Serpentine Belt snapped while driving/Steering Lock failure info

Jbwrecked

So I'm cruising around the city on Thursday night. Just highway cruising at around 60mph with music playing and windows down. I take an exit to merge onto another highway and do a good 15-90mph pull. As I slow down I hear some clicking or slapping of some sort. I ignore it as its very faint and just clicks for like 8 times and then goes away. On my final stretch going home I notice that my power steering is gone and my AC is blowing hot. I kind of freaked out and checked out my gauges and noticed my Voltage was at about 12V. Then I look at the cluster and see my "BRAKE" light and my "Battery" warning lights are on. I look down and my brake is engaged or anything. I get home, open the hood, and belt is just ripped on a couple of the ribs but off all the pulleys which explains the power steering and AC failure.

Kind of just venting a bit but also wondering.... Why would this happen? I was driving for about an hour when all this randomly occured

VIDEO:
Irregular Nissan 370z behavior - YouTube
(Sorry don't know how to embed)



Next day (Friday) I take it to the dealer to get it checked out and I'm told they have to contact my warranty company (I DO have 100k warranty). Unfortunately they're closed so they have to wait till Monday to see if I'm being covered. At this time the Service Agent asks me if their is anything else going on with the car and I tell him my 5th and 6th gears have been grinding as well as my clutch acting funny and randomly my SRM has about a second delay before actually rev-matching.

I'm told that they have to drop the transmission to check that the clutch isn't worn because (for some reason) if it is abnormally worn, then I've basically been "abusing" the car which then results in my warranty not covering anything but at the same time I have to pay for the labor of dropping the transmission. I thought that was COMPLETE BS.

Anyway, turns out my clutch is fine and everything will be covered. Getting a brand new transmission and they will be fixing my pulley and what not with a $100 deductible. What happened with the serpentine belt is, my tensioner pulley spring on the inside had collapsed and just threw everything off. One of the ribs got wrapped around my Power Steering line and damaged it so that is also covered.

Side Note:
NOW FOR ALL YOU GUYS WORRIED ABOUT THE STEERING LOCK FAILURE. The service agent told me that there was a recall for that and they will be replacing it and taking care of it on them of course. They ALSO told me that people have also been getting reimbursed if they had to pay for it to get fixed on them. Haven't looked through the forums to see if this info is out already but just wanted to share with you guys in case there's anyone wondering about it.

In a way I'm upset this happened to my Z and am stuck in a Altima for a while but at the same time I'm super happy that Nissan/Warranty is taking care of me and hopefully will be getting rid of a lot of headaches.

Super sorry for the novel, in a lame statistics class and felt this was more important

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wheee!

Good to hear it worked out for you! The steering lock issue is well documented and several threads are already covering that issue. Thanks!

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fuct

since the tranny comes off you have to replace the CSC. are they going to cover a new one?

DEpointfive0

How many miles are on your car/that belt?

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DIGItonium

Wow, that's scary. My Gates belt isn't showing any cracks, but some threads are fraying a little bit. Time to order a new belt soon, though.

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megalapagas

That happened to me due to one of my idler pulleys looking and then unscrewing itself from the belt, no harm done just replaced belt and all 3 idler pulleys. Same exact situation happened to me the "brake" light Everything. Quite a scare since I almost crashed due to the power steering but glad you have everything worked out and its getting fixed OP

Jbwrecked

Good question I will probably give them a call in a bit.
Bought the car with 9k and now have 21.3k so I'm assuming 21 or so
Good idea! 2 of my threads are what wrapped around a line and messed em up
Yea it was kind of crazy it definitely gave me a scare when I first realized it

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Ghostvette

I'm glad it's being covered under warranty. Call me overly paranoid, but on every car I've owned with a serp belt, I've replaced belt, tensioner and idler pulleys all at the same time.

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Jbwrecked

I think I'm going to have to start doing that. I've only owned 2 vehicles prior, a scion tC that I drove from the dealer to 84k miles and only replaced it once at the 40k mark then a g35 from 90k to 121k miles and had no pulley or belt problems whatsoever. Good lesson though

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Hotrodz

My belt let go during some spirited driving at about 15K. It was just as you described...scary! I was able to drive it back to my brothers house and of course this took place on Sunday. I took the next day off since I had now way to get back to AZ and lucky for me my brother is a motor-head so he was able to get a trailer for us to tow it to the dealer. The local dealer in Victorville, CA did not have the parts and made some calls to other dealers in SoCAL for me. Long story short, we trailered the Z to the dealer in Montclair and they had me in and out within hour and a half. They change the idler pulley, replaced the belt and washed the car. They were awesome!!! No problems since then, but its always in the back of my mind and I check it regularly now.

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Jbwrecked

That's good!

UPDATE: was supposed to get the Z back today but apparently after they put the whole tranny, power steering pump, and pulleys back together and started it they realized my AC compressor had some wires snipped off due to the serpentine belt ripping and probably whipping the wires thus cutting em. They had a warranty inspector stop by the Z today at the dealer to check it out so far and approve everything they were doing and now I'm waiting for warranty to approve the dealer ordering an AC compressor. I was told mid next week now. Needless to say, I miss the Z.

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kfull

Same thing happened to me years ago with my shitbox ford tauras(except I wasn't doing a 15- 90 pull, maybe a 15-30 pull over the same distance)- serpentine belt came off because a metal guide that held it in place broke off- lost power steering and all that jazz, it was a bit scary actually.

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Hotrodz

I got to say I got lucky that my belt didn't tear stuff up...I feel for ya. It sucks having any vehicle on the outs, but it's the worse when it's your baby girl!

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roy'sz

imagine had it taken out the radiator hoses...eww....nasty!!!

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Jbwrecked

Yea just very startling

Heard that. First time this has ever happened to me with any of my vehicles.

Yea I made sure to check that first thing. It was about 1am when i came back in so I didn't have much light but I did notice a few wire that had been stripped etc.


Just got another UPDATE:
Service manager told me they will need another week
They decided that instead of replacing my AC compressor they will be replacing the part that was fried which was the clutch/coil?? So I'm keeping my own compressor just having it "rebuilt" in a way. Which they have to wait for the part to come in from Tennessee therefore taking so damn long. First ETA was September 25th, then today the 30th, and now sometime next week.... Kind of upset about it but in the end I guess it's just better to have everything 100% and double checked

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