Steering column or shaft failure on the 1999 Nissan Pathfinder
1 crash 1 of the 13 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 steering column or shaft failure gets reported
Owners of the 1999 Nissan Pathfinder report steering column or shaft failure at a median of 135,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 120,000 miles and a quarter after 155,000 miles, from 11 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 85,000 miles. It is the 2nd most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 115,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 170,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 51,676 miles across the middle 80% of reports.
A window that narrow is the signature of a part that fails on its own schedule rather than on how the car is driven — which is usually a design or supplier problem rather than wear and tear.
0% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 116,324 miles | 118,662 miles | 135,000 miles | 154,000 miles | 168,000 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, 1 a crash 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 $600–$2,500 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.
This mode is classified as critical, which means a failure can leave the car unable to stop, steer, or stay out of the way of traffic. It is weighted accordingly in the risk score.
The same failure on other years
The same failure is reported on 6 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2002, at a median of 50,000 miles, and latest on the 2000 at 150,000 miles.
By volume the 2006 carries the most reports, with 22; the 1999 has 13. A mode that appears across most years of a model is usually a design choice rather than a bad batch.
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 was driving my car into my neighborhood. I turned a corner heard a "clunk" my steering was tight. I then turned into my driveway and lost my steering. Fortunately I was moving slow and did not hit anything. I got out of my vehicle looked under the hood and discovered that my left front wheel well had rusted through and had rotated up and into my steering column breaking the spring in the column and knocking out my steering. So far nissan and my dealer have done nothing. They have rejected my claim that this is a safety problem and they have not given me a formal estimate of the cost to repair. They did offer me $500 of trade in value towards a new vehicle purchase. On november 13, 2009 I requested that the vehicle be repaired at my cost. I visited the dealer on december 1, 2009 to check on progress, and as of this afternoon december 4, 2009 they have not prepared an estimate. I feel this is a safety issue an additional bracket would prevent the wheel well from hitting the steering column. I am lucky that it happened in my driveway later that day was going to drive that vehicle to new york state where if this happened at high…
I was driving my car into my neighborhood. I turned a corner heard a "clunk" my steering was tight. I then turned into my driveway and lost my steering. Fortunately I was moving slow and did not hit anything. I got out of my vehicle looked under the hood and discovered that my left front wheel well had rusted through and had rotated up and into my steering column breaking the spring in the column and knocking out my steering. So far nissan and my dealer have done nothing. They have rejected my claim that this is a safety problem and they have not given me a formal estimate of the cost to repair. They did offer me $500 of trade in value towards a new vehicle purchase. On november 13, 2009 I requested that the vehicle be repaired at my cost. I visited the dealer on december 1, 2009 to check on progress, and as of this afternoon december 4, 2009 they have not prepared an estimate. I feel this is a safety issue an additional bracket would prevent the wheel well from hitting the steering column. I am lucky that it happened in my driveway later that day was going to drive that vehicle to new york state where if this happened at high…
I was driving my car into my neighborhood. I turned a corner heard a "clunk" my steering was tight. I then turned into my driveway and lost my steering. Fortunately I was moving slow and did not hit anything. I got out of my vehicle looked under the hood and discovered that my left front wheel well had rusted through and had rotated up and into my steering column breaking the spring in the column and knocking out my steering. So far nissan and my dealer have done nothing. They have rejected my claim that this is a safety problem and they have not given me a formal estimate of the cost to repair. They did offer me $500 of trade in value towards a new vehicle purchase. On november 13, 2009 I requested that the vehicle be repaired at my cost. I visited the dealer on december 1, 2009 to check on progress, and as of this afternoon december 4, 2009 they have not prepared an estimate. I feel this is a safety issue an additional bracket would prevent the wheel well from hitting the steering column. I am lucky that it happened in my driveway later that day was going to drive that vehicle to new york state where if this happened at high…
Also reported on the 1999 Nissan Pathfinder
Strut, shock or spring failure
Other steering problem
Other suspension problem
Complete transmission failure
Other wheel or tire problem
Engine sensor failure
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 13 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 steering column or shaft failure happen on the 1999 Nissan Pathfinder?
Across 11 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 135,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 120,000 miles and a quarter after 155,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is steering column or shaft failure on the 1999 Nissan Pathfinder?
13 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.3 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