2003 Nissan Sentra SER SpecV from North America - Comments

Brake booster and master cylinder went out at 14,000 miles.

Other than that no problems, and all recalls have not been included with my car.

All around wonderful car. Stock form it's very well balanced: roomy, quick, handles great, stops fast, great fuel economy (24-26mpg city, 28-30mpg highway).

I have had several import sports cars including '94 Acura Integra GS-R, '95 Mitsubishi GS-T, and '85 CRX Si, all have not stayed stock for very long. This car did for a little longer only because of the limited parts due to being only a year old. But I have added some basic bolt-ons: cold air intake, header, cat-back exhaust, air/fuel controller, springs, big brakes, wider, lighter rims with sticky tires, and solid engine mounts. After being dyno tuned the car now runs 14.7's, makes 162whp and 176wTQ, and gets around 25-27mpg city and 34-36mpg highway.

Love this car, hasn't let me down yet, and I hope to keep it a long time.

This car has brought me many wins in races in auto-crossing, road racing, drag racing, etc. All the fun, but legal racing.

My spec-v is an 03 and I have been having a lot of problems with the motor. After having the car for 2500 miles the rings in the motor went,6600 dollars later I now have a new motor and converter. Now 6000 miles later I am having trouble with the motor again. Don't get me wrong I love my car and it is one of the fastest cars in my area, but I think that the 2.5 is a motor that best fits the Altma because anyone in a spec-v is going to want more than the 2.5 has to offer. I plan on keeping my car, but I am also planning to put an SR20 in my car.

I also have a 03 spec-v and my engine threw 2 rods, spun main bearing and blew the intake manifold almost off. It was covered under warranty. I have many performance parts on my car and nissan still covers it under warranty until you switch internals which is good. right now I am in the the process of getting a turbo kit and internals to hold about 20-28 psi. it should pull close to about 700-800 hp. William Meredith president Defy car club las vegas.

I have a 2003 Spec-v and I love my car. I haven't taken the time to add any performance parts into the mix just yet. I'm not really sure I want to do so, either. I have my doubts as to whether or not the 2.5 could actually handle anything more than the standard bolt-ons (CAI, header, etc). I have pretty well "babied" my Spec since the day I got it. I've never raced it, never "red-lined" it, and never really tried to push it to it's limits.

I was returning home from a trip across town one Sunday afternoon, and as I pulled into the parking lot at my apartments, the engine died. I tried restarting it several times, and after letting it sit for a minute or two, was finally able to get it started again. I took it for a short trip around the block and naturally, nothing happened. So I parked it and thought nothing of it. The next day, as I was driving to school, the "Check Engine" light came on and as you can probably guess,performance was drastically reduced. I called my local dealership and asked the service advisor if he could fit me in. I nursed the car back across town to the dealership close to where I live and dropped it off to be looked at. I got a call the next day from my advisor stating the they were going to replace the engine under warranty. At 24,000 miles, I wasn't complaining at all, but I certainly had my concerns about the quality of the build. Apparently what had happened was one of the bolts on the throttle body had broken off on the inside and had been sucked in through the intake into the #3 cylinder. My engine was destroyed.

It's been about 6 months and 6,000 miles since then and I haven't had any major problems with the car. I'm just very hesitant to do any real modifications seeing as how I had such major problems under normal driving conditions. Anyone have any suggestions?

The nut getting sucked into the intake is actually not unheard of. a lot of people use lock tight to prevent this. I have heard of people going to use the lock tight and discovering that some of the screws already had lock tight and some didn't.

Supposedly 80% of the problems with this car were fixed by the end of 02. and all problems are fixed for the 04 production year. to fix known problems with 03 is very cheap and easy... go to www.vboard.com for more information.

1-lock tight butterfly screws - almost free and is a must before warranty runs out.

2-knock sensor relocation - almost free and completely unnecesary.

3-short shifter to clean up the feel of the stock 6speed (good idea for all years) - easy/cheap and completely unnecesary

4-precat replacement with header (recal does fix the problem) but header removes the problem entirely and improves both power and mpg - few hundred dollars, but improved fuel economy recovers investment. also completely unnecesary, but the recal is a MUST.