Two problems related to camshaft position sensor have been reported for the 2004 Nissan Maxima. The most recently reported issues are listed below. Please also check out the statistics and reliability analysis of the 2004 Nissan Maxima based on all problems reported for the 2004 Maxima.
I have a 2004 Nissan Maxima. When I was driving, the steering locked up and there was no way to steer. I don’t know how I did it, being petite and not so strong, but I managed to make the car move to the side, then it turned off automatically. I tried to turn on the car and it didn’t start. I had to wait a few minutes and turn the key for a few seconds until the engine restarted. It becomes extremely difficult to pull over to the side, and I was saved the 5-7 times this happened to me. Luck was on my side! I didn’t drive my car on the freeway, because I was terrified my car would stall and my son and I would die in a terrible car accident. I finally had to go to my shop and replace the two camshaft sensors with the following codes p3040 and p0345. With some searching, I found out that I’m not the only one with this issue. I stand by the former complaint: ‘I found out that Nissan has a recall on altima’s with this same issue, but will not cover and recall my vehicle. This is very dangerous and I do not understand why they would only recall certain makes when it is the same exact error code on both vehicles. It is a p3040 and p0345 cam sensor/cam shaft recall through Nissan. However, they say my make and model does not fall under this recall. Shouldn't they recall all vehicles with this same problem?’ thank you for your help in this safety issue.
My disaster: first while driving, the car shut off. I was left with no power anything (steering, brakes, etc). Luckily I was able to pull onto a side road. The local shop said I needed a new electronic control module (ecm) or onboard computer. Had to then tow it to the dealership for programming. I was still getting a mis-fire and it was a result of 6 bad coils which are believed to have created the bad computer. On top of all this, I needed to replace my cam shaft sensors because they were damaged. To summarize: bad coils lead to burning of my ecm, which in turn destroyed my cam shaft sensors = $2700!!!.