Problem! HELP!

[Bruckner]

Everyone, I briefly talked to my Nissan dealer today and he essentially repeated that it's the dealer's policy to get a release form signed before touching any engine. I will probably hire a Nissan guy to look up the car outside opening hours.

I'm very impressed with the quality of the knowledge being passed on this board, I feel I'm getting the most accurate and honest info here. Thanks!

Now, I have receipts for at least 3 oil changes during the car's life. The problem happened overnight, so nothing gradual as we'd expect with slow but cumulative damage from internal friction due to poor lubrification. Could a timing chain bearing be faulty and cause the problem? Before I got the car towed in for repair, the car wouldn't start. The starter almost fired up the engine but it never reached a stable idle. I'm thinking this may be due to incorrect timing. In which case oil has nothing to do with my problem and warranty.

What are the symptoms of a badly lubricated engine?

Christian

[tdaily]

A badly lubricated engine will show signs of deterioration well before it completely quits. You would have noticed a slight knock in the engine due to poorly lubricated heads. It would have started out very lightly and progressed fairly rapidly to a severe and very repititous knocking sound that you could hear very clearly, especially upon acceleration. You would have known without a doubt if this was your problem. The knocking sound would have started long ago and would have occured everytime the heads changed positions (many times in a matter of seconds) It would have been virtually impossible for you not to noticed symptoms such as this prior to your engine completely quitting.

[Bruckner]

I guess a 'knock' is a detonation? The sound I was hearing was continuous, not seperate 'bangs' or bursts of noise. The problem also appeared suddenly, the engine wouldn't start 3 days after I first noticed the problem.

The car will be towed to another dealer tonight, so I'm hoping to have progress tomorrow.

Thanks to all of you for your valuable input,

Christian

[Pick]

The loss of your timing chain would throw everything all out of whack involed with pistons, fuel mixture, etc. I think you shoould find a trusted mechanic and tell him to get his ass over there to the garage and get his opinion before Nissan does anything else with the car. Just a thought....

[bk2kmax]

Sorry to sound like I'm playing the Devil's Advocate to everyone else here on this board but the VQ engine needs TLC and not changing the oil at the suggested intervals can (not always) lead to damaged engine internals.

The VQ has a molybednum (hope I spelled it right) coating on most or some of it's internals, if dirt from the oil continues to cause friction which causes wear, couple that with heat and the normal reaction of the oil to lose its' viscosity after prolonged use and it (dirt) will wear into the metals which will cause damage.

Due to the high compression of the VQ the engine is constantly working at a high level of performance and in order to maintain that performance you have to keep that engine clean.

Seriously, the one thing the mechanics won't BS you about is the VQ, because they know that this is the thing that makes the Max, the Max and they are held to the strictest schedule for oil & filter changes because of it. Don't believe me, look in your owner's manual, this is why they make the statement that they are not going to be at any fault if they have to do work on your engine while you weren't following the stringent guidelines to oil/filter change services.

Nissan knows they make $hitty trannies, this is why they try to bull people out of making them fix them (cost them money, lots) because there are so many that break and they're still under warranty when it happens to most if not all, I know because it happened to me.
The engine however is a different story.

[Bruckner]

Update. The car has been towed to another dealer and a mechanic quickly looked over the car. Although the head was clean, metal deposits were found in the oil pan, so there's been premature wear. More work needs to be done to figure out what happened, but the mechanic suspects a cam bearing may have failed. The dealer will forward copies of maintenance receipts and pictures of the engine to Nissan, we should soon find out whether the warranty will cover repairs.

I should have more info and perhaps pictures sometime early next week.

Christian