The Nissan Motor Co. is recalling over 92,000 vehicles for faulty clutch and seat covering problems, the automaker and the Transport Ministry announced last Thursday.
The automaker will recall 76,929 cars of the Note, Tiida, Cube, Tiida Latio, March and the Wingroad models produced between May 2005 and March 2006 and sold in Japan, the transport ministry said in a statement. It added a crack may occur in some of the clutches because they are not strong enough and the car may stop in worst cases. Further, the ministry said that there have been 66 cases of reported troubles but no accidents.
Nissan also plans to recall about 420 Tiida vehicles sold in Singapore, Hong Kong, and Mauritius for the same problem, according to company spokeswoman Haruko Wada. In addition, the Japanese automaker also plans to recall 14,716 March subcompacts produced in September and December 2006 and sold in Japan. The ministry said that some of the coverings for front seats are not sturdy enough. Wada added that about 520 March subcompacts sold in other countries including Singapore, Mauritius and New Zealand are also subject to recall for the same reason.
Overall, 76,929 cars built since May 2005 until March 2006, are subject to free repairs. The Japanese automaker received 66 complaints from drivers connected with these defects. Almost 15,000 cars of the March series need the front seat support be replaced because it is not safe enough. The defect is burdened with the rupture of safety belts in the event of a traffic accident.
Defects on the , clutch, engines, radiators, filter, suspension, and other auto parts accessories are expected to decline with the opening of Nissan's new Global Production Engineering Center which will be used for testing purposes only.
The $42 million-worth facility, which opened last year, is designed to ensure quality of Nissan vehicles. "We are about to go on a major offensive," said Senior Vice President Toshiharu Sakai. With 30 models going into production worldwide in 12 months, production for three or more models needs to be tested a month quite a challenge for the center, Sakai said.
Testing production in advance on mock assembly lines may help fine-tune production and improve product quality, said Shozo Takata, a science and engineering professor at Waseda University. "It could serve the purpose of separating problems at the design stage from problems at the production stage," he added. "That tends to be meaningful."
In one demonstration, a cockpit of a car, which includes the steering wheel, glove compartment and other front interior parts, was placed into the frame of a vehicle, to make sure it fit properly.
William Schwartz, the Executive Vice President of TBM Consulting Group, which advises companies on production methods, said that other Japanese automakers, including the Toyota Motor Corp. and the Honda Motor Co., test out production methods for experimentation and changes before full-scale production. "The goal of production preparation is to create the best method with the least amount of waste. Worker productivity is improved regardless of the country or culture," he said in an e-mail.
The Nissan Executive Vice President Hidetoshi Imazu said that the center helps cut the time for development and production preparation. "It is important that Nissan maintains the high levels of quality that our customers expect," he added.
The third largest Japanese automaker has acknowledged that quality has sometimes suffered in recent years abroad. But Sakai and other Nissan officials are determined to catch potential glitches early in the game. When problems are found, they will be corrected right away.
