My car needs a new clutch?! 9500 miles!!!???

crystalline

Background information. I am the second owner of this car, a 2009 Nismo 370z. I bought the car 3/8/2011 with 6700 miles on it. It was originally purchased on 5/07/2010. The dealer I bought the car from purchased it at auction. The slave cylinder failed on 4/29/11 I believe (date on the invoice is the day they finally got the part in and replaced it.) I have babied the car 100% since I bought it and have barely pushed it hard AT ALL. I wanted to save it until 10k miles (oh the irony) before I pushed the engine hard. My cars for the last 6 years have all been manual transmission.

Now on tuesday I was driving home from work and stopped a stop light. When the light turned green my car skidded a little bit more than usual and what I expected (it was raining but it wasn't that wet) when giving it the gas and when I went to shift to second the pedal dropped all the way to the floor and stayed down. It felt like the clutch was still partially engaged and the car was coasting along for ~10 seconds then the pedal popped back up. Thought the CSC had failed again and and I drove the car in 3rd all the way back to my house.

I checked the fluid when I got home and found them fine and no murkiness in the water. I did notice the horrible smell of a burnt clutch. The next morning I checked again and nothing had changed with the fluids. However the car now slips when you put it into 1st or reverse when you start moving. I brought the car to the stealership and of course the entire clutch needs to be replaced! (they said the same thing the last time with the CSC failure) They said the clutch plate was worn and possibly the flywheel and it would be 4353598983598 dollars to fix it because its not covered under warranty. I said no thank you, took my car and left.

Now I am looking for your guys help as to what I can do here because this is totally messed up. I suppose its possible the person before me beat the snot out of the clutch but enough for it to be burnt out after 9500 miles? I read in another post that the clutch is covered by nissan until 12k miles? I am going to speak with the GM of place I purchased the car from on saturday but I doubt they will pay for a new clutch. Those ******** put nismo 350z mats in my car and wouldn't even buy the correct 370z ones for me. Of course I could purchase an aftermarket clutch and pay for it to be installed, but i mean I just paid $32,500 for the car, which the dealer said was "just as good as a new one" so I really don't want to do that...

Any ideas would be really appreciated.

crystalline

http://www.the370z.com/engine-drivet...ailures-3.html

halfway down is my post detailing the CSC failure if anyone wants that information

crystalline

101 views and no posts? Small update for you guys I spoke to Nissan of North America about the problem on friday and they seemed to think it was covered under warrenty. However, it was just the person in the call center, who I figure is totaly clueless. I am waiting for a call back from a zone rep on tuesday after the holiday...

AlphaSnacks

That's BS. It should be covered under 3/36 warranty. You're past the 1/12 warranty since you have an 09. Though, I believe your dealer is supposed to honor any work for 90 days of purchase on a used car. So take it back to exactly where you bought it from, because you don't have much time left of that 90 days.

You're also saying that the slave cylinder was replaced just a month ago? Since it seems the part has failed again, the dealer has to fix it as long as it fails within 1 year since the work was done.

crystalline

It should be covered by the 1yr/12k because the problems started before 1 year off the lot(it was bought in 10 even thought it was an 09) albeit just barely. I was told the 3yr/36k did not cover wear parts like the clutch, brake pads, rotors, oil, etc., but I read online that the 1yr/12k does cover some wear parts.

I have been in touch with the original dealer who I bought the car from, they are not a Nissan dealer and bought the car at auction. They said some bs and I am waiting to hear back from the GM of the dealership, same as Nissan of North America, tomorrow on tuesday.

nismo 1234

my car had the similiar problem awhile back, the car shakes like crazy when engaging and clutch seems to slip causing tire to spin a bit, and the road was dry at the time. and i could smell burnt clutch also, but my clutch pedal still came all the way up.

but from my experience, i left the car sitting in the garage for 3-4 days and towed it to nissan dealership (free towing from roadside assistance so why not haha. i made sure it was a flat deck, not dragging my front tires) after my car got to the dealership.. the clutch magically healed itself... so i dono

so far, when i drive my car for 2 hours straight, the car vibrates when i engage (but not as much as before and tires dont slip)

dont mean to steal your thread, but last time i was on a very steep hill, and i was in first gear, wasnt engaged yet, but car seems like its stalling so i give it more gas, somehow the RPM wouldnt go up! that might be one of the after effects of that too. Anyone know what might cause this problem??

DIGItonium

If it's not the slave, then it might be the master cylinder. A few owners reported replacing it as well. I'm sure the clutched burned out because of the failed part(s).

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crystalline

Just posting an update after long hard battle it seems like I have lost, an will be paying for a new clutch on a vehicle with under 10k miles. Nissan decided that the original dealer lied to me and that they performed 0 reliable diagnostic work on the clutch and simply tried to dupe me into purchasing one from them. Because of this Nissan decided they did not know what was wrong with the clutch and referred me to another dealer to have them perform the correct diagnostic work. This would cost around $700 or more IF THE PART IS NOT DEFECTIVE. Of course if it is defective they cover that fee.

My problem with this is that I know the part is broken how will they prove its defective verses abuse? The rep I had assigned from nissan agreed with me that it would be hard to tell the difference. So that seems like a waste of money.

At the same time this was going on I had been trying to reach the General Manager of the dealership I bought the car from. Boy is he a hard guy to get in touch with. He strung me along by not returning my calls or having my calls to the dealer screened for about 2 weeks. He did make an offer of me bringing the parts + $250 after I suggested I bring the parts and they install the clutch for free. I thought this was ******** of course but it was the cheapest option presented to me so far so sucked it up and told him I would accept it. He said he would speak with his service manager and call me back to finalize a time to bring the car in.

Of course he never called me back or returned my call for an additional 5 days, and then he has his service manager call me back and tell me it will be parts plus $600 or more. It took me another 2 days to get a hold of the GM to which he said they did nothing wrong selling me a car with a broken clutch for the same price as a car with a good one... lol And that obviously you can blow out a clutch in just one day... lol I'll leave it to your imagination what I said back to him.

So it looks like I got ****** long and hard by both the dealer and Nissan and will now be paying for an aftermarket clutch for my car

edit: The sad thing was I had a quote for a new nismo for 37,550 and I bought this used one with 6,600mi for 32,500. Lesson learned.

tjlazer

^ yep you cheaped out so accept that this will happen when you do that, and suck it up as you are doing and buy the upgraded clutch. If you don't want to to this don't cheap out and buy a new car that they have to cover under warantee. Used cars are usually sold as is anyway but it sucks as it should be covered under warantee. But like you said, there is not way of knowing what the PO did to the car...

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2009 370Z Monterey Blue,Nismo Conversion,RE-11's, K&N Typhoon intakes,Blue Kickplates,Homelink,FI 18" CBE,ERZ HFCs,Hotchkis sways, Swift Spec-R, EVO-R Highwing, UPREV

gr8-wrx

Sorry to hear this happened to you.

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Me: 2022 Toyota Tacoma SR5 Double-Cab SB
Wifey: 2013 Toyota Highlander Limited AWD
Weekends: 2010 Nissan 370z Roadster

crystalline

You cant be serious? I didn't "cheap out" I just took what appeared to be the better deal, I don't believe the dealer that sold me the car was aware of any clutch issues when I bought it, they are just cheap ******** and refuse to cover it now. It might still be covered under Nissan "warantee" but I don't feel like risking $700 to find out.

The lesson learned statement was mainly due to the fact that I was furious when writing that last post, I will still come out way ahead money wise, just father behind hassle wise. I hope you don't really think that anyone who buys a barely used car will have major parts fail which should last thousands of miles for no reason. If the car had 50,000 miles on it you would have a point.

I suppose you think the PO sat in his driveway revved the car to 7500 rpms and engaged the clutch part way to destroy it before trading it in? Whats more likely a defective part which failed, or the PO destroying the clutch in less than 7000 mi?