I'm an Absentee Father. But That's OK, Because I Drive a Four-Door Sports Car

Lets get something straight. The Nissan Maxima does not get the love it deserves. Not from the auto press and not from car enthusiasts. Any commuter would be hard pressed to find the combination of power, luxury and reliability at a decent value that the Maxima offers. That's probably why the nameplate derives such fierce loyalty, and I have owned 3. That being said, I'm very excited about the announcement of the 2015 Maxima, which was briefly teased at this year's Super Bowl.

Now I'm sure you have seen the commercial by now. Some people even understood the correlation that this super-cool racecar driver is a family man who chooses the sporty 4DSC Maxima as his personal ride. Unfortunately, they chose to use "Cats in a Cradle" as a soundtrack, whose opening note inspires guilt and anxiety in pretty much every father who wishes they could spend more time with their family. Not the kind of marketing message I would want to send, but I hope it works for them.  

But damn, its sexy. Official photos were released today. It has a very muscular front end and rear haunches that are reminiscent of Infiniti models, yet somehow different. It also takes design cues from Nissan's current lineup, with boomerang lights, while that grill fascia really needs to be available in a matte black. I'm a little nervous about the high beltline and visibility, but I'll reserve judgement until I take a test drive.

Photos from Newspress

As for the powerplant and technicals, no one knows what that will be, but I'd  venture guessing either a 3.5 or 3.7 liter V6, mated to a CVT. I don't think we will see a platform beyond FWD, as Nissan still relies on Maxima upgraders for the survival of the Infiniti brand.

The car is set to debut at the NY Auto show in April, and I'll be there.


information via http://www.newspressusa.com/

What's that big exclamation point on my Dashboard?

I am seeing a lot of web searches coming in for "dashboard exclamation point", so I decided to update this classic post.

Now that the temperature is dropping, a lot of drivers are noticing a new symbol which might have appeared in their dashboard. It looks something like this...

That huge exclamation point certainly looks scary, But don't worry,  this symbol is actually and alert for your cars Tire Pressure Monitoring System, (TPMS) kicking in.

When is gets colder outside, air contracts and reduces your tires air pressure (PSI) slightly. Usually, the reduction is not enough to be dangerous, but certainly enough to trigger the sensor.

How do you fix this problem? First, don't waste your money going to a mechanic. Go check your tires recommended PSI, (usually inside driver-side door) fill it up, and wait for the sensor to eventually turn itself off when driving. Don't fill it to the max psi rating that's printed on the tire.

Relationship Troubles

I know an automotive blog isn't really the place to vent, but recently, me and missus haven’t been getting along. I understand it was a long, cold and hard winter, and she tried her best to tough it out with a smile. Alas, all of the potholes, salt and bitter cold really took a toll on her this year. Admittedly, I have been a bit rough on her, but the mood swings are incredible; some days she is happy to be given a vigorous workout, and some days she groans, bitches at me, and phones it in for the day. A few times I even considered leaving her for a younger, newer model, but I have way too much invested with her to simply cut out. After all, we have been together for more than 100,00 miles.

It started in December, right before the holidays, which is typically a stressful time for couples. She wouldn't go more than 30 miles per hour without hiccupping, and sputtering as her ignition cut out and the revs dropped. In an effort to diagnose, I ripped out the ABS controller, and it brought back the acceleration, but at a cost; she took away all of my gauges, safety and slip systems. My dash lit up light a Christmas tree with every idiot light imaginable. This was mildly distracting while driving, but my attention daily was more focused on slipping and sliding my way through the worst Long Island Winter in memory. Seriously, you have no idea how hard it is to navigate a 300 BHP car with no limited slip differential, ABS, traction control or other systems through multiple icy blizzards. Because of this, I wound up intentionally avoiding her and taking the train to work in the city for much of January.

That's a lot of warning lights....

I think she started to get suspicious when I was up all night surfing the web. I’m not gonna lie, I was in some pretty deep stuff, late at night in the deepest bowel of the interwebs. I found myself viewing hardcore DIY YouTube videos on hydraulic braking systems and Nissan electrical components, I scanned some dealer technical bulletin and service guides that had been obtained by illicit means, and finally, under an anonymous name I plotted ways to manipulate her with other forum members in chatrooms. All this research led me to believe I had a faulty ABS wheel speed sensor, and all I had to do was go to the dealership to get it checked out on their diagnostic machine to figure out which one was bad.  

So I bought her to the dealership in Massapequa, which basically looks like a day spa for cars. Its white walls, glassed off, and way to clean. They made us part ways at the front to prepare her for a day of pampering, while I went in to go talk to a service adviser. I explained what was wrong, what diagnostic scan she needed. They didn't understand a word of it, and insisted she was more high maintenance than I thought. 400 dollars worth of testing later, they came back to me and told me they had found the problem. The entire rear end needed replacing, including all wheel hubs and sensors, to the tune of $3000. I said no, and left, and then found out they never reconnected my e-brake. So I went home, ripped the wheel off, put in a new ABS sensor for 20 bucks, and she worked fine. Except the disconnected e-brake is a constant reminder of the infidelity suffered at the hands of the stealership.

Then came the bitter January cold, which made her plastic bits brittle, and she was feeling kind of fragile. We lost the lower engine cover to  a pothole,  and her entire inner fender well was literally shattered by a chunk of ice. 16 bucks on rockauto.com and a few zip ties later, she was good as new. The cold did although kill the battery in one of my TPMS sensors, and now it just blinks at me. Blink. Blink. Blink. A constant nagging reminder that I need to buy new shoes soon, or I’ll continue to hear about it.

For a little while there, we were doing good. She was looking good and feeling good, and she knew it. A renewed spring was in her step, and I was once again feeling good about our relationship. Then she started nagging me again. At this point, my dad, my brother and my friends all told me I should leave her, but I didn't want to listen to them, I was committed to making it work. 

The shrill crying rattle came from the rear, and I didn't know why - did I forget her oil change? Not give her premium fuel? I deduced it was the anti-rattle pin, which was actually, ironically, rattling. The only way to stop it was to quickly pull the parking brake while driving. Fast. My first attempt to fix this was not successful, as I lacked the tools to take off the rotors. Then my son and I went to Autozone to purchase a breaker bar, which is not as fun as it sounds.

Saturday night, 10 pm, I settled down for a couples therapy session. She bought her bad attitude, and lots of blame. I bought a 4-pack of Guinness and my Dewalt cordless impact driver.

It was a long night, but after a while, I think we finally found the root of our problem. I have the rotor off, and I found this: Suffice to say I now know what was causing the rattle.

Think we found the problem... Hint-  pins are supposed to be straight

 I put her back together, and apologized profusely for hurting her feelings and the ordeal she had to go through. A week has since passed, and I think we are fine. For now, that is, until she finds out about the fling I have been having on the side with a cute little German number.

A distraction from your crappy holiday commute

This post almost turned into a rant about crappy drivers, traffic, and how awesome Top Gear is. But I held it back.

The roads are going to suck this week. I hate to be the one to break it to you, but Thanksgiving week is when the family packs into the minivan, and proceeds to Grandmas house, always in the left lane and way under the reasonable speed limit. This is when the travelers come out to do battle with the commuters.

How can you tell if you are stuck behind one of these people? A surefire way to know is if they slam on their brakes in the EZ pass lane, or you see someone blindly following their GPS into oncoming traffic. Do your best not to get behind ay minivan with stenciled stickers of the whole family plus the dog.

But I thought I was smart. This week, I did everything I could to avoid the roads. I had meetings scheduled in NYC on Monday and out on the Island on Tuesday and Wednesday. Then my Tuesday got moved, and now I’m stuck driving to Jersey today. It took me 2 hours to get in, but that’s probably nothing compared to what thwe ride home is going to be.  But at least its better then Wednesday.  I guess that’s karma teaching me not to meddle with my business schedule just to avoid driving.

But the post today is actually to distract me from all of this with some auto-erotica. I don’t understand the Nissan Juke, although I have been dying to drive one. A sporty, well handling compact car seems like a no brainer for commuting, assuming the MPG is up to snuff. But then the boys over at Nissan UK decided to stuff a 3.8 liter V6 from a GT-R into it. The result is pure beauty. Autoblog has been covering the build from day 1, and they have now posted some videos from Nissan on it. We can expect this will never be more than a project car, but its good to know that they care. Check out the video below of the complete build firing up, anturn up your volume around the 1:00 minute mark to hear some Christmas music come early.

Via Nissan via Autoblog.

Video courtesy Nissan

 

The death of Panther from the people that use it

I’m a talker, or so I have been told. Maybe it’s my up-stater-ness, but like engaging people in conversation, and this holds true when I’m stuck in a car for someone for about an hour. Because of my job, I often find myself utilizing car service when driving or public transportation is not practical. Last week, I took a late night ride home from Manhattan with a Pakistani driver who had a lot of opinions and shared some knowledge with me.

Some guys just know more about the roads than us commuters can ever imagine. Among airline pilots and cops, my favorite people to talk to our livery drivers. Unlike NY cabbies, these guys have to have a good grasp on English, and an extensive knowledge of the tri-state area, not just the five boroughs. So of course, we had a great long conversation on the death of the Crown Vic/ Town car / Panther platform which is on top of the minds of many.

This is a very interesting topic which has some very passionate to fleet drivers and managers, yet we know nothing in the mainstream, and it affects us all. Here’s the scoop: after this year, Ford will discontinue the Panther platform, which is responsible for the Crown Victoria (cops cars, taxi cabs), the Lincoln Town Car (livery and fleet drivers, gypsy cabs) and the Grand Marquis (old people, already dead with Mercury).  Perhaps it is time to embrace a platform with better fuel efficiency and modern features. So let’s explore these groups, and how they are affected:

Cabs and Livery: For the cabs, this means a replacement in the next few years, which the city has decided to go with a Nissan minivan that’s drawing a lot of criticism, but hey, fuel efficiency. Other cities like Las Vegas are trying out the Ford Transit connect, which lost the NYC war due to fuel efficiency.  The livery folks are on their own; they tried the Camry hybrid, but found it to falter mainly on comfort and space. I was told you can only fit 2 large suitcases, whereas the venerable Town Car can fit 4-5 bags, and still have room left for a dead prostitute. It looks like the best runner up right now will be the Lincoln MKZ and MKX, basically a Ford Taurus and a Ford Explorer. Some of the guys drive hybrids, especially for the large Escalades and Tahoes, but with $5 fuel in our near future, efficiency becomes even more important, and we will be seeing less of this platform, especially as car companies are adopting a driver-owned fleet.

Cops:
No one feels the hurt from the death of Panther worse than cops who are losing their trusted Crown Vic Interceptor package for whatever the local community decides what’s next.

So why not the Ford Taurus interceptor Ford showed as the replacement? Simple answer is that it’s FWD. I talked to a couple of cops, and they hate the lack of control and torque FWD cars offer. While an AWD option is available, its doubtful many departments ill pony up the extra cash, and the hit to fuel efficiency makes it less attractive.  They cited the failure of the Impala as an intercept vehicle. I think this is a bad move on Fords part, as a good chunk of their community fleet sales are going to go to the Dodge Charger Pursuit package that’s already the scourge of NYC roadways. Another factor is intimidation. The Charger has it, but I think the Taurus pictured here will give the Charger a run for its money.

Old people: Don’t worry, Buick is coming back with a vengeance, no one is going to notice the Grand Marquis.

So why would Ford kill off such a successful platform with such a long history? While I am sure that they have their reasons, the common word on the street seems to be the influx of third party parts. See, the manufacturer makes a boatload on parts for cars. Rotors, radiators, drive belts, all of these wear out due to wear and tear, and are incremental revenue to Ford.  Now, there are so many third party companies undercutting the OEM parts, that the only way to get this revenue back is to completely overhaul the platform. If this is done, its going to be years before third party vendors can re-tool CNC machinery to reverse engineer OEM-like parts. Do I know this for a fact? No not at all. This could be totally way off, but this seems to be what the common thought is.

Autoblog tests the Nissan Cross Cabriolet

Nissan sent Autoblog a Murano Cross Cabriolet to test out, and the results are...A fully loaded Murano minus the roof, but still more questions than answers. Good luck to you, Nissan.


http://www.autoblog.com/2011/03/08/2011-nissan-murano-crosscabriolet-first-drive-review/[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="1280" caption="image from Autoblogs review"][/caption]

Nissan Murano Cross Cabriolet

there are two facts that I should mention before this post. First, I am a Nissan Junkie, but you probably know that. Secondly, adding the term "Cabriolet" to anything automatically dismisses any cool factor. While I would never buy this, I am very anxious to see it in person. Nissan has always been on the forefront of design, just think of the space-age maximas, Z's and the Juke.

Nissan decided to use Facebook as a launch platform for the new cute ute,  bypassing traditional media. while we know nothing of powertrain, clearance, etc, we can safely assume it will ride on the shared PM platform with its roofed brother and Altima. It also seems to have lost two doors in the conversion.

The new crossover will be debuted later this week at the LA auto show.

Thanks to Autoblog for the news