WASHINGTON :A U.S. auto safety agency on Wednesday closed a seven-year-old investigation into 2.03 million Nissan Motor vehicles over issues related to rear suspension control arm failure without seeking a recall.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration investigation, which covered 2013-2018 Nissan Altima and 2016-2018 Nissan Maxima vehicles, was opened in 2018 and upgraded to an engineering analysis in 2019.
The probe reviewed whether the lower control arm of the rear suspension system could separate from the chassis due to corrosion posing safety risks.
Nissan implemented a design change in January 2018 to improve the durability of the lower control arm. Nissan did not immediately comment on Wednesday.
NHTSA said it reviewed about 1,300 reports of the issue and a small number of complaints suggested they had been in near crashes. Just one complaint said a vehicle made physical contact with another object, bumping into the trailer hitch of a truck.
“Nissan acknowledges that a crack can develop in affected control arms due to stress loading from normal use and that salts commonly used for roadway snow and ice treatment may result in corrosion that exacerbates the progression of the crack,” the agency said.
Most reports occurred in salt-belt U.S. states prone to corrosion issues with vehicles averaging over 113,000 miles (181,856 km) at the time of failure. No injuries have been reported.
More than 47,000 vehicles were repaired with a new part under a Nissan customer satisfaction campaign announced in 2019 and some vehicles received a warranty extension to 10 years.
“With a declining trend of reports and Nissan’s actions to implement a countermeasure and extended warranty coverage, further investigation of the issue does not appear to be warranted at this time,” NHTSA said.
