Calling Patrol Experts

to follow up with a second question... is it an easy task to adjust the handbrake on these patrols? if so, does anyone have any brief directions?

Cheers
Tom

Hi Tom

They do go up and down a bit, but I guess its trying to guage if yours is excessive or not.
Should hardly notice it on a flat road.
If excessive then its possible its a vaccum leak, but first I'd check the cable tension at the throttle body, couple of adjustemnt nuts there and overtime they get slack.

On the handbrake , it comes into two areas - theres possible free play in the cable
which is adjusted at the handbrake and 2nd the little brake shoes may need to be adjusted up for which there is grommet at base of each back wheel and you use a flat blade screwdriver to rotate a little wheel inside the brake housing.

You adjust till brake comes on and back off 1/2 a turn.

Robin Miller

I had one, A Command, in my patrol and it was actuated by a pull cable on the accelerator pedal. Autron do make one that interfaces with the electronics so it could be either one.

You may find that the system is set to maintain a speed in too narrow a band and mine was adjustable. Each activation of the vacuum motor was too much so it then slowed down till it pulled on the pedal again to maintain speed. If you set the speed band wider then it allows the vehicle to stabilise the speed within the band.

Tom, I had 2002 Patrol which was the first of the 4.8's. This was a common problem with them. Mine surged only a tiny bit and it took me a while to figure out it was happening. If you take to a Nissan Dealer they can reprogram the cruise. It needs to be in for a day.

Cheers

I had the same problem on a Cruise Control fitted to a Commorore I once had,,
Brand name was " Command "..
They are gr8,

What I found that on the back of the controller it had 3 settings ,,Low,,Medium ,, and Hi ,, ...
They were actually sensitivity settings,,
Once I had set the switch to " low " , the cruise control became my best friend.

Now I got a Navara, from new, and had one put on it ,( so called " factory fitted ")
Guess what ???,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, another Command Cruise Control
Never an issue about surging with this one

I suggest you start looking around for the controller init,, chances are that you just might have one with the sensitivity setttings,,

If not try to find out just what brand it is, and go looking on the net , to try and get a " Users Manual ". There are a few things that you can do to set them up which may change it. ( on the Command one you can )
I think I have kept the instructions ( my copy of them ) as if I ever disconnect the main battery ,, I have to re-set the controller

Cheers mate ,, and good luck

Bucky

i have the same problem with my 4.2 iTD. BUT only if you set the cruiise spot on 110kmph If i set 108 or 112 fro example it is ok. I too can feel it jabbing at the accelerator pedal, but only when set at exactly 110kmph. Try to set it at different speeds, because i think it has something to do with rpm. Just have the feeling that at this particular speed, rpm is not sitting in a comfortable position in the torque band....i might be totally wrong but to me thats what it feels like. let me know how it go's at other speeds mate.
cheers
wayne-o

Hi Tom

My 4.8 auto Patrol is the same age as yours.
I had serious problems with the cruise control as it would surge, slamming down to 3rd gear, on slight hills or in sweeping corners. Imagine that you are doing 100k on the highway and go into a corner and the transmission slams down to 3rd gear. Frightening!

Had it looked at by Kittles in Alice Springs and they advised that there was a recognised problem and Nissan were changeing cruise control chips.

Took it to my dealer, FTG Nissan in Vic, and they claimed no knowledge of the problem until I advised them of what Kittles had told me. All of a sudden they remembered that there was a fix.
After replacing the chip, or whatever they did, the cruise control is heaps better but I would not class it as a good cruise control. In fact I still think it is crxp.

Possibly too late for you to ask for a warranty fix but I hope this bit of info helps.

BTW. Nissan and FTG Nissan's attitude to warranty problems is terrible. FTG Nissan claim numerous "Best Nissan Dealer" awards but I don't know how. Maybe it is because they are the best at following Nissan's "We do not recognise warranty sp pxss off" attitude.