CarComplaints.com Notes: The 2005-2007 Pathfinder appears to have a widespread defect where coolant leaks into the transmission, causing transmission failure around 90,000 miles. Repair costs are typically upwards of $3,500.
According to the New York Times & a class action lawsuit, the defect actually extends through 2010 model year. More info here.
1.7
hardly worth mentioning
Crashes / Fires:
0 / 0
Injuries / Deaths:
0 / 0
Average Mileage:
99,643 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.
Vehicle shakes and transmission slipped when driving. Dangerous in traffic. Took to amoco and told the transmission fluid is mixing with the radiator and both failed. Cost over $4,000 dollars to fix or it is utterly useless - just over 82K miles. Investigation shows dangerous trend for safety and complete product defect, with years of foreknowledge by Nissan. Driving is dangerous since the vehicle doesn't accelerate consistently and steering violently shakes.
Drove to wawa for gas and as car was idiling it over heated and check engine light came on. Got my car home and started poking around online just to find thousands of other people are experiencing the same issue. The radiator cracked and mixed with transmission fluid. Don't know if transmission is destroyed yet but time will tell. Horrible that there is no recall for this. And what a hazard I had my 3 children in car and had to tell them no baseball for them. And top it off there was no signs of any issues and car only has 59,799 miles on it.
Went to dealership and notified them of shuddering when driving in excess of 40mph and check engine light on. Was told by the service department that the transmission fluid is 'milky' as a result of coolant mixing in with automatic transmission fluid due to a crack in the radiator. Advised repairs to include a transmission cooler would be in excess of $8,000+. also advised that mileage of 91,033 voided extended warranty. (3 years, 80,000 miles) vehicle is non-operable due to total transmission failure.
Just purchased 2006 Pathfinder from local (Jeep/Dodge) dealer. Was literally driving it home from the lot when I encountered vibration and near loss of control at freeway speeds. I was able to get the vehicle home and after checking the fluids found a milky white (atf?) fluid in the coolant/radiator. The vehicle has 87500 miles and I'm beside myself right now. The dealer I purchased the vehicle from seems willing to work with me to remedy the situation but I'm not sure if they'll pay for a new transmission and radiator...? after a couple of minutes of investigation on the internet found the mass of folks dealing with the same radiator/transmission failure problem. I've got an appointment with the local Nissan dealer this week... we'll see what happens. NHTSA please help the hundreds if not thousands of Nissan owners dealing with this obvious defect!
- Bellingham, WA, USA
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In October of 2011, my 2006 Nissan Pathfinder began violently vibrating on the highway when I reached 60 mph. Sometimes it would stop when I let up off the gas. Other times it would continue to shake. After repeated visits to the mechanics and new tires, rotations, brakes and balancing, we decided to go to a transmission shop. They discovered that there was coolant that had mixed with the transmission fluid. As a matter of fact he had 5 Nissan Pathfinders on his lot with the same problem. After multiple searches, we discovered that there were hundreds of entries of Pathfinder owners with this same problem. Eventually, the car started to stall in the middle of the road. Very dangerous! I have taken the car to Nissan in my town and contacted corporate. I will be filing a civil suit if they do not agree to pay and fix my car that I have had for only 3 years.
As has been reported by many our 2006 Pathfinder has been found to have antifreeze in the transmission and we are now told it will take 4500 dollars to fix. This is no doubt a manufactures defect as there was no way to prevent this from happening or knowing for sure when it did. This SUV has been maintained by professionals and they did not catch it, I believe Nissan knew about this based on actions they have taken and now should have to repair these vehicles.
A D V E R T I S E M E N T S
- Anaheim, CA, USA