I am going to keep a log in here of my rebuild progress starting tonight.

Bascially within the span of 2 hours I had the motor mostly ready to drop out. The only thing left to do now is disconnect the power steering pump, pull the axles and then drop the entire assembly.




Tomorrow I will order a full set of pistons, rings and some 350Z head gaskets. If time allows I will get the pistons ceramic coated and I will file extra gap in the rings to support more heat (nitrous).
I will continue to do business with the parts department because those guys know me well, give me good discounts and treat me with the same respect that I treat them.

 

umm ...werent u saying that they suck a couple of threads ago...

but besides that good luck man!!!



lol dont mind me just wanted to wish u luck and be an *** while doing it

-IgS

 

I don't see the need to burn any bridges with the guys in the parts department just because a few individuals in the service department are unprofessional and treated me like a criminal. I said I won't use the service department anymore. I will continue to use the parts department.

 

SR20DEN : Your thoughts on a stroker kit? Would you buy a fairly priced stroker kit that stroked your VQ35 to a 3.9L?

 

oooop didnt catch that....me too tired need to go to bed now...heh

-IgS

 

I fail to see how any type of stroker kit could be called fairly priced. And on top of that I am uncertain that VQ can be stretched out that much.

If you bore it +1mm and stroke it to 86mm over the stock 81.4mm it comes out to 3773 ccs. A VQ38DE would be nice to have but the rod ratio would be terrible and the motor simply would not last. Aside from that the cost of six custom rods, six custom pistons and a custom crankshaft could easily cost you over 4 grand.

Even at 3.5 liters I am certain this motor has been stretched beyond it's original design parameters. 3.0 liters was likely to have been the limit of the design. Keep in mind there was also a 2.0 liter JDM version.

 

I just tried to order a ful set of pistons, five grade 2 and one grade 3. It appears there is only one grade 2 piston two grade 3s in the whole country. I only know so far that I need one piston but I suspect I might need more.
So I just ordered a motor from a local salvage dealer. I will disclose the price of the motor only after I have it in my posession tomorrow.

 

Dam, this turned out to be more of a hassle than i thought... I also thought, why didn't you just try a different dealer, but if you have that spare money on the side for these parts, then this is the best thing for you.
Have you gave forged pistons and rods a thought?
http://store.yahoo.com/sgpracing-sto...ctronics4.html

 

Do you have access to a flexible borescope? Being able to look into the cylinders through the spark plug holes could give you some kind of idea the level of damage in there and help with the parts ordering. You should also be able to see if there has been any cylinder wall damage. This could be a huge time saver.

 

Nice progress man. BTW, before you took it apart, did you do a compression check of all the cyllinders? I know you mentioned you had 0 compression on one, wasn't sure about the others. I would think you would want to replace them all anyway, but I was curious as to which one went south. Also, pistons doesn't seem like something that a dealer would typically stock.. Hope you can get them in on time.

Finally, what does a full set of pistons and rings cost?

 

All of the other oes were between 140 and 160psi so compression wise they were fine. But from the looks of the exhaust manifolds I suspect more pistons are shot.

I did look into the #2 cyl with a bore scope and could see the damage. The left side of the piston top is gone down to the rings. The rest of that area is crispy. You can tell it's been burned. I did not check the other ones on the bore scope. Using the scope is a PITA and it's really hard to tell what you're looking at through it. So in a sense I do not trust it.

I decided that my best and quickest course of action was to do a motor swap.


Ordering JE pistons from SGP is not an option. I think I can get a better price if I order something custom from somewhere else. Besides there is no time to get them here.

OEM pistons areroughly $55 each and a set of rings is about the same price. I emailed Total Seal this morning to see if they have a ring set for the VQ35 but have not heard back. They're probably still not open this early in Arizona .

 

Can you explain what rod ratio is?

 

http://forums.maxima.org/showthread.php?t=243261

 

Good Luck with your re-build! Will u still spray Nitrous after u re-build?

 

 

Sounds like the right move for a tight time-frame.

Are you still going to "build" the current motor for a later install?

 

Yes. I'm not giving up.

 

good luck with everything... hope all goes smoothly

 

That's a good question. Are you planning on just getting it together for NOPI and building up the other motor?

You could do it in your time frame and as cash allows while getting all the things done you want, like coating the valves & pistons, extrude hone the intake manifold, (cams?)... Then when you're done there should many header options available, it will be much easier to do that install while doing a motor swap.

 

Time to build your "Frankenstein" I hope it's a monster. And when you finish you can go back to those fugging nissan a$$holes and lay a huge patch on thier lot, or better you order about $5000 worth of parts from them and never pick them up, then lay the patch. Anyway, I hope your rebuild goes well.

 

No I'm not going to do that to the guys in parts. They're still good to me. I explained to them how I had been treated by service and they were peeved.
There are many possibilities right no of what i can do with the current motor. But right now I am only going to focus on this one task.

 

wish ya the best with it...I like the updates...

 

Once your up and running you shoud put some old crappy tires on and park in front of the service dept and do the BIGGEST BURNOUT known to ever be made my a maxima.

Thats how i feel right now.
I took m car in today and service told me that the reason my car has been struggling is because Im using Copper one step colder plugs. And charged me 130 dollars to pull out a plug.

 

TAKE LOTS AND LOTS OF PICS!

I want to see what that BURNT piston looks like.

Also, can you take a pic of one of the injectors?

 

wow...cant belive im learning so much..thanks for all your info Mr. Nitrous.

 

Please document the whole thing. Engine drop and all.

 

If I lived in his area, I'd be over there taking pics of the whole process in a heartbeat.

I'd lend him a hand too, but I'd really like to see what the inside of that engine looks like.

 

SR20DEN: Have you tried contacting the owner of the dealership at all?

 

I don't think I am going to bother with that. They are owned by Autonation which is the largest automotive chain the the country.

 

I do plan to take many pictures and some videos to document the events. You will find them all here http://www.poweredbynissan.com/image...oject_rebuild/

 

Thanks for being a sport about it.

SGP Racing for pistons?

 

I seem to be getting tons of comments about the overpriced JE pistons from SGP.

Why don't you guys all chip in and buy them for me?

I will also give you guys all the info you want so long as you help keep the haters out of this thread.

 

I can't...







because I just purchased some for myself...

 

I got $20!

BTW, what was your "latest" project with the nitrous? Did you go direct port, switch to a wet kit, what?

Also, if you have time to get the pistons coated, where are you sending them? Got SwainTech~~>http://www.swaintech.com/

 

Ouch. I hear that.

 

Okay, now this I want to hear about as well :-) Did you go lower compression or are you going all motor?

 

I will be heading out shortly to go get my new motor. It has 22k miles on it. I'll post pics when i get back.

 

 

 

I purchased the 8.5:1 CR pistons, and I'll leave the rest up to your imagination...