6th Gear Syncros going after 5K.

Scribe

Well, I got the car back a couple days ago. They replaced the transmission, but the guy at the dealership was trying to lecture me that Nissan wants people to drive sequentially to avoid this wearing syncro issue. It's possible that a company offering a beefed up fifth and sixth gear stands to make quite a bit of money off of the out-of-warranty 6MT owners. In the DSM community, TRE and John Shepherd were well known for their awesome aftermarket transmissions.

DIGItonium

Doesn't make sense... are you experiencing grinding and clunk getting in all gears prior to this issue? I have to shift slower now just to baby the gearbox. [sigh]

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black09Z

well the people that ive talked to at nissan say that shifting from 4-6 only hurts it if you do it realy fast. so if your gonna skip a gear, wait to put it in 6th until right after the rpms start going down. this will make the synchros wear down alot slower. but if your not skipping gears it could still happen. just remember, unless your "getting on it" you really dont need to shift very fast.

imag

Those things might make the problem worse faster, but a transmission having consistent issues with this kind of mileage (below 10K!) has serious design flaws. Josh - 3 replacements in warranty would make me afraid to own the car out of warranty - are you going to sell it?

I've been chomping at the bit to get this car on the 15th of May, but this is a big enough issue that I'm not even sure I want it. My whole reason for getting a new car is to avoid having random broken crap to deal with on a regular basis, and what I consider to be a major transmission issue is just BS.

drmike

Just to throw in a little perspective, non-supercharged MINIs have had a similar problem. On MY2002-2005 MINI Coopers, the gearbox was made by "Midlands" in the UK, and this gearbox was a real POS as it turns out. Many, many of them started shifting funny, and more than a few puked their guts out. MINI (BMW actually) has never admitted that there was a problem, though they did switch to a bulletproof Getrag transmission for 2006.

I helped a friend of mine install a new Midlands out of warrantee, and a year later, it selected two gears at once and cracked wide open. Nice. After that, we figured out how to put a Cooper S 6-speed in the car (a Getrag unit) and that did the trick.

So the point is, I have my doubts as to whether Nissan would ever come right out and admit that the 370Z gearbox has issues. They'll more likely deal with each customer individually through the dealer network. That means, unfortunately, that some will get three gearboxes, and some will be treated like the morons that they certainly are not.

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eXo5

Christ! Im about to cut my losses and just buy a used 350Z! It sounds like Nissan is dropping the ball a bit with the 370!

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imag

While getting three new transmissions would be more of a pain than I want to deal with (even if the dealer is nice about it), I worry more about having to buy a transmission every 15K miles after the warranty is up. I guess the moral is that if you have gone through more than one transmission by the time the warranty is about to expire, you sell the car

Josh@STILLEN

I can't wait for the tranny to go again.. just turned 80k.. and it's out of warranty.. but there is no way they would have replaced transmissions religiously within 20k miles and not do it with me even out of warranty.

I trust they will take care of it, and if not, that will be a different conversation.

Technically it's just out of the lemon law world, as the first occurrence was at 19k.. but 18k miles isn't set in stone, it's more of a reference according to what I've read. There is a problem, the problem repeated, their fix to the problem was replacing the transmission, over and over again..

This is the only problem I've had with the car, I would have hoped it would have been resolved 5 years later with a new model, new engine, etc.

Scribe

Sounds more like you want to justify an inferior purchase. The 370 is far better engineered in every aspect than the 350Z and the transmission is nearly identical including the syncros that went bad on mine. It's to be expected that if you drive like I do, with hard accelerationg and then just throw it in a higher gear and let the syncros sort it out, you are going to wear them out. You would in a 350Z just as well as the 370Z or any other car with this or a lesser transmission. Nissan didn't drop the ball any more or than anyone else so just step back from the ledge and don't worry about it.

Scribe

I don't slam gears ever and shift a lot slower from 4 or three to 6 than I would 5 to 6. I'm a bit more careful now and am watching to ensure that the transmission shifts as well as it did before this issue surfaced.

alan93rsa

Sounds like the best mod for the 370z may be installing a Cayman S in the garage.

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imag

If it's a used Cayman S, you're looking at over 20% failure rate of the motor...

http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/wil...gine-failures/

I think they've fixed it in the new ones, but you can buy a lot of transmissions for the cost delta...

Chaser720

As far as my 350z goes, i started having your identical problems at 6K. At 47K miles im now about to get my 5th transmission. Keep an eye on that for potential future problems.

Im currently arguing a lemon law case with Nissan on this exact issue and was offered a quick settlement (2K + lawyer costs) to keep it out of court within a few weeks of filing against them. Im thinking they know that their transmission department (ie GTR) isn't up to par but dishing out settlements is a more cost effective way to "fix" the problem.

Keep us posted on future similar problems.

Phimosis

I get a sticking sensation between 5-6, but I assumed it was because it wasn't completely locking me out of the "reverse" shift gate.

What I do get, even at 500 miles is grinding on 1-2 shifts if I shift quickly. Once this happened and embarrassed me a few times, I started pushing the clutch to the floor and leaving it there until I made sure I was in 2nd. It goes 1....grind, grind, 2.... then clutch out. Ouch! I started shifting slower, but crap, I shouldn't have to. All of the rest of the gears work fine. (currently at 950 miles on the odometer)

:-(

mannyz

WEll now Im concerned, I just trade my 4G Eclipse because I was having syncros problems and grinding 2nd and 3rd in high rpms. Now I heard this, great

The only thing that dont worry me is that Im good to deal with stealerships BS, with my 4G I learned so much BS from stealerships that I think I have a degree on how to deal with them.

I read here some of u guys having issues with the stealership, becasue they are saying "you are miss treating the car" That is easy to handle, just go to the dealer explain the problem with no details, just say "having problems getting into gears" and when the tech or manager says, we are not gona cover because it seems you are misstreating the car, you just say "PROVE IT" that Im miss treating the car or driving it like a maniac "prove it"

And there's come the lawsuit