Nissan Murano Mechanical Review

Today we're going to be reviewing the Nissan Murano. Now unlike other car reviewers that would complain of the Murano's quirky boomerang styling or how the CVT holds back this wonderful VQ engine, we're going to be taking a look underneath the hood and underneath this momobile to see what's inside and how it works. And we're going to start under the hood of the Murano where we have Nissan's infamous 3.5 liter V6 engine. It's the VQ35DE that you find in many other Nissan products. And this one is situated transversely for a front wheel drive setup. And underneath all this plastic, the airbox, and the battery, we have this wonderful engine paired to a CVT transmission. Taking a look at how the components are laid out under the hood of the Murano, we start here where we've got the windshield washer reservoir. We have the hydroelectric power steering pump and its reservoir. We've got the coolant jug over here. We have the engine in the middle here. Now this is a transverse engine which means you have three cylinders on this side and then three cylinders on the back side. Now underneath this air intake, we have the ECU computer. Off to the side here, we have the battery, a couple of fuse boxes, the airbox over here, and the master cylinder reservoir here. Now taking a look at the Murano's air intake setup, air is going to begin its journey at the front here where cool air is drawn into this air resonator tank. It'll then go down into the air filter box to get filtered out, pass by the mass airflow sensor over there, and then into this drive-by wire throttle body, and then into this plastic intake plenum. It'll then get drawn down into this aluminum lower intake manifold before going into the engine to get burned. Now replacing an air filter on a Murano is pretty straightforward. There's just two clips that you lift up here. You lift the airbox up and peel the filter out, just like that. Now with the air intake box removed, it really frees up this engine bay a lot and it's probably the first step you have to do in order to do any work under the hood here. You can see you've got clearer access to the drive-by wire throttle body on this side. Now looking on top of this intake plenum, you can see there's a bunch of these diaphragms on here that control flaps inside of here, and those are all controlled by these vacuum switching valves, and that's for the acoustic induction system to vary airflow at various RPMs. Now taking a look at the top of this VQ engine, you can see you've got these plastic valve covers. Now the ignition coils are located for the front bank right on the front here, so you get easy spark plug access here. However, accessing the three cylinders in the back requires you to remove this air intake plenum, which means you've got to deal with all these vacuum hoses and a couple of wires, and it's quite the job to change spark plugs. Now this engine does use 0w20 weight oil. Now these engines were known for their reliability and sturdiness, but they were very oil sensitive. However, if you do starve it of oil or you overheat it, they're known to spin a connecting rod bearing or eat a timing chain tensioner, so you got to make sure this thing is always full of oil. Now the dipstick is located down at the side here, it's a little difficult to access when all the plastic covers are on. Now taking a look underneath the Murano, first of all it's got this really stupid lip here that's there to bother you when you're trying to jack up the vehicle or slide underneath. Regardless, the rest of the vehicle underneath is fairly flat, although it's not fully covered from elements and for aerodynamics. You have this middle section over here that's not covered because of the exhaust that has to run here, and the two side parts here are covered. The rest of it at the back here is fully uncovered. Now that undercover is held in by these little clips here, which are pretty cumbersome to remove, and they could break pretty easily if you've got to remove this to do any repair work underneath the Murano. Now looking underneath the Murano with the covers removed, we've got the oil pan located on the passenger side here, and the transmission pan on the driver's side. Now luckily both of these oil pans are made of stamped steel, Volkswagen. Now unfortunately you do have to remove that stupid plastic cover in order to access the drain plug located over here, however once that is removed you have clear access to all the oil pan bolts if you need to change the gasket. Now the oil filter isn't even located underneath the vehicle, it's actually located on the side here inside the passenger side wheel well. It is a canister style oil filter which means you just screw it off and replace it. Now in order to get proper access to the oil filter you have to remove the passenger side wheel and this splash cover here to reveal this oil filter. So there's a lot of covers you got to remove in order to do basic maintenance on this Murano. Now this big round thing around the filter is the oil cooler, and it's got its coolant lines going around here. Now next if we take a look at the fuel system on the Murano we have the low pressure pump in the tank that's going to bring fuel up to the fuel rail here. Now this fuel rail powers the rear three cylinders. We've got a front fuel rail located over here and it powers the front three cylinders. You have the three fuel injectors located over here. Now this is a port injected engine only which is good because you don't have to worry about carbon buildup in long term, however it still doesn't make as much power as a direct injection model would. Now right on the top here you have the evap line that goes to the purge valve and then that vents into the intake. Now on the top of this valve cover we have one pcv hose over here and there's another pcv hose on the back that directly routes to the air intake. Over here on the passenger side of the engine underneath this timing cover we have timing chains which is good because you don't have to change them over the life of the vehicle that is if your chain tensioner doesn't fail. Now there's actually three chains one that comes down from below on the crank to power the intake camshafts on the insides here and then two sub chains that run from the intake side to the outside over here. Now this engine is a double overhead cam engine and it's got dual variable valve timing on both the intake side here and the exhaust side. You can see one of the oil control valves are over here and the other oil control valve is located at the back here. Now because this is a v6 engine stuffed in such a small engine bay, just in front of those timing covers down below is where the drive belts are set up. You can't even see anything from up above here. Now you might be able to make out that alternator located at the front of the engine, however accessing it means you have to remove the entire front half of this vehicle including the bumper and the radiator in order to get enough room to work back there. Now from underneath here you still don't have much access to the drive belt side of things because it's really so close up to the frame rail. We do have clear access to the ac compressor which would unbolt this way and come down although it is pretty tight to get inside of here with a tool. Now in order to access the drive belt side you do have to remove the wheel and all these splash guards on the side here and even then the access here is pretty tight. I can barely pass my fingers here where this tensioner is going to be. You can't even see the alternator which would be located up above and here is the ac compressor so you can definitely tell things are going to be pretty tight when you have to work on the front half of this engine. And now we'll have a listen to the engine. Now looking across the Murano's engine bay there is quite a sea of plastic although there is a reliable vq engine buried in there somewhere. Now because this engine's been around for so long looking at the electronics it's not too complicated with too many wires or hoses or anything though the ecu is located right at the front here where it's subjected to any collision or weather damage. Now off to the side here we have this box which is not exactly a fuse box it's more of a junction box it has a bunch of wires in it and there's a couple of fuses inside of here. Over here is where the real fuse and relay box is you can see there's a couple more there and at least these are well labeled. I guess Nissan still can't give away from Renault although this is an American built and marketed vehicle. Now taking a look at the Murano's transmission it's their tried and failed CVT transmission that's always been in every Murano that everyone hates these do tend to have a higher failure rate. Regardless the first thing you might notice is actually this thing right here which looks like a dipstick however when you pull it out there is no dipstick it's actually sold separately so if you want to check your transmission fluid you'd have to go to the dealer and buy a dipstick. I guess they just put this here as bragging rights so owners can say that yes there is a way to check CVT transmission fluid and it's not sealed. Now the top of the transmission there's a manual gear selector to select your park reverse and neutral drive there's no electric motor there. Now looking on top of the transmission way down inside of here is where the starter motor is buried. Now in order to access that starter motor way down there which is against this bell housing you do have to remove this ECU and the battery tray and perhaps even this coolant line so it's quite a mess to get down in there and access it. At least this Murano doesn't have start-stop technology to take its toll on that starter motor. Now looking from underneath the CVT we have a drain plug although it's not located at the lowest part of the transmission which is counterintuitive so you could drain the fluid out easily. Now in order to fill fluid you do have to remove this bolt here which is a check and fill bolt and plug in a special adapter which will allow you to pump transmission fluid into this transmission then you tighten it back up warm up the vehicle and remove it to remove any excess fluid. Now just in front of the transmission is the transmission warmer and that's just to help warm up the fluid when it's too cold. Now if you think accessing the starter from the top is difficult this is what it looks like from the bottom so you definitely can't access it from here. Now once the CVT is done changing its gear ratio it's then going to send it out to the differential located in this housing over here. Now that differential is then going to send power over to this transfer case for the all-wheel drive system. Now the transfer case has a drain plug located on the bottom here but the fill plug is located up on the side of it over here and it's pretty tight to access things especially with this hot exhaust in the way. Now the transfer case doesn't have any electronics on it it's simply just going to translate some power to this differential leading out to the rear. Now that drive shaft is going to bring all that power over to this rear differential assembly here. Now this differential assembly is a bit long because the front half here is responsible for activating the all-wheel drive system you can see it's got its electronics here and the rear half is the differential part. Now this is going to be electronically actuated where we have a set of clutches here which is going to vary the torque that's transmitted from the drive shaft over to this rear differential and thus the rear wheel. Check out how tiny these CV axles are for the rear it's probably the same diameter as my finger it's probably not going to be any good other than for a little trip to the dollar store on a foggy morning. Now the Murano's got an interesting engine mount setup there's actually no transmission mount that mounts it to the frame on this side at the back of the transmission you have a mount over here then at the front of the transmission down underneath here you have an active engine mount then if we go over to the passenger side you'll see there's another engine mount over here and then we have a dog bone mount that's for the engine rocking back and forth over here on the top. Now here's what the front engine mount looks like underneath mounted to the subframe we've got this vacuum line here because it is an active engine mount and here's what the rear transmission mount looks like mounted to the subframe from underneath. Finally underneath the engine we've got yet another engine mount this one's just like a dog bone style where you got a bushing on the subframe there and it joins to the upper oil pan over here and here's another look at that engine torque mount on the passenger side. Now one thing that I do appreciate about the Murano though it does show its age is the fact that it still uses a fully boxed in subframe which means that you have a subframe that goes from the back all the way around this way and even continues out to the front over here across this way which means that you do have a strong point at the front of the vehicle here where of course you have the engine mounted to but you can also jack up the vehicle when servicing it so although this radiator support is made of plastic and you can jack up on it you have this nice structural support just behind it so things are pretty rigid. Now taking a look at the front suspension from underneath we can see this lower control arm here it's actually made of aluminum and it's got an integrated ball joint so if you do have to change that ball joint you actually have to change the whole entire arm itself luckily changing this arm is pretty easy you just got a bolt over here and a bolt out of the back here now the knuckle itself is also made of aluminum and it's got these bolts here that bolt on the front bearing which means that you don't need a press to change it out. Now taking a look at the front suspension setup on the Murano we do have a McPherson strut style suspension which means that the strut itself connects to the knuckle and the knuckle here is made of aluminum now connected to the strut is the sway bar link which is also made of aluminum and that's going to connect to the sway bar that goes over to the other side here you can see that lower control arm and it's got these holes in there for weight savings and also to help with drainage then we've also got the inner and outer tire rod overall though having a McPherson strut suspension on the Murano should be pretty good because it's easy to maintain there's not many parts that'll wear out and they won't wear out nearly as fast now I'm equally impressed with the use of aluminum throughout this suspension especially for a vehicle in this class although if Nissan does want to take this another step up to the luxury level they should definitely swap this out for a double wishbone design. So here I am jacking up the back of the vehicle wondering why the trunk keeps opening and closing now I didn't realize was actually triggering this sensor over here which is what you wave your foot underneath in order to open that hatch taking a look at the rear suspension on the Murano we do have a multi-link setup where we have a upper control arm here we've got a rear lower control arm which carries the weight through the spring here then at the front here we have the shock absorber now that shock absorber attaches to a lower control arm on the front here and then we have this rear trailing arm here now the rear stabilizer link actually attaches to the underside of this upper control arm and then on this side here to the sway bar that goes around to the other side now we definitely have a mix of materials here with the subframe being stamped steel this rear control arm here is also stamped steel we've got an aluminum upper control arm an aluminum knuckle and then some steel arms on the front over here overall though a multi-link suspension in the back here is pretty typical for this class it's going to aid definitely with handling however if you do have to replace some components like this ball joint for example it's actually integrated into this control arm so it's cost you a little bit now looking at the rear suspension from underneath we've got the aluminum knuckle over here and you can see it's got these four bolts for the rear hub so when you got to replace bearings you don't need a press to change it out now one thing i do like what Nissan's included is cam bolts for the lower control arms on the front and the rear here and it's going to make it easy for you to give your Murano that stenced out camber look next we'll take a look at the cooling system on the Murano now we start here at the radiator cap which is on top of the radiator holds the pressure for the system then off to the back here we have the coolant jug and here's where things start to get interesting because this engine bay is so compact there's absolutely no room between the engine and the back of the radiator you can barely see down inside of there where the hoses are going to lead to you'll have to trust me but the lower radiator hose does run down here and where it attaches to the engine is actually where the thermostat housing is located so in order to change out that thermostat you got to completely remove this whole power steering motor setup in order to get some access down there now what's worse than the thermostat is actually the placement of the water pump which is timing chain driven that's right it's actually driven off of the same chains that drive the camshaft way down just underneath the intakes over here now accessing that water pump is pretty difficult it's kind of tight to work inside of here but there is an access port that you can open up on the timing cover so you don't actually have to remove the whole cover you do have to remove the tensioner on that side though and then you can pull out that water pump can you imagine if your water pump starts leaking what's going to happen when it mixes with the oil inside of the timing chain definitely bad things could happen now if we follow the upper radiator hose across here you can see that it goes to the side of the engine here where we've got this coolant pipe now from this coolant pipe it actually is going to split off to the heater core and then go into the individual heads at the back here now here's a look at the radiator fans from behind there's actually two of them and you can see again how compact it is in this engine bay to work here if you got to do any work on the engine you do have to remove those fans and even the radiator as if the cooling system couldn't get any more complicated if you ever have to change out the radiator you have to remove the fans you have to remove this radiator core support and the front bumper fascia in order to put this radiator out it's actually really complicated to work on any transverse v6 engine so it's not just a nissan thing now the miranda also have active grille shutters in its lower grille which is going to close up at higher speeds for better aerodynamics and open up at lower speeds for better airflow and here's a look at the active grille shutters on the lower grille from underneath and you get the actuator motor over here now taking a look at the cooling fan setup from underneath you can see there really isn't much room to work on anything from underneath here because there's not much room between the subframe and the radiator support now taking a look at the merano's exhaust setup because this has two banks there's going to be an exhaust manifold on this side and one on the front side over here it's just a stainless steel manifold it's not integrated into the head everything else happens down below now looking at the exhaust from underneath things are kind of weird where we've got the rear bank that comes around over here and joins at this y-pipe to the front bank now this looks like it's been shaped by a hammer or something the way this thing is shaped here it's actually meant for a tool to go in here to access this fastener now once the exhaust passes these flex pipes on the y-pipe it's going to head over to this really flat section here that's because it's got to go underneath this hump here for the subframe and then go out to the next catalytic converter and the mid muffler now that exhaust is then going to travel from the mid muffler through this tailpipe around this rear differential out to the rear muffler over here now that single inlet muffler is then going to translate out to the dual exhaust tips on the outside there the good thing is you can replace this in one piece if it does fall off or wear out now luckily you don't have fake exhaust tips on the merano you have real beautifully finished exhaust tips that stick out the back of the bumper and now we'll have a listen to the exhaust now the power steering setup on the merano is pretty interesting it actually uses an electro-hydraulic setup where we have a motor here that's your power steering pump that's going to pressurize power steering fluid from this tank and send it down to the hydraulic steering rack i guess nissan should have just gone with an electric power steering setup like most other manufacturers today and mounted to the subframe is the steering rack you can see we've got the power steering lines here that go into the rotary valve instead of the hydraulic rack now next up we'll take a look at the braking system on the merano and things are pretty traditional here we have a vacuum booster here mounted to the firewall and it draws its vacuum directly from the intake manifold there's no vacuum pumps you have your master cylinder located here with a small little reservoir here and the larger reservoir over here and the hose connecting the two now that master cylinders lines are going to then lead over to this abs module located underneath the firewall here now this is responsible for the safety features of the vehicle including abs traction stability control and any autonomous braking features on this vehicle speaking of autonomous braking we have the radar sensor located on the bottom of the bumper here where it's pretty close to the ground subjected to any impacts from the curb or any chickens crossing the street now most other automakers choose to put the radar sensor in the emblem itself but nissan's chosen to put their 360 camera there of course the only downside to the 360 cameras if you whack your mirror really hard it's going to be pretty expensive to replace that mirror because it's got a camera inside now looking at the brake setup on the merano we have a dual piston floating caliper design on the front here with this disc rotor now the rotor is a decent size and having dual pistons is definitely going to help to stop this heavy vehicle it's good to see a dual piston setup on a non-luxury vehicle in this class now the merano's rear brakes leave a lot to be desired it's just a single piston floating caliper on a disc rotor now inside of this drum here we do have a mechanical parking brake that's actuated with your foot there's no electronic clampers here now the fuel tank on the merano is made of plastic now there is a part of it on the passenger side here and there's a big hump in the middle and then another part here on the driver's side now following the lines from the fuel tank the evap canister is located behind the rear differential now unlike many other body-on-frame suvs once you remove the lower seat you can get easy access to the fuel pump and its filter now in conclusion the merano does make a good attempt at being a semi-premium vehicle in this segment at least in the interior however under the hood you can definitely tell where nissan's had to cram a lot of stuff inside of here in order to make this vehicle competitive for its segment i mean even if you look around the engine bay you can see that there's really not much room around the engine itself to work so if you're going to be owning or working on one of these you should definitely take that into account however i'm pretty impressed that nissan's still offering a two-row suv with this vq engine a lot of its competitors have moved over to a four-cylinder turbocharged variant now mechanically speaking i think the vq engine will hold up pretty well however i think nissan still needs to make another offering other than that cvt transmission i could definitely see nissan rebadging the merano for the next generation as a nissan plus or an infinity product however i'm pretty sure that they're going to get rid of this vq engine because it's been sitting around so long and it's not really up to date there's no port injection there's no turbos there's no hybrid systems and it's not going to really get you the best fuel economy now you tell me in the comment section down below what do you think of the nissan merano do you think it's getting a little long in its tooth with its aged engine and still having a cvt transmission or would you recommend this to your in-laws make sure you follow me on instagram for more behind the scenes footage and subscribe for more videos just like this one