Well, maybe to you veterans of Maxima modding, but not me. I've been lurking in this forum for some time now, searching & reading every possible thing I could find about the 3.5 swap into an A32. I rarely post here, because I have spent my time going over details of other people's swaps, carefully planning my own.

Anyhow, enough of that. I will describe what I did. I had one goal in mind for this adventure: to successfully transplant a 3.5 into my 98 I30t 5-speed. I had two priorities on this swap. First, I wanted the installation to look like it came that way. Second, I wanted it to start, idle, and run great. Emission testing is here in Middle TN, so that was a concern. With that in mind, I transferred every single emission device from the 3.0 along with the 3.5. My goal is NO CEL's, and when I remote mount the EVAP purge valve later it will happen.

Sure, I know I'm giving up a little performance here, since I am running A32 ECU with no external tuning devices. I'll admit, I am much more the mechanic/machinist than electronics tuner. Maybe someday, but it is really a kick in the pants over the 3.0 just the way it is.

Oh, and BTW, I put a NEW LSD trans in while I was doing this also. Old one had 234K and the usual problems. Saved for rebuilding later.

Here are some pictures for you to enjoy.

 

Great job you obviously took your time...very clean set up--> IACV looks great.

 

I give this 2 thumbs up. I think you achieved your goals. Congrats on a job well done

 

Good job, the only thing I'd be 'worried' about is that S-bend after the MAF, seems like it'd be relatively restrictive.

 

Congrats indeed. Looks very clean.

why did you put that bend after the maf?

 

Thanks for the compliments guys.

As for the intake tube routing, that is what it took to connect to the stock airbox location.
The tube connected to the TB is simply a spare one I had laying around the shop. It is from a Pontiac Grand Am. It fit perfectly, so I just left it for now. I really don't prefer the short ram cone type filters, so I went with this. I could change it sometime, but for now it is allowing me to drive and enjoy.

 

wow, very nice! it certainly looks 100% factory

 

Major props for that nice piece of work. I see a custom EGR port grafted into the intake as well as another port for the IACV.

Impressive planning and execution of your conversion. This is really interesting to me since I'm just now dealing with my 3.5 installation and what to do with the IACV.

You need to post more details as you make them happen - some of us need some help!

How does the car drive with the VLSD 5-spd? Any problems with the low-end torque? This is a WOW project - congrats.

 

Thanks grey, I did a lot of planning & research to arrive at the final product you see there. I've been making custom stuff for myself for some time now, ever since the first time I needed something that was unavailable or non-existent. Not to boast, but I can say that this swap was no small feat, from drilling the cams to fabricating the EGR & IACV mounts, lots of hours here.

As for the VLSD, the car was originally equipped this way, so no real difference. Just a little more torque steer due to the 3.5.

 

Very clean & organized set up.The welds are very clean and
I like your return style fuel rail.

 

Nice work old man!!

How about tossing one of them in my 3rd gen..

 

I'm extremely jealous of you having the 6th gen VQ in there, here I am plotting moves involving relays and what not to eliminate 1401

 

This may not apply to you, but I cleared my 1401 EGR temp sensor code by plugging in all connectors, of course, and freeing up the temp sensor and lying it in the valley under the LIM. Code went away. Probably just dumb luck, but it's gone. Now if I could just bury that 1105 code...

 

But did that also take care of your egr system readiness monitor?

 

In Pa you can still pass obdII emissions if one monitor is incomplete(not ready) Ask your local inspection station

 

??? no other EGR codes now .... guess I'm not sure what you're referring to.

 

Unfortunatly not the case in mass

system readiness moniters: confirmation from the ecu that it has successfully completed its self test of certain emmisions sytems, most obdII scanners (and mass inspections stations ) can access this information

 

Holy crap that is a clean swap! Looks stock!!!

 

i would love to see this pulled off. i'm no mechanic, so i shyed away from the swap beacuse of the same issues you were concerend about (factory appearence, reliability, and function). only thing that could have made this thread any more exciting was a write-up of the steps you took to customize your install.

 

Sorry about that.

Yeah, I enjoy reading other's write ups, but when it come to compiling my own............


I would be glad to tell about a specific portion of my swap to anyone interested. The cold idle control and the IACV mount are my own design. But honestly, the pictures combined with the info in the stickies pretty much sum it up.

It involved a good deal of custom machining & welding to do this. Bottom line, if you are capable in these areas, you could probably duplicate it with no problem.

 

Best/cleanest/most professional-looking/most thoughtful hybrid 3.5 swap I've seen yet.

 

Very nice! Looks completely stock.