New Truck, Short Trips, GDI, Need Advice

[Nesterenko]

As far as using the wrong grade of oil. The dealer would be hard pressed to distinguish a 20 from a 30.

 

[Nesterenko]

I saw so many 2017+ Pathfinder owners get engine coverage denied from Nissan or extended warranty companies simply from missing some oil change receipts.

I would think that with so many claims on a known bad engine series that it would be the opposite. In other words Nissan would have trouble denying customers coming in left and right with bad engines.

 

[JTK]

If the engine is clean - the oil changes done on time - the correct viscosity range was used and there's no accusations by the dealership that the oil volume level on the dipstick was run too low, they cannot deny you a warranty engine fix - if you haven't oil change receipts.

I hear you. Most of the owners who had problems, were following Nissan's 7500 mile OCI recommendation that was acceptable for the 0w20 oil in the owner's manual at the time. These engines were building up sludge heavily at that OCI. When catastrophic engine problems happened and Nissan service saw visible sludge, their next step was looking for proof of oil changes. Most owners had a paper trail, but not a complete paper trail. They were a second owner or were missing receipts. Easy out for Nissan. Good used 35DDs are hard to find and expensive due to demand. If you can find a new one, they are $12-14K.

The OCI was lowered to 5000 miles max around 2019. Owners were still reporting sludge with that.

What it boils down to is people were accustomed to the port injected VQ35DE that was an excellent engine and could easily go 7500mi between OCIs. IMO, GDI did a number on the VQ35.

I would think that with so many claims on a known bad engine series that it would be the opposite. In other words Nissan would have trouble denying customers coming in left and right with bad engines.

I could link you to 100+ threads on sludged/failed VQ35DD's, but this is already far out in the weeds from to the OP's Titan in question. I only brought it up because I believe it's relevant to the GDI 5.6L engine.

 

[RAVL]

In what alternate universe do dealers ask what oil viscosity is used when performing warranty work? I worked 21 years for a major Japanese auto OEM, and I've never even heard of the question before signing up here.

I'd run 5W-30, change it at 5k, and use whatever cheap synthetic oil struck my fancy. Do this, and the engine will outlive the rest of the truck.

They don’t ask about viscosity, this is true. If the vehicle is not dealer serviced they will ask for receipts.

Have a happy 4th.