My wife's cousin wanted to buy a 2004 G35 Coupe from me, but then she said she's read "all over the Internet" that their accelerators are known to go flat to the floor and lose control.

I have never heard this from any owner or my service department. Has this really happened, or is this Snopes material?

 

Never heard of any such problem.

Ivory Coupe 5AT
Z tube, K&N drop in.
Crawford Plenum and Fujitsubo Exhaust soon to come...

 

Well, I take it back. My accelerator goes flat to the floor a lot of the time, but this is a desired effect of being a lead foot.

Seriously though, if the G had a problem with spontaneously accelerating causing the driver to lose control it would make national news.

Ivory Coupe 5AT
Z tube, K&N drop in.
Crawford Plenum and Fujitsubo Exhaust soon to come...

 

"Seriously though, if the G had a problem with spontaneously accelerating causing the driver to lose control it would make national news."

That's what I figured. Maybe it was posted on an Audi website.

 

Anyone know if the Cruise Control pulls the pedal down like on some other cars out there? I haven't used mine yet. If the cruise control doesn't do this, then I would have a hard time thinking of any reason the accelerator pedal would get pulled down. The throttle itself is controlled electronically. While I can see the potential that the throttle can get stuck open, the pedal would not get stuck with it if the problem occurs at the throttle, ECU or the sending unit.

 

Eh I hope it happens to me. Slap the clutch pedal in and then get some claims money out of Infiniti.

Black / Black 2004 GcoupeMT. Premium. Splash Guardz.

 

Just checked NHTSA's site and 2 hits came up for this type of problem for 2004 models(unknown if it was coupe or sedan) and both involved cruise control. In 2003, there was only one hit but it didn't involved cruise control. There was an out of control situation also listed that possibly could be similar but the decription left in the complaint of the problem was too vague and could have been many things including driver error.

I handled a couple claims for a situation like this before. It was a mid 80's Mercedes. Maybe a 300SL or 360SL? I can't remember off the top of my head. But in both cases the throttle went wide open and caused the car to hit something. NHTSA had many complaints of that problem with that car. Granted the G hasn't really been around too long, so it's hard to say if this is a trend. I expect we will see at least a imited amount of cases like this with drive-by-wire still being relatively new to Nissan and as standard equipment in most cars. The unfortunate part about one of the cases I handled is one person got seriously injured in one of the losses. Since that one involved front end damage, it required the car be restored in order to inspect for the cause. The cost of repairs were too extensive considering the chance that we may not find the problem. The second loss caused the car to go in reverse so the front end was preserved, but the experts I sent were unable to find anything wrong. Frankly, I can not speak to how well the experts investigated this matter, but given the large number of complaints, I saw in the NHTSA site, I was hoping to find an answer.

 

Thats freaking crazy.....I'm scared now...cuz that car has soo much speed...before u know it ur doing 100 smack into a light pole...

 

maybe it's out of control, meaning...leaving the VDC off and cornering, etc.

 

The're were over 200,000 G35s and 350zs sold for 2003/2004 and NHTSA shows 3 hits? And these aren't explained? We DON"T have a problem. here. Let's not invent one!

Lou

 

I'm reminded of the Jeep Cherokee ( or other jeep vehicle) that had a similar 'problem'. Turned out the pedals were too close to each other and people were really stomping the gas instead of the brake. Matter of poor design and panicked drivers.

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2004 G35 Coupe 6MT, Desert Platinum
1968 Chevy C10, never ending hobby

 

It's also only been 2 years. I won't get paranoid over this, but it's worth thinking about. At least to know that it is a possibility and if it happens, to have at least thought about how you will react.