nissan protection options and extended warranty

hi all,

my stx king cab is due next week and i need to make a couple of decisions on the offered nissan extras.
nissan have the following protection products available:
paint sealant/protector- $895
carpet and upholstery protection- $495
Vinyl and leather protection- $495
electronic rust protection- $895
protection package(all of the above)- $1800

has anyone had these done to their vehicles and if so does it seem worth it? are there better aftermarket products available? any help would be appreciated.

another query is with the nissan extended warranty. i think it was $1300. it seems from reading a few of the posts on the forum that the original warranty isn't worth that much so why pay to extend it? i have yet to check with the dealer what effect modifying the vehicle (eg suspension, fuel tanks, aftermarket bar) will have on the warranty. if its going to void it anyway i don't think I'll be paying for the extra couple of years anyway.

thanks again
shero

These items are purely down to what you think you need, want, and desire. But more than anything what you are willing to pay for.

My opinion (and others will vary)
Paint protection, never had it on any new car and to my knowledge none ever suffered, but then it will depend a lot on where you park it and how you treat it.
Carpet protection, waste of money to Nissan, if you're worried buy a can of scotch guard and do it yourself.
Vinyl protection, same as above, I doubt very much Nissan really warrant their coat of Armourall any better than they warrant vinyl that hasn't been done by them.
Electronic rust protection. I don't think it works but it's a can of worms.
Protection package overall, you can probably find somewhere else to better spend $1800

As far as the warranty goes, bare in mind that no matter what you pay Nissan they are going to try and get out of any expensive claim in as many ways as they know how, it's just the way they have to be otherwise they'd be paying out a fortune in claims. But that doesn't mean all warranties are useless you just have to decide if the cost justifies your piece of mind.

Nothing you can add after market can automatically void the regular warranty unless the mod is the direct cause of the problem (i.e a 2 inch lift can't be blamed on a dead engine), however some extended warranties may have more limitations on them so read the fine print carefully.

We opted for part of the protection package (cloth + rust) and declined the extended warranty. We added window tinting, we have the paint protection and I'm positive it went on the lawn with the first wash.

Now that I've had the vehicle for some time ... here are my thoughts.

The rust protection is probably worth it, so if asked again I'd get it again.

The cloth/interior protection is bullsh*t, get some seat covers - which we did anyway.

As for things affecting your warranty - ask Bosshog for a recent example. He has aftermarket suspension, which is what caused his cabin mount to sh*t itself and cause the tub to rub the paint off the cabin. If you believe that, I know this wonderful investment scheme ...

My dealer told me that I could do stuff to the vehicle as I saw fit and it wouldn't harm the warranty unless what I did had impacted on the item being claimed under warranty. I'm kinda thinking now that adding the winch is an issue, because it's not a Warne winch that they supplied and if ever my mirrors stop working, it'll be because of the increased down-angle of the front of the car caused by the non-compliant winch.

I'm not as angry at Nissan as that sounds. I happen to think I've got a great vehicle. But you know they're going to bite when you need it most - they're a car dealer. Same happens everywhere.

No.
No.
No.
No.
No.

Better aftermarket: No.
Exact same product from aftermarket for less than half the price: Yes.

Does that particular extended warranty cover less than the factory warranty like some? Either way: No.

Not with Nissan Australia at least.

What Dion said.

Id go to a Ming dealer, do the seats and thats it.

Dave.

You can do all those xtra yourself for far less $. I had the xtra warranty thrown in on mine, but wasn't worth the hassle, trucks a piece of crap and I'm getting rid of it. I Hope you have better luck with yours.

I passed on all that stuff today.
What was funny was instead of the expected female to try and sell it, it was some part bald, part unshaven young bloke. He didn't do anything for the missus, (or me), except make her eyes glaze over and brain go pphzzt, so she pulled the old "I've got to go to work number".

The extended warranty basically boiled down to paying $795 now for up to <edit> $3,000 </edit> worth of parts AND LABOUR in years 4, 5 and 6. Given they charge $105/hour now, I could see that going in a few short jobs. clutches were not counted on 4WD.

Frankly, I'll be happy to get back to having work done by the local garage when the warranty s up. They have kept the old vehicle chugging along for 18 years at very economic rates.

As the others have said Nah Pass
one of the guys here got the paint protection and they dont tell you that you have to buy some weird shampoo to wash the truck with and the stuff is exxy
Ill go a decent coat of wax anyday and Scotchguard the interior

If you think Electronic Rust Protection works, read THIS and then let us me know if you still think it works...

That's not a very compelling anecdote, I'm sure there is a lot more evidence both for an against, in fact I'm sure there is a thread on this very forum somewhere that has more information than that letter. I really can't see that one little thing being enough to convince someone who thinks rust protection works to jump ship and throw away their rust proofing.

No matter way you read this article, either for or against, it is still one of those issues that will be debated by both sides forever. Just like adding oil to diesel to make your car go better, adding hydrogen to tyres to increase economy there is always both sides and people are going to believe what they want to believe.

There's someone here in Australia that I have a lot of respect for when it comes to knowledge of a great many things related to vehicles, caravans, motorhomes and the various aspects of these.

One page that he's written is about these rust inhibitors: instead of just trying to think about whether or not it works and then spouting off some hearsay, he's gone and tested it.

The result: they successfully INHIBIT rust. The dictionary definition of "inhibit" is to hold back, or restrain. It does not mean STOP or PREVENT.

If that means my car - side by side with an identical vehicle used in the same environment* - is going to outlast that other vehicle that doesn't have the device then I'm as happy as Larry (and remember, Larry's relaxing on an island with a dozen Miss Universe finalists bringing him beers and being his own personal windscreen wipers).

* Environment is vital to consider. A car taken regularly through the surf to Fraser Island is going to see issues with rust long before mine that spends most of its time in a forest. Salt in water breaks down into ions and causes the water to become conductive, and iron only becomes rust when it can shed an electron and combine with an oxygen molecule.

Do they work? I trust the word of Collyn, I've not found anything objectionable in anything else he's written - it's always made sense. If he says he's tried it and it works TO A DEGREE, then that's enough for me.

I don't think there's a single thing on this planet that will STOP or PREVENT rust in our car bodies while we make them out of materials that can oxidise.

Shrug, it works on ships because they are having a bath all the time. I just don't see how it can work in air.

No to everything,

Although at 99,950km's I did sell my soul and extend the warranty for another 50,000km cheap insurance I thought, negotiated the price down to $900 odd dollars.

sorry tony, but that bit of text does nothing to convince me in anyway that they work.

The physics behind the idea tells us that it can't - as terryc says, as a car isnt constantly immersed in water, or carrying around a nice big sacrificial anode, it just can't work.

I had wondered a little about it too, but there are other factors at work.

If you have a raw piece of steel/iron and place a drop of water on it, it will rust where the water drop is quickly, but the rest of it will start to develop rust over time. That's because the air does have moisture (humidity).

If there's salty moisture (higher ionisation levels within the moisture = better transfer of electrons) then the oxidisation process occurs at a higher rate.

This is all chemistry stuff we can experiment with ourselves if we want to, anyway. If we wanted to, we could check it out for ourselves.

Old.Tony said:

If there's salty moisture (higher ionisation levels within the moisture = better transfer of electrons) then the oxidisation process occurs at a higher rate.

Click to expand...

My 2c is that the steel already has a protective coating on it anyway and I thin anything the factory can apply in equipment/set up built specifically for this purpose is going to be superior to anything added on top of those factory coatings.


BTW, has anyone every see "rusty fingers" on sheet metal? skin oils from some people can leave rust patterns on new steel very fast( two months).

I can share a funny story with this, after purchase, you get sent to the bird who tries to sell this stuff. She offered me the full package for $3000 if I signed now, I said I'd need to think about it overnight and read the brochures, she says "oh ok yeah you can have it for 3k tommorrow too." I flick throught the brochures for 10 seconds and say "hmm seems a bit exe..." she says "Oh well I could to it for $1500 if you like..." F^&k me 50% off, just like that!!!!! this was just priceless for me. Suffice to say, down to autobahn, container of wax, and bottle of scotchguard later...