A good friend of mine has an '02 max SE auto. He has about 45K on it.

I posted this on Maxima.org - the only response I have gotten is to get rid of the car. Maybe you guys can help.

He had been complaining that sometimes in the morning the car made a lot of noise when cold - I never heard it, but dismissed it as normal cold engine cam chain noise.

Now his car barely runs. It starts and idles on the front cylinders only, but when you give it a little gas the back 3 kick in. it has very poor acceleration.

Reading the codes gave multiple misfires detected from multiple cylinders, bank 1 and 2 cam position sensor faults, etc.

My friend who owns the car thinks the cam chain jumped. I don't think that is very likely unless a guide broke, or the tensioner totally failed.

I am going to go look at it this afternoon and check the codes myself. Has anyone seen anything like this?

He said the whole back bank comes and goes as a group. He has replaced the plugs, and checked all the obvious stuff to no avail.

He took it to the dealer who said they can't diagnose the problem - they think it is internal. They said any oil lubed part is covered under warranty still, but if they pull it apart and it turns out to not be internal, or they can't find it - he is responsible for the labor. I am also worried that if he doesn't have a reciept for every oil change (which he wouldn't becuase he does it himself with Mobil1) they will not honor the engine warranty anyway even if they do find an internal defect.


The codes we are getting are:

P0011 IVT Control (Bank 1)
P0021 IVT Control (Bank 2)
P0300 Multiple Misfires detected

We replaced both of the Cam shaft position sensors with no change.

Any ideas you guys can offer would be appreciated.

Thanks

 

You've got PM.

 

Where's DaveB when you need him?