There's no Z on the word reliability...
I just got done reading Autoweek's long-term wrap-up on the 350Z. Although they seemed to like it overall, I found some comments they made regarding problems with the car to be very interesting.
The only problem Autoweek had on their long term car was the ubiquitous premature tire wear/tire feathering issue that seems to have affected a lot of the 350Zs (a problem that recurred even after adjustments made by their local Nissan dealer), but the problems reported by their survey respondents were eye opening, to say the least.
Out of 72 respondents, 54 had similar problems with premature tire wear/feathering/noise issues. That's 75 percent of owners with the problem.
In addition, one in nine of the respondents had their manual transmission replaced under warranty, in most cases more than once. According to the article, Nissan has revised the transmission design three times so far in order to alleviate the problem.
Other reported problems included: poor Bose audio systems, interior rattles, harsh/bouncy suspensions, a tendency to pull to the right, grease streaks on the windows, and seats that wear too quickly. In all, there are more than 30 service advisories for the '03 model 350Z, according to Autoweek.
Even worse, 20 of the 72 respondents claimed that Nissan dealerships either feigned ignorance or ignored their complaints, 10 of the 72 swore they'd never buy another Nissan after their Z ownership experience, and 5 of the 72 invoked the lemon law to get rid of their cars. That's seven percent of respondents whose problems were so bad they invoked the lemon law.
Granted, a sample of 72 isn't exactly large enough to draw any hard conclusions from. Still, the frequency and severity of the problems these people have encountered with the 350Z seems outrageous for a modern car, especially one that stickers from $26k-36k. What gives?
On a plus note, Autoweek did mention that they've recently acquired an RX-8 for their long-term fleet. It will be interesting to see how it compares ot the 350Z in terms of reliability over the course of the test.
