Jiro's diesel Xterra

[roninjiro]

So glad you got that beast running. I will be curious to see how loud it will be when you get the exhaust finished. For me that would be the deal breaker ,yes it sounds cool but after hours of driving it would drive me crazy. I love how quiet the 3.3 L is when cruising down the road.

Cheers!

unfortunately it will never be that quiet, I have never heard a diesel that quiet before. The closest I have heard would have to be the new vw Jetta TDI's and they have a lot of exhaust emissions ,baffles, mufflers and whatever else involved. I only have a glass pack to tone it down, with the length of pipe. I doubt it will be loud, but it will never be oem xterra quiet. I think it will be as loud as how my xterra was with the Nismo exhaust.

 

[roninjiro]

I personally like it even as it is, the sound is definitely not a problem I would think. The only reason that I am not trying this is my skills, eeh, the lack of my skills
IMO that is how all Xterra's should be

I can say it is not for the faint of heart! after it has all been said and done... it was a royal PITA. If anyone would like to try to tackle the swap, I do have the spare td27t drive train awaiting a body to go into.

 

[roninjiro]

finished up the exhaust and did a real road test today

 

[nasko]

Man, I truly envy your wrenching skills. I just love the sound of the diesel.

 

[roninjiro]

thank you nasko!

 

[The BN Guy]

So is it really any louder than the 3.3l?

 

[roninjiro]

So is it really any louder than the 3.3l?

yes it louder. This is comparing it to the original drivetrain that was in there. It had the 4 cats on it with a chambered muffler. Now it only has the turbocharger and glass pack to muffle the sound. It is not stupid loud, it just sounds like a domestic diesel pickup I suppose.

also a small update... I have fried the ecu. I am using the original ecu to retain stock gauges, a/c, transmission interlink.... and I did it all by grounding out the ecu on accident testing the a/c system.

 

[abcab69]

Darn great job you have done there, wish I had seen this thread earlier. I am from South Africa and those power plants are fairly common here in many different models. My truck has the slightly lower model than the one you have there now. I think your s is fly be wire (no throttle cable, but ECU controlled accelerator). Excuse the African terminology, we have some strange ways of naming things.

I think there is a model still better than that one you have that came with a top mount Intercooler. The big question I have is around the ECU. We have another truck here with a similar 2.5 motor. The sub assembly is the same, just the bore and stroke and some hang on bits are slightly different. We want op install the QD32ETI motor that came out of the Nissan Caravan and E50 Terrano. Boots 150KW, so nice power, but fully ECU driven to Elctro/machanical diesel pump and injection system.

The Caravan and Terrano were never available here is South Africa, so we are stuck. Some guys have taken the pump and butchered to run full mechanical, but fuel consumption is horrible.

So if you have any information where we can lay our hands on a ECU or what ECU would work for us, it would be great.

Some thoughts:

Your noise level is typical of a the diesel Nissan. I watched your vids and the interior noise is about the same as mine.
I don't understand all this emission mumbo jumbo you guys have there, we run as we want. My 2.7TD runs open straight pipe. It's a concoction of sizes that was put on by the previous owner and then the silencer removed by me whet it blocked up totally. Here is what mine sounds like
Picture of my motor I replaced after Hydraulic lock when I did not make it through a river


We found here, due to our high temperatures, that the viscous fan was the way to go. The electric fan units just could not do the job.

Love your truck and seriously of all the nice goodies you guys got from Nissan over there. We never saw the Xterra or the first Gen Pathfinder and the Caravan. We only got the Terrano II and then some after market builds like my truck.

Looking forward to some replies here and watching your progress.

 

[The BN Guy]

Yuck on the hydro lock and the fried ECU! Not cheap to fix on either accounts.

 

[roninjiro]

Darn great job you have done there, wish I had seen this thread earlier. I am from South Africa and those power plants are fairly common here in many different models. My truck has the slightly lower model than the one you have there now. I think your s is fly be wire (no throttle cable, but ECU controlled accelerator). Excuse the African terminology, we have some strange ways of naming things.

I think there is a model still better than that one you have that came with a top mount Intercooler. The big question I have is around the ECU. We have another truck here with a similar 2.5 motor. The sub assembly is the same, just the bore and stroke and some hang on bits are slightly different. We want op install the QD32ETI motor that came out of the Nissan Caravan and E50 Terrano. Boots 150KW, so nice power, but fully ECU driven to Elctro/machanical diesel pump and injection system.

The Caravan and Terrano were never available here is South Africa, so we are stuck. Some guys have taken the pump and butchered to run full mechanical, but fuel consumption is horrible.

So if you have any information where we can lay our hands on a ECU or what ECU would work for us, it would be great.

Some thoughts:

Your noise level is typical of a the diesel Nissan. I watched your vids and the interior noise is about the same as mine.
I don't understand all this emission mumbo jumbo you guys have there, we run as we want. My 2.7TD runs open straight pipe. It's a concoction of sizes that was put on by the previous owner and then the silencer removed by me whet it blocked up totally. Here is what mine sounds like
Picture of my motor I replaced after Hydraulic lock when I did not make it through a river
View attachment 103486

We found here, due to our high temperatures, that the viscous fan was the way to go. The electric fan units just could not do the job.

Love your truck and seriously of all the nice goodies you guys got from Nissan over there. We never saw the Xterra or the first Gen Pathfinder and the Caravan. We only got the Terrano II and then some after market builds like my truck.
o
Looking forward to some replies here and watching your progress.

my model is a drive by cable, I cannot stand the drive by wire systems myself. The better version of what I have has the intercooler on it but it also has an electronic module on the injection pump, of which I did not want as that would require the factory terrano ecm. As of right now I use my original ecm from my petrol engine, but only because it effects other creature comfort items and also the transmission. The QD32ETI is a totally different beast that I could not imagine trying to tackle as far as all the electronic ecm sections. But I believe you can tackle that project if you do not mind reading the schematics. My conversion has me going back to the schematics all the time and lucky for me I like doing things like that.

Honestly if you want to do something like that, buy a service/workshop manual for the vehicle that the QD32ETI came in, and compare the schematic to your truck. I bought and installed the TD27T for fuel savings, and simplicity reasons; not power. The way I saw it... the engine is used worldwide and spoken highly of.

I don't have to worry about emissions where I register my vehicle. I could also run straight pipe, but chose not to, and used a single fiberglass packed muffler to tone it down a bit. And even in the area were I live I MAY be able to get away with emission exemption because of the diesel power train.

I myself do not like electric fans, I have had electric fans installed on my xterra only to overheat due to the extreme outside temps I have encountered also. I now only try to run the viscous/clutch fans also.

Thank you for your post



On another note:
I have went to a salvage yard and picked up another ecu and BINGO, everything is working the way it should (kinda)! The old ecu is fried and I fried it by grounding out the a/c system. With the replacement ecu I made progress on the Tach signal. FYI the tach signal is coming from a VR sensor off the injection pump gear, but I had to convert the signal with a HEI module and still trying to figure out the right amount to resistor to pull a proper rpm square wave signal. A signal is registering but not in the right boundaries so I am still working on it. Once the tach is working properly the a/c system will cycle on properly. So once the tach is working I am going to be technically done with the conversion

 

[abcab69]

Thanks for the reply.

Those manuals are like hens teeth. My buddy who is insisting on this engine is grinding away at the internet daily, and we may just have an option or two with existing ECM's that can be re mapped. That now seems to be the biggest mission, to find someone who is willing to "play" with it.

I also had a problem with the tach, and am presently running without it. The sensor off the import (japanese) motor is not the same as the one our local trucks came with, so the guy that did the first swop, butchered my tach meter circuit to make it work, but like you, it gives rubbish readings and is not worth much.

My hydraulic lock was easy fix and relatively cheap. The insurance had written the vehicle off, so I took the max cash O could get out of them, did a heart transplant with injector and pump refurbish with less that half the money. I had no conversions to do, it was a straight pull old one out, and push the new one in. It took me just over a week to work around some of the stupid things the previous guy had done. Wish I had the original engine that came with the car, as I could have taken off some of the sensors (tach) that would have got me back to everything working as it should.

But that was in April 2008, and the motor is still going well with 130K kilometres that I have put on it. That on top of me experimenting with LPG and HHO on the motor on and off.

Future, I want to install a water to air intercooler, water/petrol charge injection cooling, surge tank on the fuel line, HHO injection and a fuel heater so that I can start playing with oil recycling to use as a fuel source.

But money is a major problem after I lost my business 2 years ago and seem to be totally unemployable.

 

[roninjiro]

As far as electronically regulated small diesel engines like the one you are planning to swap in, I could not give you any advice on that. I prefer "mostly" mechanical injection, as it keeps repairs by me as easy as it will get while on the road should something need troubleshooting.

The tach signal that my truck originally had was an optical sensor, but now I have an VR sensor. Originally it was a square wave sensor, but with the VR sensor that is not the case and I have had to convert the signal with an HEI module. It works, but still needs fine tuning. My truck has have to have a tach in order for my A/C system to work. Odd huh?

I have used HHO on gasoline engines and they really do not pay out like it should have. On my system it put enough load on the electrical system that it brought down any fuel savings I made by increased oxygen content in the exhaust. May not be the case with a diesel pack though.

You my friend have A LOT on your plate as far as mods go. I eventually will run recycled oil (WVO) but just not now.

 

[The BN Guy]

I can't wait to hear how it does offroad! Both literally and performance-wise.

 

[abcab69]

You my friend have A LOT on your plate as far as mods go. I eventually will run recycled oil (WVO) but just not now.

You don't know how frustrating it is when got all these ideas and no money (job) to do them with.

I ran my truck for a while with old engine oil that I mixed back into the supply. I never went more than a 20% mix with the diesel to keep things "fluid" enough in the tank. I did not do any additional filtering or treating of the oil, and it eventually got my whole fuel supply system so dirty that you could not see what you were doing any more. I am looking into centrifuge filter systems, but it will have to be home built or imported. I can not find one supplier locally of any sized unit.

I have never driven a petrol engine off road ever, but have been out with many petrol heads and see how they have to use higher revs than the diesel guys to make things work. We all drive manuals here, and the petrol guys burn clutches quickly. Diesel has low down grunt that makes it great for crawling at idle. Turbo lag could be a slight problem, but you work around it.

 

[roninjiro]

You don't know how frustrating it is when got all these ideas and no money (job) to do them with.

I do, it took me over 4 years in planning, and almost 2 years from the start of the first order for the swap to now.