My Maxima has the 3.0 DOHV engine that made a lot of banging noise that didn't hinder it's performance. Some times it would be quite but got noisey and I just told people that it was a Diesel. lol The engine knocking finally cracked something and oil runs down, from the top area and behind the pully. I get 20 miles on 5 qts of oil. I like my 1994 maxima, as I purchased it new in 1994. I want to replace the engine but fear that I will get another engine that does the same. Did nissan solve the problem with this engine and I was told the SOHC engine could not replace it. Help!

 

Sounds like the variable timing control issue. If your looking to do a swap with the sohc vg30e engine it will fit into your engine bay with no issues but you would just have to find one with the harness and all the accessories. Theres a thread somewhere on the 3.5L vq35 engine swap by NWP. That might be a good swap if you want to have fun with it and add some pep to it otherwise the sohc engine (vg30e) has a little less hp than the dohc you have but it's a solid reliable engine or you could just put another dohc vg30de back in it sounds like you got a pretty good run out of it being the original owner and the fact that the car is 20 years old.

 

You most likely have worn a hole worn in the cover. If you keep driving it, you are going to ruin the engine. If you stop running the engine, and go ahead and replace or rebuild the VTC's, you can avoid a major overhaul. If you keep driving it or even running the engine, VTC's will explode and you will really have your work cut out.

 

Supposedly Nissan had fixed the VTC sprocket issue for the '94 model year of the DOHC(VE) motor but you either got a left over '93 motor or they didn't really fix it. I don't know if Nissan ever did a recall for the Variable Timing Control sprocket but you could always repair the motor yourself.

 

They never fixed it, even their rebuild kit with countermeasure spring didn't fix it.

VG for tha win.

 

Apparently the 300zx had that same issue but i believe they did come up with a fix for that but not the max but to get 20 years out of that ve isn't bad at all if you compare it to how long cars last these days. Seems like the auto industry needed to come up with less reliable cars to make more money from all of us consumers. I once heard of a vg max on it way to breaking a million kms with well over 900,000 kms before it got wrote off. Tranny was apparently done a couple times but the vg engine kept on going.

 

I just swapped in a ve from japanengines.com and so far its running well. I only have 260 miles on it but it sounds good and theres no vtc noise. I know what you mean about the diesel thing. my old boss thought my car was diesel and got really excited cause he was from europe... then i hadda tell him it was gas. The toyota filter really helps with that tho