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Take the car back to who ever you bought it off as their are issues with high klm GT-8's and tell them to sort it, the oil is $1,500 and $26,000 for the gear box from Nissan Australia (last time I checked Nissan Japan don't stock them).

They overheat which causes a few issues but the materials used are not up to standard as they have various failures, the guy in NZ repairing them makes his own parts that have failed as they are not available Ex Nissan.

I can go on all day about why they fail, why the were released in Japan only and other problems but just do a search and everything is mentioned.

I was hopping that you might be able to give me the specs for the oil Ive been looking but no luck so far

  • 2 months later...

Hi all,

Well to keep everyone up to date and after seeing how many views this tread has had thought I would add the out come.

Dealer took the car back AGAIN and could not fault had it go into limp mode again got consumer affairs involved dealer farmed out the work to a guy in Granville who found the problem was O2 sensors ?? Apparently the V35 3.5 has 4 O2 sensors not 2.

Any way the car has now done another 10 klm's with no issue

thanks for all the advise though.

  • Like 1
  • 2 months later...
Getting back to the original problem, these guys might be able to help:

http://www.cvt.co.nz/index.htm

They're pretty much the only ones in this neck of the woods that know anything about the Extroid CVT, the Nissan dealers will likely only be familiar with the belt type.

Sounds like the gearbox controller is detecting something wrong with the gearbox and putting it into 'limp' mode. Not sure if there is a diagnostic mode for the controller that might allow you to work out what is wrong? When it gets into this mode does it flash anything on the dash cluster?

Great site!!

Been reading site....saw this:

Nissan Skyline drivers These vehicles do have a EXTROID CVT transmission, when you change the oil be Sure you use the right oil Special for people in AUSTRALIA because there are workshops they will advise you to use NS2 CVT oil. This is wrong. Use only Nissan KTF CVT Fluid Cost around $160.- per liter and have to be changed every 100K.

The user manual shows it should be changed at 80K service, same thing as the Nissan workshop advised.

So do we change it at 80,000KM or 100,000KM??

  • Like 1
Hi all,

Well to keep everyone up to date and after seeing how many views this tread has had thought I would add the out come.

Dealer took the car back AGAIN and could not fault had it go into limp mode again got consumer affairs involved dealer farmed out the work to a guy in Granville who found the problem was O2 sensors ?? Apparently the V35 3.5 has 4 O2 sensors not 2.

Any way the car has now done another 10 klm's with no issue

thanks for all the advise though.

mate got a good deal on a CVT 8 and asked me how V35 are.... as i got a 2004 coupe, i said if you getting a V35 get anything but CVT-8, then asked WHY ??..

just showed this thread.....and well...now he now not getting V35 at all......too afraid..... :P

Its great you got this sorted out and hope no more issues in the future.......

  • Like 1
Does anyone know if the 5 spd auto uses the same type of oil and if they require the same amount as the CVT?

Judging from the above, a full transmission oil change would cost more than 1k including labour!

just the OIL!! would cost more than 1.3K then plus labour...

its a real OUCH! my next service is the major 80Ks..the CVT flush :)

  • Like 1

Despite the transmission oil price, i think the 8 speed CVT is a quality transmission. You guys shouldn't be bad-mouthing it or spreading anti-CVT views just because the flush is expensive.

I mean, look how expensive Porsche maintenance is, yet there are still so many owners out there. Another example, look at superchargers, they are a great technology, but parts need to be replaced often, and often quite expensive...How come no bad-mouths superchargers? And turbo's, etc...The list goes on...No mechanical product lasts a lifetime!

If you buy something, be prepared to maintain it, through good and bad....Sounds like marriage...LOL...

For those married, you go try tell your wife "Oh, I married you thinking you were cheap to maintain. But it seems not!" ...See if you get out of the house alive!!!

Edited by siu_loong_bao
  • Like 1

We are not bad mouthing the CVT-8 merely warning potential buyers what they are in for. You are forgetting a few things:

1. Porsche owners wages are not in line with V35 owners. If I earned what a Porsche owner earned, I wouldn't have gotten a V35 to start with

2. If the CVT breaks, afaik no one in Australia knows how to repair them or would touch them. They are different to the CVTs found in OZ delivered Nissans.

3. Cost of replacement of a CVT transmission is somewhere the vicinity of 3/4 of the price of the V35

4. There are members on this forum in this situation and their cars have been rendered useless due to the above

That is all.

  • Like 1
We are not bad mouthing the CVT-8 merely warning potential buyers what they are in for. You are forgetting a few things:

1. Porsche owners wages are not in line with V35 owners. If I earned what a Porsche owner earned, I wouldn't have gotten a V35 to start with

2. If the CVT breaks, afaik no one in Australia knows how to repair them or would touch them. They are different to the CVTs found in OZ delivered Nissans.

3. Cost of replacement of a CVT transmission is somewhere the vicinity of 3/4 of the price of the V35

4. There are members on this forum in this situation and their cars have been rendered useless due to the above

That is all.

well said .

plus we are simply pointing out that there are better options out there when buying V35, plus any person with common sense would know when a 8 Speed with steering mounted shifts are cheaper than standard bog 5 speed auto of the same year. something is not what it seems....

knowing the issues does not mean you should not buy it...maybe someone can use it to negotiate with a dealer or private seller to get a good discount...

Now all we need is a another Chris Rogers type, only with CVT boxes and all sorted... may be Ben at shugun should run with this as he has had bit of experience.... thanks for V quick complianceon my V35 by the way :)

  • Like 1
Despite the transmission oil price, i think the 8 speed CVT is a quality transmission. You guys shouldn't be bad-mouthing it or spreading anti-CVT views just because the flush is expensive.

I mean, look how expensive Porsche maintenance is, yet there are still so many owners out there. Another example, look at superchargers, they are a great technology, but parts need to be replaced often, and often quite expensive...How come no bad-mouths superchargers? And turbo's, etc...The list goes on...No mechanical product lasts a lifetime!

If you buy something, be prepared to maintain it, through good and bad....Sounds like marriage...LOL...

For those married, you go try tell your wife "Oh, I married you thinking you were cheap to maintain. But it seems not!" ...See if you get out of the house alive!!!

there is a reason that the Xtroid CVT was discontinued after it was only run in 2 models of cars that were released in japan ONLY. If they were so good you would be seeing them in the cimas and fugas.

Ben says stay away from CVT, below is his issue with CVT taken from his Y34 thread

the long story cut short is that i was driving the cedric for about a week. Noticed the box starting to play up at cold start, slipping and surging etc...

Called CVT NZ and they recon it was the box fluid, ordered new fluid at $1750 then dropped the sump off and found heaps of metal on the magnets and very dirty brown fluid. Called CVT NZ and they recon its normal to find some metal. Put new bright blue fluid in, attempted to drive car for a a couple of hours and it was making some terrible scraping noises. Put it on the hoist and called CVT NZ. They wanted 11K to rebuild, i told them that i could buy another car for that and proceeded to pull the box apart for my own interest. Found out what was wrong and no tranny specialist in australia would fix it without costing less then 11K.

So i thought screw it, i'll find another box in japan and bring it over. 2 months of searching and countless people helping me look i found nothing. Then i thought i'll buy an accident damaged CVT car and swap the boxes over. Thought about it some more and realised that im probly going to get into the same situation again.

Kristian being the kind and considerate man found me a cheap ass gloria with a regular tranny that checked out well and its arriving on the 12th.

Then i'll be swapping everything over from one to the other, selling the spare engine and dismantling the rest of the car. Kristian has dibs on the shocks and CD stacker already :)

Moral of the story, DONT BUY A CVT Cedric/Gloria!

The CVT car we complied for a guy in WA had red fluid leaking out of the box. I called and told him that he MUST drop the fluid immediately and replace with some new fluid no matter the cost otherwise he'll be up for a 11K rebuild or donor car.

I thought about going manual as i have access to a 5sp manual Z32 300zx, but with no clutch, brake, accelerator and ECU to put in, it would turn out to be more costly then bringing over a donor car.

The donor car will cost me approx. $5500 landed but hopefully i can make some of that back in selling stuff out of it.

We are not bad mouthing the CVT-8 merely warning potential buyers what they are in for. You are forgetting a few things:

1. Porsche owners wages are not in line with V35 owners. If I earned what a Porsche owner earned, I wouldn't have gotten a V35 to start with

LOL...I was a Porsche owner once...Yet, I went and ordered a V35 as a daily a few weeks ago...

Anyway, a few rotten eggs doesn't make the whole batch bad...

I remember stripping 1st, 2nd and 3rd gear on my 2001 Astra when it was 10,000kms old..does that make all Astras bad? (exclusion for the Camira - That was trouble from it's humble beginnings...)

If you are prepared to marry a Russian, be prepared to learn Russian...That's all I am trying to note here. I hope I don't spark arguments here...LOL

  • Like 1
LOL...I was a Porsche owner once...Yet, I went and ordered a V35 as a daily a few weeks ago...

Anyway, a few rotten eggs doesn't make the whole batch bad...

I remember stripping 1st, 2nd and 3rd gear on my 2001 Astra when it was 10,000kms old..does that make all Astras bad? (exclusion for the Camira - That was trouble from it's humble beginnings...)

If you are prepared to marry a Russian, be prepared to learn Russian...That's all I am trying to note here. I hope I don't spark arguments here...LOL

Glad to know you have owned a porsche mate, cause you'll need the cash to fix up the CVT. I wish i could justify spending >50% of the purchase price of the car to get the auto fixed.

Im sure the astra box didnt cost half the price of the car!

The insides are soo precise and clean that if anything at all breaks, even a 5c washer, you will be sure to break everything. And to top things off, when something does break, you cant just order a new part as Nissan do not stock anything for it.

To buy a new automatic from Nissan is $28,000 AUD because they will start a production up and build you one.

The extroid CVT is a brilliant box and I can see why it was voted best box in the world at the time, but 100,000kms later and after some lazy, poor japanese owners have thrashed it, its bound to be problematic.

Ben

Thanks Ben.

Based on everyone's comments regarding the CVT, I'll be buying a 3 year mechanical warranty on the car from the dealer. So, for the next 3 years, I should be "safe".

Can I ask if finding a donor gearbox, say a 5 speed auto or 6 speed manual, is a hard task? I mean, if the CVT is gonna break, I might as well change the whole gearbox.

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