I cannot find much about the process on the net, but it does not look too hard, just a pain to remove the wheel well to get to the belts. Any resources that may help? Would a Maxima manual help?

The rest is a vent, so ignore as you see fit

Here is a perfect example of a shop trying to take advantage of a woman (foriegn student to boot). She brings it to a mechanic for the state inspection, she fails for brakes and tries to tell her an all wheel brake job will cost at least $400, probably more. He also tells her the serpentine belt is bad, that will cost over $800 (which would figure about 10 or so hours labor if I calculate correctly), and a CV joint is going bad, another 2K. When I called, he refused to give me his estimates and would not put it in writing for her.

I did check and replace the brakes (including a lug stud he cross threaded during the inspection). I would like to tackle the belts, but do not want to bite off more than I can chew.

Have a great day!

 

Yes, the Maxima and Inifiniti's are the same vehicle, except for some body differences.

Here's the snapshot from the Maxima shop manual.


http://www.greghome.com/images/Maxim...DriveBelts.jpg

 

i keep saying: go to a local libray and find chilton manual for your car. will cost you maybe 50 cents in copies, or less, to have copies on hand. thanks to okc, you have general idea of belt routing, but you need the removal protocol.
i have not done it myself on nissans, but when you mention tire well removal, it plain sounds like our eclipse/CR-V.
just eyeballing the job, you'll have to remove plastic tirewell cover, which is usually: jackstand the car securily, remove the wheel, slide it underneath the control arm in case life happens and jack failes, locate clips and bolts that hold the cover, and remove them. knowing japanese, you'll probably have 10mm bolts and some clips that look like phillips head screws. remove bolts and pry plastic slips out with flat head screwdriver. you should have full access to all the pullies in 10 min rookie job.
after that, just follow the protocol. i am yet to come across a car where belt removals warrant $800 charge. which i know there are some out there that require engine to be pulled out to replace spark plugs and you MUST do it. so maybe they put engine mount so that it blocks the belt, or something, designers appear to never work on the cars themselves, thus you can come across some real dumb stuff designed.
but gut tells me that you'll be fine DIYing it. bruised knuckles maybe, but hey - that's the fun side of it.
oh, and have belt removed 1st, then take it with you to parts store to compare. selling wrong belts is a routine problem. unless you buying from nissan.
i replaced multiple halfshafts myself (cv joints) refurbished halfshaft is anywhere between 60 to 200 bucks in a parts store. takes about an hr to replace. if the shaft nut is removable, of course. but $2000 for it? owner must have expensive mistress..

 

Thanks for the input, sad thing is, there is no I30 manual by Haynes or Chiltons, but if the Maxima is the same (which it seemed like it was, engine and brake wise anyhow), I will probably invest in that for her.

That is what I thought about the belt (I would do both belts as long as I had it apart, and perhaps all the hoses as well).

I could probably do the half axle myself as well, I would have to really scope out that job to feel comfortable doing it... other than the steering and front end related stuff, it can't be too much different than the rear half axle on my toy.

Thanks,

Dave

DIY is an excuse to buy more tools!

 

Here's the factory service manual for your vehicle. You might need 7-Zip or WinRAR program to decompress it.

http://www.vq35de.com/ESM/Infiniti/I30-I35/1997_I30.7z