CarComplaints.com Notes: The 2004-2006 Nissan Maxima has widespread transmission problems. It starts with the vehicle jerking when shifting, & progresses to full-blown transmission failure.
Maxima owners report spending $3,000 to replace the transmission, typically around when the odometer hits 100,000 miles.
There's a class action lawsuit filed in late 2011, & it is still in the "discovery" stage. Apparently, these things take time ... far too much time.
10.0
really awful
Crashes / Fires:
3 / 0
Injuries / Deaths:
4 / 0
Average Mileage:
90,422 miles
About These NHTSA Complaints:
This data is from the NHTSA — the US gov't agency tasked with vehicle safety. Complaints are spread across multiple & redundant categories, & are not organized by problem.
So how do you find out what problems are occurring? For this NHTSA complaint data, the only way is to read through the comments below. Any duplicates or errors? It's not us.
Car was fine initially then started car which took longer than normal to start and car would not hardly go due to it not being in 1st gear. Put the transmission into manual mode and downshifted it to first and got a hard clunk but car would now go under its own power but when you put it back in auto mode it goes straight to 3rd gear. Shut car off came back later and started car it started right up and had no issues with transmission. Drove it for a bit turned car off for a bit and then went to start again and had the long start and bad shifts again.
When driving the car wil lose power and start jerking badly, cutting back like losing power. It feels as if it is going to stop in the middle of the road. I took it to a well know transmission specialist and was told that this is a problem with several Nissan cars including mine. There are several recalls including the 2003 but not my year, I'm confused and it's getting worse. But it's a known issue. I don't understand. My safety is warranted"?"
Whenever I accelerate and the speedometer hits 20 mph the transmission jerks or if I'm going 60 mph on the freeway and start to brake and as my speed is decreasing when the speedometer hits 20 mph it jerks. The transmission must be slipping or have an issue.
These transmission should of been recalled years ago I always tend to feel a gear jump in the first gears when about to start moving the car or braking. This can be a serious problem when you suddenly need to make a hard stop and the transmission will make a huge jump then stop and with that extra time it takes to jump them stop can be a minor injury if a pedestrian is present or even death.
- Pomona, CA, USA
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The transmission is having issues when changing gears. It starting to hesitate between first gear and second and second to third. My vehicle has only 85,000 miles.
I just purchased the vehicle this year as a used vehicle. The vehicle has started to jerking and would not accelerate when I press the gas. It takes at least 1 minute then the RPM shoots up. Sometimes I feel that I am going to get whiplash from all the jerking this vehicle does. I should not have to pay for a new transmission when Nissan knew about the transmission in these vehicles. They should be hold accountable for their actions and replace all the transmissions in these vehicles and pay other individuals back their money that has already paid to replace their transmission.
Vehicle has 91000 miles on it and transmission is failing.(jerks when vehicle takes off from stationary position. Front end gives rough ride, after replacing struts.
Transmission is stuck in 5th gear when going forward. Shifting to reverse or attempting to downshift causes serious jerking (thump). The problem seems to be electronic in nature because restarting the vehicle would fix the problem when it first started occurring. Now, restarting the engine does not fix it. Nissan has certainly known about the problem for years, since many complaints occurred when the vehicles had fairly low mileage.
Problem with transmission started soon after I purchased car, I would say in the first year I had it which was in 2003, although it is a 2004. I took it in more than once when the transmission started causing trouble. It would act (and still does to this day) as if it had/has been knocked out of gear, RPM goes up and then the transmission picks back up. When that happens it will jerk really hard and take off. As I said, I took it to my Nissan dealer and each time was told they did not find any thing wrong with it. This is my 5th Maxima, and have to say it is my last. The son of a woman I used to work with had the same problem with his 2004 Maxima, which he bought used. He traded it for something else. My car is still going, although the problem does not seem to be happening more often, but does seem to be more severe when it does happen.
I was pulling out at a stop sign for a left turn when all a sudden the car jerked and I heard a loud bang. This was my transmission letting go. I was stuck in the middle of the road. Luckily someone stopped and helped me push the car to the side of the road.
Transmission shift poorly, high rev inbetween shifts, hard down shifts and extremely hard up shifts. Very dangerous to drive during icy conditions due to the high rev and hard down shifts that cause uncontrollable loss of driving.
Transmission jerks when downshifting on highway and roads, this is a very hard jerk that is very hazardous. I have done research online and there are hundreds of other people having the exact same problems with the same vehicle.
Transmission failing for second time. Transmission was rebuilt/overhauled in March of 2014. Mileage at time of rebuild was 111,090 miles. The total cost of said repair was $2,996. As of today August 19, 2016 the said mentioned transmission is failing for the second time. The current mileage is approximately 136, xxx miles. The current symptoms while car is in motion are, extremely hard shifts and slipping into upper gears.
A D V E R T I S E M E N T S
- Pioneer, LA, USA