2023 Nissan Ariya Powertrain & Transmission Problems

Recently I been hearing a clicking noise every time I come to a complete stop and when I take off again. It started happening recently. After I hear the click noise coming from the middle of the front of my car, the wheel feels like it’s spinning just a little bit before coming to a stop.

The contact owns a 2023 Nissan Ariya. The contact stated that while driving at an undisclosed speed, there was a loud thud coming from the vehicle. There was no warning light illuminated. The contact stated that while attempting to inspect the vehicle, the vehicle restarted while in park, and unexpectedly rolled away. The contact was able to quickly re-enter the vehicle and stop the vehicle. The vehicle was towed to the dealer, where it was diagnosed with transmission failure. The contact was informed that the transmission needed to be replaced. The vehicle was not repaired. The manufacturer was made aware of the failure, and a case was opened. The approximate failure mileage was 77,000.

I had just left the [XXX] on the [XXX] when our Ariya suddenly lost power at highway speeds. It felt like a very dangerous situation, because there are very long distances between exits in this area, and the shoulder is somewhat narrow in spots. The high voltage battery had been DC fast charged to 95% at said service area minutes earlier. But the display suddenly went to 0%, turtle mode appeared, and the message “Warning Service EV System” showed on the display. For some reason, the windshield wipers also activated momentarily, despite it being a clear summer day. It was not possible to maintain speed, as the car had a power limit of about 10%. I was fortunate that we were able to limp the ~10 miles to the next exit behind a very slow RV. However, the car slowed down dramatically when going uphill. It was a very white knuckle experience. Once we made it off [XXX], I was able to slowly coast into a gas station parking lot and collect myself. I tried turning off the car and turning it back on, but the message did not go away. Since I also carry tools when traveling, I then tried disconnecting the 12 volt battery for a minute and reconnecting it. Fortunately, that made the error go away. Having a suspicion that the 12 volt battery could be at fault, I replaced the OEM flooded lead acid battery with an AGM battery at my own expensive. The next day, I took the vehicle to Poughkeepsie Nissan in Wappingers Falls, NY to be looked at. The write up is included with the submission. The dealer was not able to duplicate the issue, but they did see error codes stored within the car’s computers. INFORMATION REDACTED PURSUANT TO THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT (FOIA), 5 U.S.C. 552(B)(6)

The contact owned a 2023 Nissan Ariya. The contact stated that, while pulling out of an end parking space, the driver made a third-point turn. While reversing, the vehicle suddenly stopped. The corner of the vehicle hit a pillar. The driver looked into the camera. There were no objects in the camera view. There was no alert activated. The contact pulled back into the parking spot with her foot on the accelerator pedal. The vehicle suddenly accelerated to 40 MPH, jumped the curb, hit a young tree, a dumpster, and an electrical box. There were no warning lights illuminated. While exiting the vehicle, there was an abnormally loud revving sound. Prior to the failure, the vehicle failed to shift into reverse. There was a symbol of two vehicles. The vehicle restarted and worked as designed. There were no reported injuries, airbags did not deploy, fire or police report was filed. The vehicle was towed to a tow lot. The vehicle was deemed a total loss. The local dealer was not contacted. The vehicle was not diagnosed or repaired. The manufacturer was contacted, but assistance was provided. The failure mileage was 59,000.

This is the fourth time this has happened to us during normal driving. I pulled out onto a highway and suddenly with no prior warning, the car lost all power and went into what I can only describe as a "limp mode" and wouldn't go above 5 mph. I had to quickly pull off the road as traffic was catching up at highway speed. The dashboard flashed "Malfunction, see owners manual" and we had an orange triangle with an exclamation point as well as a circle with exclamation point with a wrench next to it. The traction control light and car with exclamation point were also lit up. After limping to a cross road we turned the car completely off for 5 min and when we restarted it, it worked normally. The same thing happened July 25, 2024 and I had the car in the dealership. They said they could not recreate the issue even though I showed them video of the dashboard acting strangely. The service manager said he believed something had blocked the front bumper sensor and that it should be fine now. We have already performed both software updated recalls and since then, it has happened to us twice more. The battery was at around 80%, had just been driven by my wife for around 30 min with no issues, was turned off in the driveway for about 15 min and then we left again. It was extremely cold during this issue (temps around 10 degrees F), but this has also happened during normal temps in the summer and fall.

Car losing power while driving, and powering down to zero. Also slowly goin backwards while in standard drive mode. Dealership has been troubleshooting for 3 weeks and not fix has been found.

Driving on the freeway this morning at 72% charge, approximately 5 miles into my 41 mile commute, message appeared on dash that battery charge was critically low, charge immediately. When this appeared the car was no longer showing the 72% charge, but 0% instead. The initial error was then replaced with "Warning Service EV System Power Reduced" and still showing 0% charge. Under reduced power I made it to a charging station 3 miles away and after a large number of attempts, finally got it to start charging. Immediately, the charge % returned to 70% and successfully charged to over 80%. To be safe I returned home instead of trying to finish my commute, as it was just past 3:00 AM and I didn't feel safe trying to complete the drive. I've also noticed since this has occurred the Nissan Connect app is no longer updating from the vehicle. If this is the same problem that others seem to have had, this becomes a highly dangerous situation both in the safety of the driver/passengers, but also everyone else on the road as the car goes to a reduced power mode!

Happened to me and my wife few times to try to put the vehicle in reverse gear and the car starts warning us to put the shifter in P and no matter what it does not go into gear. After ignition cycle it will operate properly, but that could be a safety issue at certain scenarios. The car doors are fully closed when this happens.

The car spontaneously shut down. "EV OFF" displayed on the screen. I was in the middle of the road and unable to turn on the car or shift into neutral to push it off the road. I had to wait over an hour for a tow while in the road. This appears to be an increasing problem as many owners are reporting the same issue on the Nissan Ariya electric SUV Discussion Group page on Facebook.