They swapped to a VG33 from a VG30 to get the larger displacement of our motor. Not sure what you're wanting to do. I guess you could get all of the turbo bits from a VG30T and put them on your VG30, but without a reliable way to tune it you're just throwing money in the garbage can.

 

Why do you want a smaller engine in your truck? I saw your previous post(s) about swapping in a 2.4L 4cyl? If you need the mileage sell the 3.3L and buy a 2.4L instead, you'll probably have much less headaches.

I also wouldn't want to know what 4wd feels like in a 2.4L 4cyl, I can feel quite a bit of a difference in my truck as it is.

 

I'm looking to boost, a 2.4 4cyl would be a very easy motor to fit because it comes factory and its alot easier to turbo a ka24 instead of a vg33

 

Boosting a 2.4 is also an expensive endeavor. If you're not worried about the high price go ahead and swap whatever motor into the truck you want

 

Still have to pass an OBD2 emissions test to get an inspection, if I didn't I'd have a 350 small block in it

 

Just chunk a 4.3 or a 5.7 in it, you'll have gobs of power and gobs more for a few hundred bucks per 100hp.

 

Wow have I thought about this swap a lot, but where I balk at is getting everything to work properly like climate control. Sure you can get a mouse motor and transmission from 99-up Chevy to bolt in to a Frontier, its just sheet metal and frame rails which all weld very easily, but how do you make everything else work? The only way I see it is get a wrecked donor vehicle and take just about everything from it - instrument cluster - unless you can somehow repin the stock Fronty one, dash harness (because part of this plugs into the ECU as well and you will now be running a Chevy one), you'll need the OBD-2 port which plugs in to a separate part of the dash harness to be legal if you in an emissions inspectable state. I'm not saying it's impossible because there are finite amount of controls and sensors and you only have 12volts to deal with, but I know damn well that it's beyond the ability of 99% of the members on this board.

Turbo'ing the VG33 with a big single - cut primary kitties off of the stock manifolds, weld a new flange on and flip them upside down, put the turbo near the stock battery location or where the airbox used to be and then get a little creative with the exhaust is all doable. Trick comes to tuning. If you're handy enough to tackle this, you should also be handy enough to wire in a piggyback fuel controller (AEM F/IC or PCS-XFC will definitely work as they can handle both MAP and MAF vehicles), swap the injectors, get a couple wideband O2 sensors, some colder plugs and whip out your laptop to dial things in. Also doable, but still beyond the skills of 99% of the folks here. There is no kit and you'd have to creatively source parts that will work. You'd basically copy any vehicle that has an OEM recirculated style turbo system (because of the MAF), like the VWs, for your pressurized air routing.

If you were handy with a welder (and torch to preheat the manifolds) you could probably be in and out of that kind of build for less than $2500 if you cheaped out on the turbo. Which is cheaper than sourcing a KA24, everything to make it run, and then all of the boost goodies.

 

Even if I went through all that work would it still pass an OBD2 emissions test?

 

Depends, do you guys have strict visual inspection or just a quick plug and unplug OBD check? Around here they only check for emissions codes unless it doesn't have an OBD II, then they'll sniff it.

 

Yes as long as you had the map sorted so it didn't run rich when out of boost if you have to put a sniffer on the tail pipe. I've used both piggybacks I mentioned and never had a problem passing both the OBD emissions test and a sniffer.

 

In ny state anything 96+ needs cats and to pass an emissions test (OBDII) 95 and older just pass the safety check ( bakes tires lights etc.)

 

Going off topic a bit but I've been thinking about what engine that Nissan had that would work better than the VG33e that we have. I was thinking that if anyone was going to try to put an engine in that may come close would be the VQ35DE, which is what Nissan should have done as the CC LB would have moved quicker.

However, with that said I would like to see the new Pathfinder combo of engine and CVT tranny in our 1st gen trucks. I know that is far out there idea as not getting all the controls to match up. I'd like to see that match up in the 3rd gen frontier and transform the Frontier in a MPG monster.

 

Ooooooor..you just buy a damn commuter car.

 

What other engine is "easier" to swap into these trucks

 

Jesus, that's what I thought was going to happen. There are no "easy" motors to swap into this platform.