What's Going on With The New Maxima?
Nissan’s new Maxima, which went on sale earlier this year, has already had a bumpy road.
Last week, the automaker announced it would be recalling around 6,000 cars for an improperly installed fuel tank 0-ring that could leak and ignite after a crash, according to AutoGuide. Nissan hasn’t identified a fix for the problem yet.
That may be in addition to (or the reason for) a stop-sale on the Maxima in July for an unspecified “quality assurance” problem with the cars. We reached out to Nissan for a comment and have yet to hear back.
Early owners have reported minor problems including moon roof noises, headlight issues and electronic woes.
This isn’t the first generation of Maxima models produced in Smyrna, Tennessee, nor is it the only model that plant produces. But any further hiccups in initial quality could damage the car’s tenuous position.
More by Aaron Cole
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What happened to the Maxima was, they listened too hard to us high school internet commenters that want swoopy crazy styling on every Camry, Accord and Altima. Then the real buyers showed up and got disgusted with this mess of a car. That it has serious quality issues is just icing on the cake. Seeing the new Maxima's styling was cool for maybe about a week. Now every time I look at a picture of it my eyes hurt. Let me attempt to understand the details of why this design is awful: 1. The side profile tried really hard with a "floating roof" concept, but the lower half of the car is too bulky and has too many character lines that don't flow. The line coming from the front fender curves down, then suddenly goes arrow-straight. Moving rearward, another line starts out of nowhere. 2. The window line ends abruptly but the chrome line continues rearward. But not before starting off with a sharp angle that does not have any context. 3. The front end goes all big-grille, but it clashes with the huge headlamps. When you accentuate something by enlarging it, you need balance by shrinking the styling elements around it. And then the huge U-shaped chrome bar is as out of place as Acura's beaks circa-2009. 4. The fish-tail split in the headlamps and taillamps are too derivative of everything else in Nissan's lineup. They don't belong on this "styling exercise," at least not on that scale. The headlamps also have a nonsensical chrome piece snaking around inside. It has no context. It doesn't even match the C-shaped LED ring that is three inches away in the same headlight assembly. A shame, really. Nissan's interiors were starting to become pretty classy too.
People who wear 5 gold rings on one hand, wear 4 gold chains at the same time and prefer gold trimmed sunglasses will flock to a this gaudy Maxima. Does it come in gold? I'm with BigTruck on this one.
The dialogue during quality meetings between Japanese chief management and American management must be quite exciting. This is a huge embarrassment for Nissan and its flagship. Nissan has its great trends in engineering, but when it goes bad, it really goes bad.
This is why a 240SX is my 4th car.