[DracoZaroff]

Just got a brand new 2014 Versa Note but I'm not sure if something is up with this transmission.
At first it was jerky starting out with a second of rev followed by a sharp take off. I'm not sure if maybe I was being a little overly soft on the gas at the time. I was just going from driving a Prius at the time. In the two weeks since I bought the car this problem seems to have gone away.
Now I'm faced with something for all I know could be normal. When accelerating from a stop I hit a point just before reaching 40mph where acceleration will drop sharply accompanied by a whine like you might here from an electronic servo. At the same time the tachometer will jump then dive back down to where it was. This all lasts for no more than a second or so and we go on like nothing is wrong.
I am due to come back to the dealership Monday to make sure there's nothing wrong but I would like to be fully prepared if this is something that should not be happening.

 

[07Versa6MT]

All new trannys are adaptive... meaning they adapt to driver habits over time to offer the best driveability. Could be just learning still. Keep driving it and see if it changes.

 

[DracoZaroff]

I don't think I like the wait and see approach as I don't know if there is some sort of damage or abnormal wear taking place in the transmission.

 

[JVersa]

Just take it in, and see what they say. You should be under warranty. Just make sure they don't just put it on a lift and look at it. You're problem sounds internal. Also you have a CVT, those transmissions want to keep the car in its Peake power range. That might be you're problem as well. Going from a Prius to a sporty transmission.

 

[Note-ified]

Just got a brand new 2014 Versa Note but I'm not sure if something is up with this transmission.
At first it was jerky starting out with a second of rev followed by a sharp take off. I'm not sure if maybe I was being a little overly soft on the gas at the time. I was just going from driving a Prius at the time. In the two weeks since I bought the car this problem seems to have gone away.
Now I'm faced with something for all I know could be normal. When accelerating from a stop I hit a point just before reaching 40mph where acceleration will drop sharply accompanied by a whine like you might here from an electronic servo. At the same time the tachometer will jump then dive back down to where it was. This all lasts for no more than a second or so and we go on like nothing is wrong.
I am due to come back to the dealership Monday to make sure there's nothing wrong but I would like to be fully prepared if this is something that should not be happening.

ok now that i've seen this i know exactly what you are talking about and it is normal for the transmission in the Note as unlike the prius you drove before it has an auxillary gear set that has both a high and low gear. the low gear is used when taking off from a stop and once you get up to around 30-40mph will switch up a gear so to speak. Mine has done this from the get go, but mine also had around 70 miles on the clock when i got it as it had been the training car for the dealership to get them to know the car. mine is now rolling up on 10,000 miles with no issue what so ever so im pretty sure you should be ok. alot of people on here may not know about it as the transmission for the Note may be the same unit as other versa's but it has been reprogrammed to be a little more peppy when you lay into the gas pedal. also as was mentioned the transmission is adaptive so if you are really light on the gas for a long period of time it will adapt to that as it thinks you are going for more economy driving rather than more spirited acceleration. i notice on mine if i am heavy on the gas for a long period of time it will adapt to giving more instant acceleration from a stop. i hope that some of this may help you and if you have any other questions im sure me or someone else will be happy to answer to the best of our abilities.

 

[DracoZaroff]

ok now that i've seen this i know exactly what you are talking about and it is normal for the transmission in the Note as unlike the prius you drove before it has an auxillary gear set that has both a high and low gear. the low gear is used when taking off from a stop and once you get up to around 30-40mph will switch up a gear so to speak. Mine has done this from the get go, but mine also had around 70 miles on the clock when i got it as it had been the training car for the dealership to get them to know the car. mine is now rolling up on 10,000 miles with no issue what so ever so im pretty sure you should be ok. alot of people on here may not know about it as the transmission for the Note may be the same unit as other versa's but it has been reprogrammed to be a little more peppy when you lay into the gas pedal. also as was mentioned the transmission is adaptive so if you are really light on the gas for a long period of time it will adapt to that as it thinks you are going for more economy driving rather than more spirited acceleration. i notice on mine if i am heavy on the gas for a long period of time it will adapt to giving more instant acceleration from a stop. i hope that some of this may help you and if you have any other questions im sure me or someone else will be happy to answer to the best of our abilities.

Your insight into this is very helpful. Especially learning that there is a high and low set to the transmission. I suspected that this might be the case but wasn't sure. It does make a lot of sense when I consider that the Prius apparently didn't have this and subsequently had very poor efficiency at low speeds.
I did however stop in at the dealership. It was a bit of a mess as there was a miscommunication and my visit was not scheduled and after an hour drive to get there to find this out. I did talk to the service manager though and he assured me that it is normal, particularly for the smaller cars to have a rough adjustment period at first. He also explained that the recent extremely cold weather is likely making this worse.
I feel more comfortable about the whole thing now. This can be a lesson for all new Versa owners to expect a bit of rough driving at first.

 

[Stevinstephenson]

I guess if you might have it's warranty then probably you might get it done in warranty and free of cost. And if the warranty period has expired then in such way you might have to worry.

 

[Note-ified]

Your insight into this is very helpful. Especially learning that there is a high and low set to the transmission. I suspected that this might be the case but wasn't sure. It does make a lot of sense when I consider that the Prius apparently didn't have this and subsequently had very poor efficiency at low speeds.
I did however stop in at the dealership. It was a bit of a mess as there was a miscommunication and my visit was not scheduled and after an hour drive to get there to find this out. I did talk to the service manager though and he assured me that it is normal, particularly for the smaller cars to have a rough adjustment period at first. He also explained that the recent extremely cold weather is likely making this worse.
I feel more comfortable about the whole thing now. This can be a lesson for all new Versa owners to expect a bit of rough driving at first.

glad i could be of some help, and yes your service manager is right, the CVT on the Note can be a little harsh at first before it's broken in and if i remember right it takes a good few thousand miles before the CVT is really broken in and starts smoothing out. When it does get broken in though it is by far the best automatic transmission that i have driven, i know other people will complain about the CVT in other nissan models, but the Note and versa sedan are the only ones to use the CVT with the auxillary gear set and that is what i think will help them in the long run to last a lot longer than a normal CVT.

 

[SilverV]

Yes it's just the torque converter locking up and switching from low to high gear ratio. If you don't come to a full complete stop it stays in high gear ratio, otherwise from a full stop it starts off in low the TC locks up and switches to high.

All normal. Please see the following video:

 

[TKO]

Just got a brand new 2014 Versa Note but I'm not sure if something is up with this transmission.
At first it was jerky starting out with a second of rev followed by a sharp take off. I'm not sure if maybe I was being a little overly soft on the gas at the time. I was just going from driving a Prius at the time. In the two weeks since I bought the car this problem seems to have gone away.
Now I'm faced with something for all I know could be normal. When accelerating from a stop I hit a point just before reaching 40mph where acceleration will drop sharply accompanied by a whine like you might here from an electronic servo. At the same time the tachometer will jump then dive back down to where it was. This all lasts for no more than a second or so and we go on like nothing is wrong.
I am due to come back to the dealership Monday to make sure there's nothing wrong but I would like to be fully prepared if this is something that should not be happening.

I also experience these issues in my Versa Note, although the auxiliary gear set upshifts at 19-25 MPH. Glad that I'm not the only one with these issues. I was about to take my car to the dealer too. My car had ~217 miles when I bought it; before I bought it, they drove it from the dealer in Imperial, CA to Huntington Beach, CA, about a 200 mile drive.

 

[Note-ified]

I also experience these issues in my Versa Note, although the auxiliary gear set upshifts at 19-25 MPH. Glad that I'm not the only one with these issues. I was about to take my car to the dealer too. My car had ~217 miles when I bought it; before I bought it, they drove it from the dealer in Imperial, CA to Huntington Beach, CA, about a 200 mile drive.

yeah i wouldnt really call it an issue though, more of something to get used to on this car....this is actually my first CVT based automatic and so far im impressed, especially after things smooth out after a few thousand miles are put on it. you guys also should be happy to know that the aftermarket for the Note is picking up pretty quickly if you're into that type of thing.

 

[SilverV]

This is one of the reasons Carlos Ghosn is very angry with JATCO because customers unfamiliarity of the CVT's in it's cars, most dealer complaints come from just lack of knowledge of the transmissions and how they work.

Although now he is getting together with JATCO to do a better job of explaining the the CVT transmission's to customers at a dealer level.

Nissan leaning on JATCO to remedy CVT problems - Autoblog

 

[Note-ified]

This is one of the reasons Carlos Ghosn is very angry with JATCO because customers unfamiliarity of the CVT's in it's cars, most dealer complaints come from just lack of knowledge of the transmissions and how they work.

Although now he is getting together with JATCO to do a better job of explaining the the CVT transmission's to customers at a dealer level.

Nissan leaning on JATCO to remedy CVT problems - Autoblog

yes and no. while there is quite a bit of lack of knowledge on how CVT's operate on the publics behalf, there is also an equal amount of valid concerns and issues that have been raised by Jatco's CVT transmissions. Just on the 2013 altima's alone over on the altima forums there have been about 25 cases of transmissions having to be replaced due to shuddering and lugging issues and just outright transmission failures in a few cases, so nissan has been coming down a little hard on Jatco to get the issues resolved quickly since they are a majority share holder in Jatco itself and any issues that Jatco's transmissions have are a reflection of nissan itself as far as reliability. Thankfully the transmission in the altima is not shared at all with the Note which leads me to believe that the Note's transmission will be more reliable overall thanks to a totally different design than the CVT in the altima which has no auxillary gearbox in the CVT compared to the Note's, which does and therefore creates less stress on the belt that is used in the CVT leading to a lot less issues which most of the time are caused by the belt in the CVT.