Quote:
Originally Posted by Alfisti
I dunno, the previous Z sold slow because it was what, basically 20 year old design. Give the engine a work over, have her breathe a bit better, like a rev more revs, get to say 375HP at 7K RPM and boom, proper simple sports car and save 50 pounds in weight too, maybe 100. .
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It would be an expensive redesign effort, it would need direct injection and benefit from different bore/stroke. My understanding is the VQ was bored as far as they could go without sleeving. Would probably benefit from the newer valvetrains too.
I’m just going to say that it was very overrated in all iterations compared to the very best sporty engines. It felt like a bit of a truck engine to me in that it had decent torque down low but was never anything you wanted to take to redline. I owned a G35C w VQ35DE, so I’m not being anti Nissan here. I thought it was worse overall than the BMW M54 in the ZHP even though it was rated for more power. Even the best version pales in comparison to S54 which would still be a top notch engine if it were in a car today with appropriate weight, and that’s a 20 year old design too. I understand S54 is not impressive on paper necessarily anymore but it has a responsiveness that’s not found in most NA engines that are left outside of exotics and the GT versions of Porsche 9A1. Of course, S54 is heavy and wouldn’t pass emissions.