2017 Nissan Pathfinder
This year drew an ordinary 185 complaints for a Nissan Pathfinder — the model's median is 101. What they were about is the unusual part: 34.1% of them mention fan, against 1.3% across the other years of this generation.
Generation 2 of the Nissan Pathfinder, which began in 2013 and ran to 2020. Everything below compares this year against the others in that generation, not against a different car wearing the same name.
NHTSA opened a defect investigation into this model year.
| Complaints filed | 185 |
|---|---|
| Median for this model | 101 |
| Involving a crash | 7 |
| Involving a fire | 2 |
| Recalls | 2 |
| NHTSA crash rating | 5/5 |
| EPA combined | 22 mpg |
What the complaints were about
- fan — 34.1% of this year's complaints, against 1.3% across the other years of this generation (26.2×).
- cooling — 33% of this year's complaints, against 6.5% across the other years of this generation (5.1×). Owners wrote it as: cooling, cooling fan, fan assembly, fans.
- noise — 30.3% of this year's complaints, against 11.3% across the other years of this generation (2.7×). Owners wrote it as: noise, radiator fan, started making, loud noise.
Words owners used for the same problem are counted together, so a fault written four different ways is measured once. Grouped by which complaints they appear in, not by a list anyone wrote in advance.
What owners wrote
I GOT 2017 NISSAN PATHFINDER WITH 37,500 MILES. RADIATOR COOLING FAN STARTED MAKING A WEIRD RATTLING NOISE, RECORDED THE VIDEO AND TOOK IT TO NISSAN DEALER. TECH RIGHT AWAY SAID IT THE RADIATOR FAN SECONDARY BUSHING IS GONE BAD AND NEED TO REPLACE THE COMPLETE…
START UP MY NISSAN PATHFINDER 2017 AND START DRIVING ON THE STREET. THEN I TURN ON MY A/C AND THEN I HEARD LOUD NOISE COMING FROM MY ENGINE. IT SOUND LIKE SOMETHING WAS LOOSE AND HITTING AGAINST SOMETHING IN THE ENGINE COMPARTMENT. I PULL OVER TO SEE WHAT WAS…
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint filings, with identifying details removed.
Recalls for this year
- 18V601000 SERVICE BRAKES, HYDRAULIC Fixed free of charge.
- 19V807000 SERVICE BRAKES, HYDRAULIC Fixed free of charge.
How this was worked out
Every year of the Nissan Pathfinder was compared against its own history rather than against other cars, which removes popularity and age from the answer — a common car draws more complaints at equal reliability, and an older one has had longer to accumulate them. A year is flagged when it drew at least 2.5× this model's median and at least 50 complaints.
This is a fault record, not a review. Nobody files a federal complaint to say the car was fine, so it shows what tends to go wrong — not whether owners liked it, and not whether it is a good car.
Source: NHTSA complaints, recalls and investigations, retrieved . Look this vehicle up directly on NHTSA's site to check anything here.
Own a 2017 Nissan Pathfinder? What happened to yours?
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