ABS module or sensor failure on the 2004 Nissan Maxima
3 fires 3 of the 35 reports for this failure mention a crash, a fire, an injury or a death. Those are the owner's words on the complaint form, not a verified finding, and one report can mention more than one.
When abs module or sensor failure gets reported
Owners of the 2004 Nissan Maxima report ABS module or sensor failure at a median of 70,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 57,500 miles and a quarter after 95,000 miles, from 26 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 95,000 miles. It is the 8th most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 50,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 147,500 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 98,450 miles across the middle 80% of reports.
When the reports scatter this far, the mileage is telling you about how these cars were driven more than about the part itself.
0% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 50,200 miles | 58,388 miles | 69,000 miles | 95,862 miles | 148,650 miles |
Read the 10th percentile as “one report in ten arrived this early”. Exact figures are shown in this table because it is the table of record; everywhere else on the site they are rounded to the precision the sample can carry.
What a percentile can and cannot tell you here
These five numbers describe the readings owners gave, in order. The median is the middle one: half the reports arrived below it. The 10th and 90th are the edges of the bulk of the distribution, and the distance between them is the part worth reading. A tight spread — say 70,000 to 95,000 miles — points at something that wears out on a schedule, and the schedule is knowable. A wide one, 20,000 to 190,000, points at a fault that hits some cars and never troubles others, which means the mileage on the listing in front of you tells you very little about your odds.
What these figures are not is a survival curve. Every reading here comes from a car whose owner filed a complaint, so the sample contains only failures: it cannot say what share of the fleet made it past 150,000 miles untouched, because those owners had nothing to report. Nor is the mileage the moment of failure — it is the odometer reading as recalled at the time of filing, which may be weeks later and is sometimes rounded to the nearest ten thousand by the person typing it.
Percentiles are shown at all only once 8 readings exist for the vehicle and mode. Below that the middle of a handful of numbers is noise wearing a decimal point, so the figures are withheld rather than dressed up.
What happens, and what it costs
Of these reports, 3 a fire is mentioned. Owners write their own complaints and the agency does not verify them, so read this as what the reports say happened rather than as a confirmed count.
Putting it right typically runs $500–$2,400 at an independent US shop. That range is an editorial estimate held in this site's failure-mode catalogue, not a figure from NHTSA, and it is a repair cost rather than a diagnosis cost.
The same failure on other years
The same failure is reported on 8 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2002, at a median of 25,000 miles, and latest on the 2005 at 85,000 miles.
By volume the 2004 is the worst of them, which makes this a problem of this specific year rather than of the model as a whole.
If one year stands out to the left, that is the year to avoid; if the whole line sits at a similar mileage, this is wear rather than a defect in one production run.
Tick median reported mileage Solid middle half of reports Faint 10th to 90th percentile Colour how bad the failure is when it happens
What owners wrote
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint narratives, trimmed for length. The mileage is the one the owner gave.
I have had numerous problems with my 2004 nissan maxima. I have had to replace tires, have had the vehicle in the shop for the check engine light coming numerous times; have paid to have the battery replaced because the car suddenly stalled; have had the catalytic converter replaced because of one of the check engine light trips to the dealer. Most recently, I replaced the front and back brakes due to what I thought was normal wear and tear. A month later, the ABS brake system fails, and I am told that is not under warranty, and the charge will be $1,645. The car is only two years old. I am at the dealer at least once, sometimes twice a month. I used to be the biggest cheerleader for nissan. I had a 1991 nissan maxima that I bought used with 173,000 miles on it. That car was on the road until it had more than 300,000. Now I feel like I purchased a lemon. I bought a new car because I didn't want the headaches that come along with a used car. I took my car to the dealer on september 18th because something weird going on with the brakes. I had had the brakes changed about a month before that, I knew that they were in good condition…
Dt*: the contact stated the ABS light remained illuminated after the car was turned on or off. The light illuminated on and off by itself. The battery needed to be disconnected to shut the light off. Most of the times, the ABS had to be completely disconnected, and the vehicle was operating without this safety feature. There were no warning signals prior to the incident. The vehicle was taken to the dealership, who determined that the entire ABS system and the sensors needed to be replaced.
2004 nissan maxima se. Anti-lock brake (ABS) components failing, there is also a service bulletin on the nissan website describing ways to fix or replace parts, but very expensive. This is absolutely a public safety issue. The ABS did kick on under normal braking and now the ABS motor is stuck running, the brake and ABS lights are on and the ABS system will no longer activate in a dynamic sliding condition. The ABS motor continues running even when the vehicle is turned off and the key is removed. The fuse and motor get extremely hot and may potentially cause a fire in the vehicle if the battery is not disconnected overnight. There are a number of different posting on the web about this problem and at least 3 different nissan dealerships that I have called are aware of this being a problem with this model. *tr
Also reported on the 2004 Nissan Maxima
Other powertrain problem
Complete transmission failure
Other wheel or tire problem
Other body or interior problem
Other engine problem
Timing chain, belt or tensioner failure
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 35 is a floor and not a count of affected cars. Mileages are typed in by owners and cluster on round numbers. And the mode itself is assigned by software reading the complaint text, which is reliable in bulk and fallible one report at a time.
Questions this page answers
At what mileage does abs module or sensor failure happen on the 2004 Nissan Maxima?
Across 26 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 70,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 57,500 miles and a quarter after 95,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is abs module or sensor failure on the 2004 Nissan Maxima?
35 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 1.0 per 1,000 vehicles. Complaints are voluntary, so this is a floor rather than a count of affected cars.
What this is and is not. These are the mileages at which owners chose to complain to a federal agency, which is not the same as the mileage at which the part fails on every car. It skews toward failures that happened outside warranty, cost real money, or frightened someone. It is still the only public dataset that carries failure mileage at all, and the shape of a few hundred readings is informative even when a single one is not. Methodology · JSON · this failure on other cars
Source Owner complaints and recall records published by the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, model years 1996–2027 Figures rebuilt Published by AtWhatMileage How every figure is computed