Ok I took my 2003 SE in for inspection yesterday and found out that I need about a $1000 worth of repairs. My mechanic who is a friend of mine told me my front and rear shocks are rusted and blown out, both front and rear sway bar link pins are shot and that I have a hole in my muffler and the tail and wide pipe are rusted out!

Now I looked my Xterra over before I took it in for inspection and noticed the rear shocks were bad and knew the links were bad but I didn't think it was that bad. Since my mechanic is a good friend I know he's not ripping me off and he's hardly charging me for labor but I’m shocked how much it's going to cost!

I bought my X used four years ago and it only had 48,000 miles on it and the only thing I was concerned with was all the rust underneath the vehicle. Does anyone else have this problem with rust and had to have all those type of parts replaced or am I the only one? I plan on driving the X for at least the next 10 to 15 years because I love it but with replacing all these parts I’m not sure it will last?

The shocks are not suprising an any way, the OEM ones were crap to begin with, and you have had them on for almost 8 years, I think that you got your money out of them.

For the rear sway bar, you dont need it to begin with. A lot of people just take them off.

when you talk of a hole in the muffler, are you talking abotu the little one that lets water drain out? Or you talking bout a big old rusted out hole in the side or bottom.

And since I have no ides what a wide pipe is, I will not coment on it.

Well that makes me feel a little better knowing I got my money out of my shocks! I'm just really worried that in the next 5 years the body my start to rust and the frame will start rusting out.

No the hole in the muffler was about the size of a baseball. I'm not quite sure what the wide pipe is either but from what I understand I think it's the long pipe that goes from the Catalytic Converter to the muffler?

I think that you are talking about the Y-pipe, not wide. It is where the two banks are collected into one.

You may want to look at one of the cat back replacements(something that you could do yourself)(as wall as the shocks).

Yes Y-pipe sounds more like it.