I have a 96 Maxima SE, with a 5spd, 167k on it, engine has a tick to the valve train it sounds like.
I want to a turbo charged maxima, and was wondering what the best route might be...
I have an exhuast from the y-pipe back, im in the process of doing a clutch, and a possible tranny rebuild.
Should I rebuild the engine i have with a kit? or get a used one and build that? Also what kind of turbo should I use? Im not looking for ***** to the walls, but I want some good power, while staying economical, and time saving as well (im a college student). And whats a good place to get the parts for it?
Does the tranny need any upgrading if I do these mods? If so, where and what needs to be done?

Thanks

 

time saving....hope you have a daily driver sitting around...

 

given your situation and requirements, you shouldn't rebuild any engine (neither your current one or another one). you can make 450whp on the stock engine with the right setup, but it sounds like you don't want to go for that much power, hence no reason to waste your money on rebuilding it. most VQs have a bunch of ticking noises coming from up top, valvetrain, injectors, etc all like to make little noises. it is nothing i would worry about, I've owned a bunch of VQs and many of my buddies have had them, they all tick.

there is a little bit you can do to strengthen the trans but if you're unable to do it yourself, you're gonna pay through the nose to have it done and frankly I think many transmission shops out there are suspect anyways - being in the trans industry myself and seeing some of the POS "rebuilds" that get sent to us because they weren't done correctly makes me qualified to say this.

any "normal" transmission shop likely wouldn't do things like gear detailing, shot peening, etc. again, I think this is an unnecessary expense for you. a basic rebuild is a good idea if you have any of the signs of the common bearing failures, but otherwise I'd leave the trans alone. if you have the desire to do it, you can try to do it yourself, there is a big thread I made up at the top of this forum about some various transmission upgrades and things you can do if you wish to pursue those. you said you don't have extremely lofty HP goals so I'm going to assume some modest power level like 300-325whp and tq, you probably won't break a trans any time soon at those power levels. obviously if you're planning on turboing your car soon, you want to get a clutch that is appropriate for the amount of torque your car will be producing, don't buy one of those POS clutches off ebay that's some joker brand you've never heard of. if you don't know clutch brands that well, do a search on here or ask us what we think of a certain clutch.

for the turbo kit itself you have the option of either purchasing a pre-made kit like PFI or Turbo Specialties or putting one together yourself. I don't know what your knowledge level is nor that of your associates (if you have friends that can weld, etc). with the pre-made kits you know pretty well what sort of quality you're getting. if you do it yourself and you don't know what you're doing you could end up with a real piece of crap. if you do it yourself and you research every decision, have the skills (or acquaintances with the skills) to do a custom setup you could end up with a very nice turbo system.


if you're interested I actually have semi-complete turbo setup for sale, click the link in my signature for the thread describing it, if you like.

 

^^^couldn't have said it better.

You can buy Neal's kit. You can piece it together to make some nice results - but it's not exactly for a broke college student.

 

do i need to worry about internals? rings? pistons? theres a good custom turbo/mod shop around that can do ****, and i have a friend who can weld well. My mechanical skills are pretty good, im an auto student, i work at a firestone, its just the modding part that im kinda new at!

 

i got an exedy clutch through the forum.. not sure if itll hold though, if i need to ill get a different one. Ideas?
Thinking im gonna build my turbo, what am i gonna need? injectors? pressure regulator? a pump?
A bit worried about the syncros in the tranny, before i started, it became difficult to shift in and out of first and 2nd, clutch is fried, gonna replace the flywheel, wasn't a whole lot of fluid in the transaxle, there was some seepage before i removed it.

Wheres a good place to get high flow exhaust manifolds? One for a turbo set up?