resale value in the used car market, or the actual cost of replacing the CVT will increase your costs….or both.
You’re probably familiar with Captain Vime’s Boots theory of socio-economic unfairness. If not:
“The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money.
Take boots, for example. He earned thirty-eight dollars a month plus allowances. A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. Those were the kind of boots Vimes always bought, and wore until the soles were so thin that he could tell where he was in Ankh-Morpork on a foggy night by the feel of the cobbles.
But the thing was that good boots lasted for years and years. A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that’d still be keeping his feet dry in ten years’ time, while the poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet.
This was the Captain Samuel Vimes ‘Boots’ theory of socioeconomic unfairness.”
@Lokki
Good writeup, thanks for sharing. Folks like my parents buy cars then drive them into the ground over 10-15 years (New York is hard on cars) and thus, resale value does not concern them, only scrap value.
I think this illustrates the limitations of reliability ratings such as published by Consumer’s Reports. I think these are fine for the first few years of ownership, when assembly quality adds to the importance of design. But it can take longer for design defects that affect long term functioning to appear and then be reflected in the ratings. I experienced the effects of this when I purchased a used 1977 Rabbit in 1979, influenced by the CU data suggesting that reliability of Rabbits was improving over the first years. It was not. Later CU data confirmed that Volkswagen was doing a better job of assembling the cars (so the first couple of years looked fine), but the design was not holding up in later years. No more Volkswagens for me. I do find one bit of long-term CU data to be useful, and that is owner satisfaction at the ten year mark. By then, the initial romance is over and people see their vehicles for what they are, and any ticking time bombs in the drivetrain are likely to have gone off. Overall satisfaction is confounded with reliability data in these numbers, but any car that has low satisfaction at the ten year mark can probably be reliably written off as a long term candidate for ownership. I have yet to find a useful source of information regarding long-term reliability of individual auto components. The closest I can currently find is the anecdotal evidence that appears on individual make and model fan sites. They seem to have taken the place of the trusty corner mechanic. Not only do you find reports of what goes wrong in the real world, and under what circumstances, but you can learn how easy (or not) the fix is. And some fixes are remarkably cheap and easy. Anecdotal data is no substitute for double-blind experimentation with adequate sample size chosen in line with the power of the statistical tests to be used, or carefully designed surveys obtained from a representative sample of owners, but we don’t have that. And anecdotal evidence is where science begins, anyway. Sorry about that transmission, I am sticking with my manual for a while longer. They seem to have worked the bugs out of those.
You make a great point on CR ratings. They rely on past experience. Which becomes worthless after a design change. So good ratings do not always apply if anything is different. And bad prior ratings always result in manufacturer promises of “we fixed that”. Which is sometimes true and sometimes not. You find out by buying the car.
The problem with CR’s long term data is that the last I checked you had to have purchased the vehicle new to be eligible to report your experience. With hit of miss vehicles that could tend to skew the results dramatically. Those that had a crappy experience after several years are likely to get rid of it before the 10 year mark and those that stuck with it for 10 years are likely to have got one of the good ones.
We don’t have CR here so when I’m buying a car, I typically do independent research via forums (either specifically for said car or on more general car message boards) and look up used car reviews on various automotive websites (as I typically buy used).
I’ve heard plenty of criticisms of CR over the years and it’s enough to make me a bit skeptical of them.
And yet, now, the huge competition/regulation for increased efficiency has led almost every automaker into CVT territory. Are they better for any automaker?
Toyota added an actual first gear to their CVT, which may or may not help. And the CVT in the Prius is a strange and deceptively simple system that should last. But what about Honda? I’d love an HR-V but don’t want a CVT. Or Subaru? CVT. New Kia? CVT. Mitsubishi? CVT.
All of the highly-touted Asian brands are using some CVTs in North America now; are we doomed? Or did they do their homework, like you’d think Nissan would have done?
It’ll be interesting to see how that plays out. CVTs look far simpler mechanically but they haven’t been around nearly as long to work the kinks out. And traditional geared torque-converter automatics aren’t always reliable either, even those from sterling brands like Honda.
To be fair Honda’s failing was sticking to their proprietary “Honda way” for their automatics which iirc worked around Borg-warner’s traditional patent on planetary gear sets and clutch bands and gave a more “direct” feel with better fuel efficiency, but didn’t scale so well as their American offerings grew in weight and torque output (good analogy to the current state of Nissan with their CVTs now).
The point about Toyota adding a first gear to their CVT is interesting, I was unaware of this:
https://www.roadandtrack.com/new-cars/car-technology/a19431445/toyota-cvt-with-1st-gear/
Nissan had added a secondary range to their CVT by way of some kind of mechanical linkage as well as of 2013 with their “Pure-Drive’ CVTs as I recall as well.
I consider myself quite mechanically well versed on the inner workings of automobiles but transmissions have always flummoxed me!
You need to get over to youtube and look up Weber Auto. The professor of automotive technology has a thing for transmissions and has a number of tear down/assembly videos. Yes much does revolve around Hybrids and EVs but there is for example a one on a Hyrda-Matic.
For what it’s worth, one of the site administrators at Temple of vtec asked the service personnel at his local dealer how the new Honda CVTs were faring in the real world.
The response was, “We’re hardly busy with transmission work these days.”
Where I live we have a mostly Japanese vehicle fleet nationally, repair shops are thriving, Nissans with trans problems are common.
We have 109,000 trouble free miles on our 2011 3.5SR Altima. I wonder if the v6 is more likely cause the CVT to explode, or that due to the increased torque (much less “rubber-band effect”) it doesn’t have to change (positions?) as much and will lead to increased longevity.
This is an interesting question. I’d need to investigate more, but all/nearly all of the forum complaints and stories I read were for the four cylinder. I don’t recall seeing anything on the V6, perhaps they actually engineered that one to handle the power of that engine. The Pathfinder, however, seems to be eating its CVTs at a rate the even CR noticed.
The early Muranos like the 2004 we had were known for CVT issues, Nissan significantly extended the warranty somewhat proactively to compensate. I believe it went to 120k miles and was issued in around 2007 so not that many vehicles had been beyond that yet. Contrast that with Automatic Transmissions at the time in Audi V8 models (anything with the 4.2) and BMW 740’s that generally were known to let go around 80k miles. As much as it would suck to replace a Nissan transmission, I have to think paying to replace a German transmission would be much worse.
I was putting together a list of mid-size crossovers for someone I know but I’ll just strike the Pathfinder off the list… I was impressed by its rather spacious third row but I was already a little skeptical of the CVT. And were I buying a three-row crossover, the out-of-date, cheap-seeming interior full of hard, scratchy plastics would be a turn-off. The typical family buying such a car probably wouldn’t care though.
The V6 is definitely not doing favors for longevity as far as torque loads IMO, but with easy driving habits in the right conditions it could last just fine.
“hooting at a passing car of girls who blasted TLC’s “No Scrubs” on the stereo in response”. This made my day! This is seriously well written material.
I don’t know what state you live in or even know about this, But this generation of Altima and many other Japanese cars made from the mid 2000s to early 2010s suffered from melting dashboards. Lexus replaced mine for free two years ago on my 2007 RX, because it was sticky and shiny. And I live in Tennessee.
One can’t help but wonder if Msr Going Going and now gone Ghosn has a role to play here?
In this corner of the planet, Nissan had a pretty stellar name for sturdy mechanicals, including in nasty outback use. True, a Nissan was never a car bought because the buyer actually wanted it, but it was at least trusted to be just as steadfast (and undesireable) at 250K as it was when bought new.
Then, as Nissan nearly fell, along came the French captain, le cost cutter, and it would seem that amongst the genius he didn’t declare on entry was all his accumulated knowledge of reliability that has kept Renault car mechanics in holiday homes and yachts since anyone can remember. For sure, he sacked a lot of folk and there’d be savings made in bulk purchases and so on, but there seems a definite coincidence of Nissan’s decline and his arrival (a unique case of a decline coming after a fall?). We’ll never really know, because he is no doubt retired and sipping champagne on his mechanic’s yacht…..oh, that’s right, he was arrested for large-scale fraud, wasn’t he? Doubtless to the satisfaction of many a hapless Nissan purchaser who always suspected someone was screwing them over. (Renault owners thought exploding transmissions were both nothing terrible and the least of the trouble with their purchases, but I’m digressing).
I sympathise with your experience, Petrichor, in having deliberately taken the dull route only to be mugged by unreported forces hidden along the way (in my case, an admittedly rather used Mitsubishi), but I have to thank you for reminding me that good old Nissan is no longer a less-likely fail than years ago. Next purchase, I thought “Bugger it” and bought a Renault – it’s the ghost of Ghosn again! – and, well, at least it wasn’t dull to drive on the days when it did.
Ghosn’s main sin with Nissan was making it become a more volume brand over keeping it more like the Nissan of old. Nothing really exciting, nothing innovative, but high volume and cheap. Plus, as noted, finance those who are not being financed elsewhere and you sell even more product. He really got the hit because the Japanese management team saw the merger writing on the wall, and understood that Renault held the reins due to their favorable financial stake in the “alliance”. With Ghosn gone, the Japanese will run Nissan (and Mitsubishi) more as they see fit. It may mean a return to the past glory revisited, at least we can hope.
A hit? Speculations would seem it could be a) Japanese management wanting a return to tradition without the autocracy of Westerner Ghosn or b) discomfort with the concentration of power he had (he really sort-of reported to himself on the board) and the high/complex remuneration packages he demanded or c) he is a crook who wanted to avoid reporting to the stock market and who failed to pay taxes.
Frankly, if it’s not c), and is a “hit”, then it speaks poorly of Japan Inc, because it is notorious that the conviction/plea of guilty rate in their legal system is close to 100% (even the three months in jail without any proven charge is already pretty outrageous). In other words, if he has been set up, it is very unlikely he will ever walk away from it. That’d be dispiriting. Apart from much else – including the diminished Nissan quality – his career was pretty remarkable.
Ofcourse, it’s entirely possible that he did indeed simply get greedy, as there is often a sense of entitlement attached to high-flyers, and that the rest of what we’re reading is just a product of the fact that the merger/cultural/political factors swirling around the story makes everyone think there MUST be more to it than an honest prosecution.
Oh Petrichor, how I enjoy your reviews!
I rented an Altima a few years back (the following shape) and it made zero impact on me. I barely remember it. Considering my misgivings about CVTs, that I don’t remember the Altima’s CVT annoying me is probably a good thing. But overall, it was comfortable but bland. Contrast that with the Passat we also rented the same trip and which we had to return because the trunk wouldn’t open. Its five-cylinder engine sounded great and the steering and handling were surprisingly fun.
But then again, I wouldn’t buy either.
You were spot-on about buying a car because it’s cheap or buying a car because you love it. That in-between spot, even if the transmission doesn’t start shooting off emergency flares, is just not a great spot to be in.
While I haven’t sat in this generation of Altima, I agree with your criticisms of the Camry interior. The ’07 generation seemed alright, the current one seems nice, but the two generations in-between were just depressing and cheap, especially the rear door trims. Yeah, probably screwed together well but full of hard, dour plastics.
I understand past generations of Mazda6, like many older Mazdas, were relatively noisy but I think that would have still been my go-to in this segment if I was looking for something reliable and well-built. They have the bonus of being rather fun-to-drive and you don’t have to pay the “Camry Tax”, although everyone’s points above about spending more to get more back at trade-in are on-point (and I enjoyed the ‘boots’ theory of socio-economic unfairness).
I’m enjoying the “Camry vs. Altima” responses here today!
Very good points have been made; for both cars.
‘Course, as I posted above, I am somewhat prejudiced in my opinion.
I test drove a Nissan with a CVT once. It was from a local used lot close to home. The salesman drove first to “show you how wonderful it is to drive a CVT”. He stopped the car at the end of my street within view of my house. I thought for a minute that it might be rude to just get out and go home from there. I was really interested in the manual transmission cars that were on his lot, and this would be the third or fourth time I had told him that as well as no CVT equipped Nissans, so I took the wheel and went straight back to the lot. “Come inside I have a few things to show you that you might be interested in”. Out comes the paperwork for financing and “how much of a deposit would you like to leave?” Deposit? On what? “The Nissan I just showed you” It was at that exact moment that I regretted not getting out of the car and walking home. It would have been the perfect F-you gesture for not paying attention to anything that I had to say.
Six months later I bought my manual transmission equipped daily driver. From somewhere else where the salesman and I were just two guys talking about everything except the car I was test driving.
The only place that tried to “hold my keys” when I was ready to leave after just test driving a car was a Nissan place. And I agree with comments above regarding Nissan taking the position of “easy credit to people who consistently make bad life decisions.” That’s not to say if you drive a Nissan you fall into this category, not at all.
Personally I avoid the hold my keys thing by either not doing a trade in or just not bringing it. With the last car I bought for the wife her old car was going to her mother so that was easy. With the last car I bought for myself I went with the didn’t bring my trade. I went in with a target price for it and was within $200 of that as they stuck the difference into the trade to get to the out the door price I was looking for. In the days when keys were just keys and you could have them made for $1 I’d just hand them my single extra key, not my key ring with my house and other keys.
I really don’t know what happened at Nissan over the years or who was responsible for it. Having had, and still have 510s, a 710, Three Hardbody trucks in all flavours from a 1988 through to 1994 model years and then a 2006 Sentra. All have been manual transmission vehicles. Every one of them was/is a delight to drive except for the Sentra. It was absolutely boring. The only thing not boring about it was the “Fuel pump issue” but that got old fast. I purchased the rebuild kit as per the TSB on the issue and once installed it was perhaps the dullest set of wheels I ever owned. It was average in every way except the seat fabric sun fading and showing more wear than it should. I never really connected with it.
Nothing in their line up interests me in the slightest. I must admit to warming up to the “Puke” I mean Juke but once inside one with the door shut I couldn’t get out of the cramped horror show of an interior fast enough. Never mind the reliability issues of the CVT. It almost seems that they lost the plot around model year 2000 or so. Then it stopped being fun.
Yes, Nissan has gone downhill in the desirably department. (in my opinion.)
My Father’s (now my Mother’s) ’96 Maxima has an excellent, spirited V6 engine and decent transmission; but the rest of the car is showing it’s age in spite of being garage kept with only 92K on it.
Dad bought the Maxima, sight unseen, based sorely on the high recommendation given to it by “Car & Driver” magazine editors. He didn’t even test drive it until he was on the way home with it!
That’s odd Mark, because that ’95-’99 generation of Maxima are absolute tanks if you can keep them away from rust. My brother just had a ’97 in the shop with 257k miles on it, just needed a bit of EGR troubleshooting and a general refresh with some fresh plugs and such. Now, they don’t feel like fantastically overbuilt “brick sh*thouses” like Camrys and ES300s of that same era do, but they feel lighter on their feet, sharper handling, and will leave a Camry (even a V6) for dead away from a light!
Bad points: A/C freon leaking from…somewhere, cheap plastic interior parts fading and cracking (on a garage kept car, no less!), multiple “check engine” light issues, hard, uncomfortable seats, fuel injection repairs, cracking at the seam windshield washer tank, rather stiff ride quality over the potholed roads we have here.
Good points: no body rust (usually not an issue here in road salt free New Orleans), decent paint longevity, awesome, powerful, potent, growling V6 engine, very good highway gas mileage.
The Maxima just feels more “lightweight” than the same year Toyotas that I have driven and experienced. More agile, yes, but at a price of substantial build quality.
It was exemplary until it hit 50K miles; then gradually became more troublesome.
“multiple “check engine” light issues”
Yes this seems to be a common theme with these, there are just a few sensors on the engine that cause this, the problem lies more often with a) total lack of even semi-proficient diagnosis and b) poor quality of replacement parts (not OEM). I agree in the overall impressions of riding worse and being “lighter weight/cheaper” feeling. I went from a 2000 Maxima to a ’96 ES300 and it was night and day. The ES300 was easily the higher quality car and handled our potholed roads much better, but to be honest I think I miss the Maxima more! It just wanted to launch away from lights and to wind out coming onto an on-ramp. My Maxima at 142k had a transmission that was starting to slur some shifts on hard acceleration and structural rust setting in. The ES300 had 209k miles when I sold it and was ready for 100k more with no signs of letting up, just a bit of rot in the rear quarter panels but structurally absolutely solid.
No “bout a dout it”, the Nissan V6 engine is the best feature of this generation of Maximas. Even today, when I drive my Mother around in her Maxima, I keep the radio turned off so I can hear the V6 engine growl when I goose the gas to merge into I-10 traffic.
It’s just that the rest of the car didn’t live up to the standards set by the engine (In My Opinion).
And I still do not like/want anyone’s CVT transmission!
The Hyundai Elantra is made in AL. My 2018 Elantra has Made in Alabama on the door placard.
I would not be surprised if the Kia Forte is made there also. It is a kissing cousin of the Elantra.
After owning mine since Sept 2018, I can say the car is well built and seems to be both well above the MSRP of $20,000 and what i paid for it (a little over $16,000 out the door)
I just tried to post three comments, after many days of not trying, and got “You are posting comments to fast. Slow down” and my comment disappearing. This has been happening over and over for weeks.
PLEASE FIX YOUR DAMN EFFED UP COMMENT SYSTEM
(I got the fourth try to post by changing my name and email address.)
Max, I’m assuming you don’t log in before reading/commenting – it works better (much better) if you create an account and log in prior to commenting. It’s not hard to do, and while I don’t even exactly recall what is needed to do so, none of your info is used or held anywhere for any use by anyone, except for you to log in and have better luck with comments. There’s obviously a little bug somewhere but the login helps keep it at bay. Sorry to hear of the difficulties, I sometimes get it as well when on a different machine or screen that I haven’t logged into.
I copy my comment into the clipboard before I hit “Post Comment”.
That usually keeps it from happening in the first place, but if it does I just paste it in and resubmit the same comment.
Wife ordered an Altima overseas at the base exchange Upon DROS back to the US. Killing time while picking up the car, a salesman asked how I liked the car. Since we hadn’t driven it yet, I told him so and asked if he had heard of any problems with the model. He told me they were very reliable. After a moment of silence, he added that the used a novel JATCO transmission that was really expensive.
I took the comment to mean that Nissan was proud of offering a very sophisticated transmission. At about 40k, I found out what he really meant. When the transmission started acting up again at 75k miles, we dumped the car.
Never bought another Nissan. Won’t buy another CVT. Even when it worked right, the damn thing reminded me of a Buick Dynaflow – but without the neat badge on the trunk. Ugh.
The story and comments bring back memories of four days with a rental Altima of similar vintage. “Just not good” is a phrase spoken about far fewer vehicles nowadays, but it fit that Nissan perfectly.
BTW the CVT in our 2004 Prius gave no trouble in 14 years and 225,000 km before we moved on. But that’s it for me and CVTs with their buzzing under load. Our newest car is a one-speed and the other is a very satisfying six-speed manual.
Toyota branding their incredibly mechanically simple and durable transmission on the Prius as “e-CVT” has confused a lot of people, but it is very very different than the expanding belt system that we associate with “normal’ CVTs (and that’s a good thing).
I rented a Nissan Altima from Hertz in Philadelphia in 2014 or so. I had no mechanical issues with this low-mileage vehicle, but its driver’s seat had a weird lump in its cushion that stimulated my prostate when the car was going over sharp bumps. Maybe some people are into that sort of kink, but not me! Crossed Nissan Altima off any future “Buy” lists, right there!
Very funny G Poon!
Did you ever see the “Curb Your Enthusiasm” episode where the broken passenger seat gave women, um, “stimulation”? It was on the season that took place in NYC.
This is one of the most enjoyable reads on CC since I found this site about a year ago.
Very well done!
Petrichor, I absolutely love your writing style. I’m laughing on this crowded Red Line train.
This is (also) my mom’s car, and I’m tempted to email her the link to this article, but I won’t for fear of freaking her out or spurring her to visit dealerships this weekend.
Yeah I’d abstain from inadvertent fear-mongering. As many of these CVTs have crapped out, many more Altimas cockroach along in Lyft/Uber service much longer than many here perhaps realize. Like I mentioned, the two Nissan CVTs I have seen were at 186k miles before failure, and an abused one with 180k that didn’t seem to have transmission issues yet.
That’s a fair anecdote (or set of) to share, thanks. While many have a story of one that crapped out, there obviously are others that haven’t and even if they do or did at 180k+ miles while disappointing is still remarkable as I doubt there is a full history of whatever maintenance is recommended with any of them.
For sure the failure rate seems higher than “average” but it’s doubtful that it’s anywhere near a majority and probably still a single digit percentage in terms of ones that failed after warranty and before a truly large mileage. Yeah, still not better odds than some other choices when it’s your own money on the line but one rarely hears from the happy owners that are driving theirs without issue.
With the 186k mile Rogue, my brother never changed the fluid but checked the onboard TCM fluid life monitor regularly, at the point of failure the fluid still had “30% life” left in it, and upon a teardown of the failed transmission, the point of failure was not due to a degradation of the fluid.
I’m so glad my cheapness led me away from that Altima I was looking at (midsize car equals comfy on road trips, right?) and the subsequent test drive was so underwhelming (you pegged the ‘uninteresting’ part perfectly) that I stepped away and went to my go-to which is ‘got anything with a stick?’
FYI, Nissan sells precisely two sedans (the hairshirt level base Versa – which I’ve owned before – and the slightly less hairshirty base Sentra) and the 370z with a standard. The dreaded CVT reigns almost supreme at Nissan. I won’t be going back when it comes time to trade. My short list today in 2019 is Toyota Yaris Ia, Honda Civic or (maybe a turbo Veloster but I’m leery of the reliability) – all with a manual transmission.
Petrichor – this one of the funniest reads in a long time! Very well written!
After my 2014 deer strike I had an Altima rental; it seemed serviceable enough for its price point, which is generally deeply discounted.
My Outback popped its CVT at 75k…service was only recommended at 60k “for extreme conditions” which I didn’t think commuting qualified. Subaru replaced the CVT as well as extended warranties nationally to 100k miles.
Oddly enough I’m hitting 130k miles and thought it might be wise to look into having the CVT serviced and lo and behold my local dealer now says Subaru no longer recommends having the CVTs serviced. Sounds sketchy to me…
I actually like the styling of the newest Nissan cars; they look like something I’d like to drive. I don’t have any information on their reliability in any aspect, but they sure look nice.
FWIW, I’d stick with the Kansas built Malibu over anything else. My Michigan built Pontiac G6 has been average reliability over the 10 years I’ve had it. My kid’s 8th gen Malibu was absolutely flawless, but it used a lot of tried and true parts from the global GM parts bin. I know the basic 9th gen Malibu uses a CVT, but I’m at the point in life where I think I’d pop for the 2 liter turbo and 9 speed autobox instead. But, until the G6 gives me any reason to doubt it (I just got back from an 800 mile trip yesterday evening, I did no more preparation for that journey than I would to go to the neighborhood grocery store), I’ll keep plodding along in my inferior GM product…
Drove a Forester 10 years lots of issues and money spent Consumer Reports said
it was the greatest thing since sliced bread Now I drive a Grand Caravan that CU
hates with a passion Had it for a year so far no troubles I should send copies
of some of some of the Subie repair receipts to CU They still fall all over themselves
telling you to buy a forester
“I’ll use this Nissan to demonstrate how Average Joes like me can be misled by published third-party reliability metrics” cause I’ve been misled as well.
I’d like to read this Petrichor