Nissan CVT Tranny ??

Mechanical Constant Velocity Transmissions fall in basically two categories... belt variometers, and disc variometers... and the ratio change concept is same for both-  two rotating surfaces in contact, where the contact point is on a variable radius.  In a belt, there's one driven sheave that goes from small diameter to large (usually by centrifugal force), while the other sheave goes from large diameter to small  (by spring force).  Tractive force is transmitted not by the FLAT of the belt, but by the SIDES.  You'll find belt-variometers in some machine tools (Clausing 5900-series lathe used one that was hydraulically controlled by an annular cylinder, they also used a similar setup on one of their drill presses, and my Milwaukee Die Filer uses a manually-variable variometer, which is like a CVT, but without the automatic variability) but the belt CVT found it's way into moped-scooters, UTVs, etc., too.

A disc-type variometer uses a drive disk on a shaft, and a driven roller on another shaft at a 90 degree angle.  The driven roller is on a sliding collar keyed to it's shaft, and sliding it from the middle of the drive disk out towards the edge of the drive disk changes the drive ratio.  You'll find these on machine tools of several flavors ( i.e. Drill presses, lighter milling machines, and the Snapper Comet rear-engine rider mower)

Yes, snowmobiles were the first place belt-type CVTs became largely popular in the US... and they worked well there, because the vehicles they were driving, were LIGHT.

When CVT transmissions were introduced in automobiles, it was very clear that they would work on very light cars, but as weight increased, their reliability and livespan reduced dramatically.

Good idea?  Well, it COULD be... but a modern electronically-controlled automatic transmission with locking torque converter, 6 speeds, and double-overdrive ratios will take a whole lot more of a beating, handling substantially higher loads, and require basically NO maintenance in comparison to the CVT, will beat it in basically every category.  Some will argue that the CVT will beat the automatic in fuel economy, my experience shows no substantial gain in that respect... they'd claim the CVT to be physically lighter, and in some cases, that would be true, but with a considerable loss in long-term power handling capacity.

In ANY respect, the torque converter and gearing of a modern automatic will stomp the CVT's tractive force capacity hands-down... as a torque converter, in full stall, has the ability to multiply torque from a standstill by a factor of 4 to 5-times' the input, and NOT SPIN the output, practically indefinately, with NO damage.  A CVT will smoke and fail...

And that is the reason why you won't see much towing capacity on a CVT... and for those that do, you'll be facing lots of repair bills.  Tbone apparently hasn't suffered what thousands of other have... my cousin's Maxima made it to about 36k before it started it's death-spiral, several tows and repairs, and by 50k, it was sitting dead in their driveway awaiting settlement for four years before the roll-back truck toted it to the junkyard.  If it'd been just two model-years older, we would've yanked the engine and CVT, and dropped in an earlier model conventional and at least had a driveable car, but no chance... the platform had changed to an irreversable setup.

on a scooter, they're da bomb...

re: Jay, all that weight is put to good use on a locomotive, not so great on a passenger vehicle.

weight ?? small diesel engine spinning a genny, feeds controller, that feeds 1 to 4 motors

engine/genny would weigh a lot LESS than the 1800#, 12K$ battery in the Lightning.

gives you CVT performance and NONE of the belt issues....