The Frustration of Diagnosing Nissans 

Nice work sir. I was a Ford tech for few years before I moved to the Nissan dealer. Diagnosing Nissans has a huge learning curve, but it gets easier once you realize it's like working on a car from 15 years ago. One single CAN network for most vehicles until they finally added ITS-CAN. And a bunch of LIN busses. And a bunch of standalone modules that have "listen for the beeps or flashing lights" diagnostics like it's the 90's. Park-sensor modules on 2023 trucks are STILL all about listening to the beeps. When new engine functions are added (like variable compression), they don't always update the ECM, they just add another module that bolts right next to the ECM that handles that one single function. It's wild. Nissan diagnostic information and trouble trees are generally poor. Lots of institutionalized knowledge to become fast at it, and tons of diagnostic information is hidden in TSBs and Tech Tips that never make it into the service manual. The TSB you might need may have been released 10 years ago but applied to most cars, but doesn't show up on the vehicle you're working on because it's a 10 year old TSB that is still relevant but not updated. I had an unreal number of printed bulletins in a folder because it was faster than trying to remember what vehicle I could search to find that bulletin under. CAN on Nissan used to trip me up until I learned my way around it. A lot of bad translations and dealer lingo gets in the way. When it says "lost communication with ECM" in the service info, that doesn't necessarily mean engine control module, that can mean electronic control module. Meaning it just lost communication with SOMEONE. Some of the cars are set-up so the modules have a "buddy" that they look for, so the missing module code only shows up in one module, not all of them. If you use the dealer-level CONSULT tool rather than R2R, you get topology access. (At least I didn't see the topology tab on your screen). It's real topology based on the VIN and what options it should have, not like Topdon or Autel topology. That's what I would have used to identify if any module was actually missing. The U1000 says someone is gone, topology page tells you who. After diagnosing about a billion faulty Laser/Radar units (salt intrusion and generally being junked killed a ton of them), we really got used to just looking to see if it was missing. The DTC Info button has never worked or provided any valuable information. Looks like you didn't get access to the navigable wiring diagrams and just got PDFs. Too bad, Nissan's diagrams have come a long way and had nice quick links to 3d connector location views, pinouts, etc. I really miss the OE wiring diagrams from Nissan and Ford. CONSULT3 is a real piece of crap tool. Data rate is unbelievably slow. If you plug in an old CONSULT2, (think Nissan's Tech2 or DRB3), the data rate is out of this world. I preferred to use my really old Solus Pro to do any drivability diagnosis, but Nissan required CONSULT3 screenshots for all warranty work. The only reason I would ever consider buying one is if I was regularly programming new CVTs or something.

You are correct that you found that cut wire along with the other mess someone screwed with. And you’re correct that Nissan should have told you on the scanner it couldn’t communicate with that module. I can see why this is frustrating to troubleshoot these cars. Have a great day!

I'm sorry you had to go through all that, but I can't thank you enough for the way you explain your thought process when diagnosing complex problems. Basically I've experienced exactly what you did by watching your video so I'll have that knowledge moving forward in case I run across a similar situation. I like when you do simple problems because before you tackle complex problems like this, you need to have a solid grasp of the basics. You do both as well or better than anybody.

That was great! Like a Sherlock Holmes mystery. Was clever to go down the path (if I understood correctly) of unplugging modules until you found one where the codes didn’t change, that being a clue that was the particular module was already implicated in the original fault. Good stuff.

I can't thank you enough for the way you explain your thought process .

Diagnostics can be real frustrating especially when information is lacking or sketchy at best. I have an 06 Nissan Frontier 4.0L V6, 6 speed manual, 4X4. I also have the 06 Nissan Service/Electrical and more DVD. Very helpful! Anyway, you did great! Thanks for taking us along through this diagnosis.

Enjoyed the video... The ICC should indeed be capable of report the sub-modules is not capable of communicating with... a bit stupid from nissan to leave it so vague... Great approach and diagnose, really enjoyed it! 👍👍👍

Jake, instead of spending your "hard earned money" money on equipment to calibrate a Nissan you should by a boat or an airplane or something! One of the happiest days of my life was when I found out my Son had sold his Nissan. Praise the Lord. We were already running into issues with that truck. Love your channel. Have felt your pain. Thanks for Sharing! 🙃🙂

Great diagnostic, I only knew about the light since my son has a Nissan and the light will blink from time to time. I looked it up in the manual and found it was the safety system. So it’s either the camera or sensor normally on those. Great find though. You are great at what you do. Keep up with the great videos - I know it takes time and we appreciate it.

Man I admire your perseverance.... Well done man... Excellent video... Nothing was making sense.. But when you found out that the distance sensor was the culprit, you kind of now tell why we have a car accident light on

Love the process of your thinking! You could teach it now!!!!

Haven’t been watching you too long but I believe this is the best video I’ve seen you put out yet.

I am glad I am not the only one that has anything to do with Nissan. Stuff just doesn't make sense. Good job on being diligent and finding the problem. Love the content keep it up. You are a wonderful inspiration as well as some others on here.

Dude, you had me laughing from the start! I feel your pain. People who don't do this as a proffesion can't really appreciate the pain felt when dealing with crap like this, lack of good diag information from the dealer, engineering design faults, etc. I've never liked Nissan either so immediately I was laughing inside. One other obstacle we face is the inability of customers not giving you all the past history and info they can which can speed things up usually. Great job again Jake!

Sir, you always do a good diagnoses on car keep up the good work

Awesome job, I feel your pain. I have a 2018 Infiniti q60 with a nightmare electrical issue. I wish I could get lucky in the same way but still fighting with things. Awesome video and way to show people to never give up.

You mentioned you found it by luck, certainly not, you found it earlier by luck but you never gave up and used logic to find that very difficult fault. Congratulations you definitely have the skills to pay the bills, love your you tube channel (uk)

Than you for not giving up! I would've given up way earlier.

Jake you got million dollar smile when you found that broken wire love your contents bro

Great job for sure! This is a great example of thinking outside the box.

Last time I looked at a newer Nissan I used my Thinktool Pros which actually has an option for Consult. It also features a great topology map and seemed to be quite friendly with Nissan. Great diagnosis and great learning!

great diagnosis sir, thanks for sharing your great knowledge

No doubt this was a mind bender... Good find! I'm a firm believer that EVERY problem can be found and identified, just as long as you have a good process, and stick to it.

On the powertrain HSCAN bus you can have control algorithms executing at different rates depending on what component is being controlled and at a data rate that is fast enough for its function. For relatively low speed information the transmitting module is actually just broadcasting the information onto the bus at a set rate, and who ever needs to read the message does so based on the identifier. Modules setup an identifier filter table to ignore messages (packets) that are not relevant to the receiving module's control functions, in this way the module is not wasting processing resources by having to look at every message. Some control is not broadcasting in nature, it is actually synchronous, in that, either executing a control state machine or feedback control usually just between two modules like the ECM and the TCM. The vehicle battery lugs need to be replace, and the battery and its terminal cleaned. The main battery cables should also be checked for corrosion or damage, especially the block ground. There was an interesting struggle between the experience domestic OEM harness engineers (harness component engineer, sign off responsibility, the engineer that works with the supplier) and their supervisors (not necessarily very good at engineering) when a Japanese competitor car reverse wiring engineering report was issued, in that saying that the Japanese are using a lot of 20 AWG wire (actually 0.5 mm^2 metric wire) and the harnesses were not well secured at times. The domestic OEM harness engineers would not go smaller than 18 AWG in anything outside of the passenger compartment, and even this was not done due to having to secure the smaller wire harness every few inches to prevent it from vibrating, and so you would see virtually no 20 AWG (0.5 mm^2) anywhere on the domestic made vehicle. The underlying reason is wire gauge is not just chosen for electrical properties but also mechanical properties, and over the years it was found that 20 AWG wire is not mechanically well suited for automotive applications. This is why you would see signal and low power harnesses in the vehicle virtually all have the same 18 AWG size wire. If you look at a domestic OEM PCM you will see mostly 18 AWG (1 mm^2) with some 16 AWG (1.5 mm^2). Only on special mixed mode connectors will you see huge power and ground wires. However, the mixed power (mode) connectors are more costly and used when there is a strict size limit on the modules installed location. For under-hood harness design you have to secure the harness from vibrating regardless of its size. You can see on the Nissan that the harnesses in the front bumper area are not well covered or well dressed (secured).

Fantastic though process, against all odds planted by Nissan. I commend your patience and capacity to keep calm with such a frustrating problem! And it was a botched job someone did in the past that created the problem. You may say you were lucky, but only on where the wire was broken, because you were on to it already, by sheer reasoning. Great job!

Good job bud, I just had a similar situation with a Nissan Rogue a few weeks ago. Very frustrating!

Great Job! I own a shop in east Ky & every time someone has electrical issue on an Nissan I run, I won’t even mess with com problems on Nissan anymore

I swear Jake you say you got lucky and all I seen was skill. One way or the other you were going to find that in literally minutes. Great job Jake..

Dude your next level to figure that out.

Man I absolutely agree with you. I have never understood the module structure which Nissan uses. It always seems like the module I want is a sub module inside a module, racks my brain. Also yes the end spike on the data packet is the end of transmission. The difference in size you were pointing out I believe is due to how far away that module is on the bus.

3:28 Micsig can translate a waveform into a message code over a network. Super Mario did a review of these oscilloscopes.

This is one of the reasons why I fallow you cuz you never give up you always persist and that what the normal humans should be persistent until we fix the problem

I agree Nissans code setting is terrible, I unplugged a coil on a 2019 Infiniti and all it gave was a P0300! Thank you for another great video! Honda's flow charts on late model vehicles is also terrible, it says erase code if comes back replace with known good.

I had been a Nissan tech for 6 years and was just recently back working at Nissan. Their systems are so dated once you have been around other manufacturers, and you also see how slow they are to interrogate. That U1000-1 code is usually just a U1000 code and the -1 is a first stage, unless they have changed that since I was there. Normally a U1000 is treated as a past/ meaningless code and usually clears easily. Since all the new tech has came out around the drivers assistance, I have seen so much more software errors or modules shitting themselves which does not help the tech make that decision to replace the unit, it’s an expensive call. Good find, and great perseverance on looking for that fault rather than giving up like a lot of others would have!

Excellent diagnosis! Having a communication code and seeing the waveform that you showed in the video it makes you think why? I was wandering if decoding that signal tells you something. Signal looks good for me! or if in the topology shows you that component in red? Good that you found the problem caused by a human. Thank you for teaching us something in every video.

Nice video and diagnosis. I guess it came down to the basics. Just knowing where to apply those basics took a long time. 😂😂

great job ..hate nissan too that is crazy how they integrate all those modules together and nobody is telling on the distance sensor or i guess distance module i learned something from this video thanks

Worked at a Nissan dealer for a couple 3 months before I quit and went back to Indy shop and I agree they are hard to diagnose. Even with a consult it’s a lot of guessing

I have this with vw/audi I HATE them! So I get it. Keep up the fantastic video’s!

You are better at Nissan than you think! 👌🏼👍🏼

Wat to go primo NEVER GiVE UP . I love your videos because that .

Great thought process and repair.thanks for sharing.

YOUR VIDEOS ARE TOP-NOTCH ,,, NISSAN'S ARE VERY DIFFICULT IF YOU DON'T DIAGNOSE THEM EVERY DAY YOU END UP TALKING MUCH MORE TIME TO GET TO THE ROOT CAUSE OF THE PROBLEM . PLEASE I HOPE TO SEE MORE DIAGNOSIS ON NISSAN ON YOUR CHANNEL AND THANKS SO MUCH FOR YOUR TIME 🙏🙏🙏👍👍👍

37:58 repair cables is the most overlooked area in crash damaged cars 😂

Nissan and Renault are "strategic partners", there is only one thing the French are good at making, female lingerie. An important lesson on this video is how to give a diagnosis estimate for this type of code, add the labor time to replace every module in the system, since you have to access all of them to inspect power, ground and can bus communication. Great video thank you,

I give u credit to learn that system and film it for us at the same time.. ty!!

Great video!!! I was listening to your video on my drive home and had a feeling it was related to the distance sensor based on those familiar codes being set as I work in a collision shop doing primarily ADAS calibrations and trouble shooting all kinds of issues after the shop has put the cars back together for deliver. How has the cardaq Jbox working for you? Any issues or complaints? Considering picking one up fairly soon.

Ho the joy's of working on modern car's full of electric gremlins just waiting to get you 😓and Nissan are part owned by Renault 🤬 so a double whammy there 😩 Enjoying your videos, thank you for taking the time and effort in making them 👍

I work in a warehouse but I enjoy learning how ya work on cars. I think ya diagnose technicians are way too under paid and should charge more. My question is. Can you do a video on your most used test leads? I’m subscribing now.

Persistence pays off. 👊🏻

We can feel your frustration but best of all we see your satisfaction. Thanks for hanging in there great video. Just curious I wonder what it would take to get all the functionalities working on that factory Nissan scan tool. DTC Expla did that button give any more Info for you??

last crash avoidance light I had on a Chrysler/jeep, came from a body shop after front end repair. Turned out that there was a soft button setting in the center stack. Customer had the crash avoid system turned off. That turned on the light, and apparently let them crash the car!!! LOL Body shop paid me 120 dollars to research SI and push buttons on the center stack. Gotta Love it. Thanks for another video, keep it up, we all appreciate you, your a rockstar.

Very good job,,,,, on the diagnosis. I know you love Nissan cars, so I told all my friends who have Nissans that they will take them with you because you really liked working on them? 😂😂

I agree with you. Nissan service information is mediocre at best.

37:36 Maybe after this case you need to watch the history of road traffic accidents. This can be useful for repairs.

Persistence always pay off.i hope you dont get to work on nissan juke..techs and mechs regrets having that car.ugly on looks ugly to work on...this detailed video will help many techs to understand Nissan..cheers

could there be a seperate network ( can bus network ) that is being used to pass messages exclusively between the modules ? ,, and thats what its complaining about ? I think i saw a nissan with 2 can networks and even a kline a while back when troubleshooting a tcm fault.

I was a nissan tech till i went to fleet, replace module even might have a reprogram and do cailbration

great video , do you charge for all your time searching service data? how much did you pay for the CONSULT ? A what interface did you use ? was it a 14 pin connector? thanks for ya videos Jake

I wonder if the ADAS function on the Autel maxsys ULTRA would help. I don't have all the parts for it myself but some day when my ship comes in.

I struggle with nissan as well 😅 im not a big fan of their diagrams and i have been spoiled over the years. I was looking at a can pin # 87 so i was looking for a BIG connector (didnt see any info from nissan on connector locations) turns out it was a 6 pin connector and nissan just continued counting pin numbers from one connector to the next. I did notice on my last nissan that had the u1000 that i could talk and read data from all modules, but the tcm was bad slow and i didnt see the tps pid updating. Corrosion in the trans plug ended up being my issue. The u1000 code was in several modules though so where do you start? Im guessing in my case the k line was transfering the data i was seeing? 🤷‍♂️

Im sure I watched all the video. Might have to go back through it. Was there any live data from the ADAS for its sensors? Looked like a satellite fault from the beginning. Surely the distance sensor would show up as strange. Nissan wiring is very prone to breaking at the exit of plugs. If you look at the copper in Nissan looms it is very brittle (and thin) compared to other manufacturers. I have to agree, a lot of manufacturers code descriptions are very cryptic nowadays. Always tug test these things. Anyway, good result 👍

How did you connect consult to the car

I may have noticed a clue in a visual inspection; as a viewer obviously. The fog light was damaged where the sensor was located @23:52, so this would have prompted me to probe around the damaged area.

It sure is a shitter they don’t give a fault code for the distance sensor. About a year ago I incorporated a preliminary check to my game plan after watching a co worker spend 5 hrs diagnosing an issue similar to this, that ended up being a burnt fuse. (I know your fuse was ok, but you were dealing with a power feed issue that could have been caused by a bad fuse) The other day, a new Lexus got towed to us from a body shop with multiple warnings being displayed on the cluster, engine light was on, electric parking brake light was on, and it wouldn’t go over 20mph. There were lost communication and low voltage/short to ground codes in multiple modules that wouldn’t clear. Before I did any research or looked at wiring diagrams, I checked all fuses and found 2 of them open, and replacing them fixed the issue. Doing this preliminary check that took less than 5 min, eliminated hours of head scratching and running around Finding this broken power wire for the distance sensor is equivalent of finding a needle in a haystack unless you narrow it down like you did, therefore the time you spent is justified. But I think this is another lesson that we should always start by checking fuses, when dealing with an issue that doesn’t make sense at first

awesome ❤❤❤

my coworker used to work at nissan. all they do its keep throwing parts until its fix. simply warranty doesnt want to pay you anything.

1k broken wire fix, at least it's not a 10k at the dealer for just throwing modules and then a whole harness, not to mention 9 months or more sitting on their parking lot. Great find, great work 👏 👍. 😊

Amazing diag

Why they didn't have a ados fault code line for open circuit for distance censor?

I was a Nissan tech, and that button would do absolutely and 💯 NOTHING. At least for the dealership I was in.

I dislike working on nissans as well. For instance a downstream 02 sensor issue sets a upstream air fuel sensor code. (This was on an 06 sentra). I believe Eric O stated this in his videos on a differnet nissan. If you didn't know what to look for you'd be Hella confused. Them transmissions too... they just keep using the same crap

Would a scan tool with a can bus topology tree have helped with this diagnosis ,just a thought as that is why i like my launch ,i also use snap on mainly as the scope is part of the same tool

Those U1000 and U1001 codes are so common on Nissan/Infiniti that lots of people just ignore them, LOL.

Great job 👍! What j-box are you using for Consult?

The ADAS unit seems to have its own dedicated CAN bus sytem to communicate with all the sonar and radar sensor modules (the 4 modules on the right at 13:44). Since a scope was never put on this network, I wonder if the power wire for the front sensor was somehow shorting out the dedicated CAN bus. Instead of just saying "power supply distance sensor" you will get a total loss of communication on the whole dedicated CAN network, meaning that all you will ever see is a U code in the ADAS unit, truly a horrible fluke of luck.

👍👍👍

Do you have a video on how to diagnose the delta sensor on a booster on a Nissan o infinity? I have a 2005 infinity qx56 that has a problem with the brakes it's giving me. A code P1179 for the delta sensor. I check my wiring and some else has replaced the brake boos ter with the sensors, abs unit and wheel speed sensor I look a the scan data and the delta sensor reads opposite from what all data said it should be I think with the brake pedal depress the delta sensor should read 0 mm and without pressing the brake pedal it should read 1.18 mm Do you know or have a good readings from the sensors ?

Grasias

I feel your pain. I've been with Nissan for 25 years. Looking at your Consult screen it doesn't look like your Jbox was allowing you to run the Can diag test. Its basically a topology. The ADAS module is a gateway and was probably blocking some info. Nissan is famous for that with aftermarket tooling. Here is a link to a CAN case study I did that may help if you get one in the future, BTW great diag. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-_-q-HYIQCHw.html

As a Nissan Technician .. Generally you ignore the U1000 and focus on what other DTC's are present. Can comm codes will trigger anytime a system has a fault and shuts down communication.. doesnt typically mean the can comm system is actually down. Consult makes it easy to see that though, because youll have a U1000 dtc but all of the modules are present in the list while in "all systems"

Did you hear me screaming "you're missing a module"??? Lol. This is common Nissan trait. These are the jobs I see all the time and surprisingly that is also what I find 50% of the time.. That's a non Nissan approved fix, probably by a bodyshop.. 😂. The communication loop is probably a redundancy thing, incase a line gets lost, all modules can still communicate with the ADAS module. Kinda like a GM MOST bus with or without the directional signal..

41:00 - I think some cars check battery health by looking at the voltage drop during cranking. If it drops too low, the battery is near end-of-life. Your battery maintainer messes with that. Possibly because it's not seeing a normal voltage drop.

A known good CAN signal would be helpful!

I had a 2020 Altima with the same kind of non descriptive communication codes for the driver assist system and ended up finding a wire at the windshield camera broken inside of the insulation. There is no reason for it to be that difficult other than incompetence on Nissans behalf.

Just curious how would u charge for that job? I work on fleet vehicles and would not know how to charge?

Mate what website you use to check the wiring diagram thanks in advance for the reply 😉

Wonder if looking in the owners manual would of told you what the warning light even related to

BMW test plans are. Not great but on all faults but definitely much better than that

The way Nissans work with scan tools is beyond frustrating. Most of the time if you cycle the key you have to back out of the module and reconnect to be able to communicate with it. It’s like they intentionally wanted to frustrate the hell out of anyone working on them.

👍

having worked for 13 years at a dealer of japanese equipment, you learn the japanese way of thinking. its a cultural deal. and the janglish translations can be fun to read!. the diagrams are different too with subtle nuances. a couple things i seen here as i was watching--- it was a u1000-1. that dash one would suggest a sub system. and as you showed the diagram of the can system @13:15 if you see the right edge of the adas control unit is a squiggly line and at the end of that branch the same named unit has a matching but inverted squiggly line showing yes these are 2 parts of the same module so yes they looped a sub can network in there. appearantly it reports through the module to the rest of the can? but probably isolated for noise reasons? interesting though that until the fault was fixed that laser distance thing didnt show up. it would have been interesting to scope that subsystem to see what properties that can has. another thing i seen was the cracked fog light lense. that thing had been crashed in that corner before. even as a tech the japanese were very secretive on what they considered propietory information. some times they would send parts and just tell us to change them rather than give us an understanding how things worked. one time the flew a tech from japan !

do you speak french i live in the uk and when when i have worked on a nissan a lot of the parts are renault as renault own big share in nissan and they keep it in the family

I cant even imagine the time i wouldnt get paid for diagnosing this when i was a nissan tech. So happy i left lmao dealer life sucks

May be next time use a scanner that shows the network topology and if a module is not communicating it would show it greyed out

When you have no information, all of them would be tough.

I feel you on that one! Nissans are the worst Japanese car to work on! Even just simple repairs like alternators they make it complicated!

You gotta love when service data has you running in circles over and over. Ahh Nissan, the Chrysler of Asian vehicles.

The code was correct. The PCM wasn't receiving ICC (intelligent cruise control) data (P1568). The ADAS was flagging a U1000 for the ICC module because it didn't see any data packets from it. The vehicle has more than one CAN bus, but you were scoping the main bus and not the ones after the ADAS module. If you were looking at network topology (system scan), I bet ICC would have been greyed out.

I'm still early in the video so I'm not sure where it goes from here, but to me the codes in the ECM say there is a fault with another module. The ECM clearly works and you can read data. Also, I think the code in the ECM was U1001 which I'm sure when you look it up will give a slightly different result than U1000. You definately have a great looking wave form at the DLC, but from there I would check at the module. The warning light that is on refers to the adaptive cruise, so I would check and see if Nissan has a diagram of what the communication bus is shaped like? In other words, do they all connect directly to the ECM or pass through other modules. Check what the comm lines are doing at the module that has the MIL lit. Verify that the scan tool can communicate with that module and is the data live. Does it drop out while driving etc. I'm excited to see where you go with this one. Also, thanks for your honesty in your thoughts as you work through a car. We've all been there with the frustration and suffering. Edit: Now I've finished the video it looks like you kicked it's ass in the end. I did not see that direction as the solution. Glad it worked for you. Finding that wire was lucky and like they say, "It's better to be lucky than good." I would take luck any day!!