Nissan has announced a recall of nearly 700,000 Rogue SUVs from 2014 to 2016 to address a problem with the dashboard harness connector. Salt and water entering the driver's side footwell could "wick up the dash-side harness tape and enter the connector" over time, according to Nissan. According to a report filed with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, this could cause a number of issues (NHTSA). Failure of the driver's-side power window or power seat controls, illumination of the all-wheel-drive system warning light, battery discharge, "a burning odor," smoke under the driver's side dash, and, potentially, fire are among them.
According to the chronology of the issue filed by Nissan with NHTSA, there have been three "unconfirmed incidents" in US vehicles with no injuries, as well as two "thermal incidents" and two "incidents with localized thermal damage" in Canadian Rogue vehicles.
According to Nissan, the issue is likely to affect only about 1% of the recalled vehicles. They include 305,220 Rogues built at the Renault Samsung Motors plant in South Korea and 383,726 Rogues built at the Smyrna, Tennessee, plant, for a total of 688,946 models from 2014 to 2016. Nissan stated that the manufacturing process was changed at the end of the 2016 model year, so newer Rogues will not be affected, and the NHTSA report stated that no other Nissan or Infiniti vehicles used the same harness layout and tape as these earlier Rogues.
Beginning March 2, owners will be notified. Nissan is still working on a fix for the problem, but it expects it to be available in the spring. Because the vehicles involved in the recall are no longer covered by warranty, the automaker has stated that it will contact owners about reimbursement for repairs made prior to the recall notification.