Modding uprating the Nissan RB30 engine!

The Lowdown on "RB30 Modifications"

How to modify and upgrade the Nissan RB30

"Comprehensive guide to tuning and performance parts on the Nissan RB30 engine!"

Forums like the one at TorqueCars are always getting posts asking how to improve the RB30 from people wanting to know what are the best tips for RB30 mods that work. So let us look into Nissan RB30 upgrades and outline the best modifications on this great engine and point out some potential pitfalls along the way.

Now we shall detail the best approach to RB30 tuning and report on the optimum upgrades. Nissan RB30 are popular engines and with the best sports mods like ECU maps, turbo upgrades and camshafts you will definitely enhance your driving fun.

When talking about the greatest parts for your RB30 engine, we are going to concentrate on the mods that give the biggest return for your cash.

RB30 induction kits

Improving air intake on the RB30

You need fuel and air for an engine to work. If there is insufficient fuel then it will run lean, if there is little flow of air it runs rich resulting in lost power and potentially damaging the engine. We'll pick up on fuelling later in this article but for now we shall look at air supply.

So Forcing more air into your RB30 is the whole point to any engine modification job.

You'll commonly see there is a limit in the air flow sensor MAF/MAP on the RB30 when considerably more air is being drawn into the engine.

You'll see that 4 bar air sensors coping with quite large power gains, whereas the OEM air sensor sapped bhp and torque at a much lower level.

The intake plenum transmit the during the engines suck phase from the intake filter and allow it to be drawn into the engine and mixed with fuel.

Design and flow characteristics of the Air Intake manifolds can make a noticeable improvement to fuel delivery on the RB30.

Most intake headers are improved through performance upgrades, although a few car makers provide reasonably well designed intake headers.

Big valve conversions on the RB30, doing some port matching and head flowing will also increase torque, the fantastic side effect is it will make space for a greater torque increase on other upgrades.

RB30 performance cam tips.

Different RB30 engines respond better to more aggressive cam durations so set your engine up on a rolling road.

The ecu map and fuelling also will make differences on the bhp gains you'll get.

A longer valve duration can alter the bhp band and on most engines the exhaust and intake durations do not need to match, although most cams and tuners use matched pairs there are some advantages to extending the intake or exhaust durations.

The cam profile plays a big part in the engines power output so cam upgrades make quite a large difference. The intake and exhaust durations will alter depending on the chosen cam profile, so large power band gains are on offer for cam upgrades.

NB: Fast road camshafts commonly raise the performance through the rev band, you may lose a little low end bhp but your higher rpm power will be lifted.

Competition camshafts, raise the higher rpm power band but as a result the car will not idle smoothly and low end power nearly always suffers.

For a car used daily you must carefully try to optimize your power band to your usage of the car.

I'd be amazed if you have ever thought a RB30 Motorsport and race cam is a pleasure to live with when on the daily commute.

Stage 1, 2 and 3 mods for the RB30

Before we break the best tuning upgrades down into stages of tune, let's list the most effective tuning upgrades for you.

  1. Suspension Upgrades - always improve your cars handling
  2. Brake Upgrades - Even before adding power improve those brakes
  3. Intake - make sure the intake is not restricted, use filters and intake upgrades to improve this
  4. Exhaust - as with 3 ensure there is not restriction in the exhaust, cats are the usual bottleneck
  5. Tunes - remapping, piggyback ECU's and aftermarket ECU's can all make decent gains
  6. Fuelling - when you've increased power you'll need to match this with more fuel
  7. Turbo upgrades - Improving the intake with a large turbo and better flowing intercooler will be the biggest power gain you'll see (but one of the most complex).

This video guide to tuning cars is a great starting point to work from in your project.

Stage 1 RB30 parts:

Remaps/piggy back ECU, Panel air filters, Intake headers, Drilled & smoothed airbox, Fast road camshaft, Sports exhaust manifold.

Stage 2 RB30 parts:

Ported and polished head, fuel pump upgrades, high flow fuel injectors, Fast road cam, induction kit, Sports catalyst & performance exhaust.

Tuning tips and articles Engine tuning Transmission tuning Care care Intake & exhaust mods Improve handling Forums

Stage 3 RB30 parts:

Engine balancing & blueprinting, Adding or Upgrading forced induction (turbo/supercharger), Twin charging conversions, Internal engine upgrades (head flowing porting/bigger valves), Competition cam, Crank and Piston upgrades to alter compression.

The RB30 power trains are fantastic to work on and we note that there are plenty of upgrades and performance parts out there.

Mapping helps to establish the full potential of all the modifications you've done to your RB30.

You will typically expect to see gains of approximately 20-30% more power on turbocharged vehicles and you can expect to see around 15% on NASP engines, but the end result usually vary depending on the modifications you've carried out and the condition of your engine.

Turbo modifications on the RB30

To get a turbo working on a NASP engine there is a lot involved, from lowering compression ratio to improved fuel supply and mapping, so we have found a great guide to helpavoid the common pitfalls or end up with an unfinished project because you were not told what you were getting into by doing this on the RB30.

The more air you can get into an engine, the more fuel it can burn and uprating the induction with a turbocharger upgrade makes significant power gains.

When an engine has a turbo already fitted upgrades are going to net you a larger power gain and you'll see that turbocharged engines are built using uprated components.

There are common areas of failure for every engine, with some being over specified and some only able to handle stock power

See where you'll find these limits and install higher quality components to cope with the power.

We see many drivers spending a lots of money on turbocharger upgrades on the RB30 only to watch the engine block go up in smoke soon after it's been finished.

Bigger turbos commonly experience a bottom end lag, and low capacity turbos spool up really quickly but do not have the peak rpm engines power gains.

Thanks to progress the world of turbochargers is always increasing and we commonly find variable vane turbochargers, where the vane profile is altered according to speed to lower lag and increase top end bhp and torque.

Twin scroll turbochargers divert the exhaust flow into 2 channels and flow these at differently designed vanes in the turbo charger. They also increase the scavenging effect of the engine.

Beefing up the air intake by adding a supercharger or additional turbo will help you achieve very large torque gains, although harder to install. We have this feature on twinchargers if you want to read more.

Tips about fuel supply on the RB30

Don't omit to pay attention to the fuelling when you are increasing the power - it makes the car more thirsty. Don't forget to over specify your flow rate on the injectors.

The accepted safe increase is to add 15% to the flow rate when buying an injector, this takes into account injector deterioration and affords a little spare capacity should the engine need more fuel.

Don't forget that different fuel grades will usually require different settings, a high octane fuel will burn more efficiently than lower octane fuel for example. A car will trim fuel supply to keep within the ideal air fuel mix but at the extreme ends you may need to adjust your injector capacity, or the mapping or you'll get flat spots and potential lean or rich fuel issues..

Recommended RB30 performance exhaust upgrades

You only need to to increase your exhaust system with an upgraded one is if the current exhaust is actually creating a flow problem.

On most factory exhausts you'll find the exhaust flow rate is still ok even on modest power gains, but on a serious tuning project with a big boost in power you will certainly need to get a better flowing exhaust.

Please dont run with the biggest exhaust you can buy you'll slow up the exhaust flow rate - the best for power gains are usually between one and a half to two and half inches. Your exhaust design, the bend angles and construction are what have more effect on flow rates than your pipe width to a certain extent. So the exhaust design is a big factor.

Typically exhaust restrictions can be located the catalyst installed, so adding a faster flowing sports alternative will help avoid this restriction.

Cat bypassing (NB:catalysts reduce harmful engine emissions) is illegal in most countries and regions.

Faults issues and things to look out for on the RB30

Like most engines an RB30, should have few issues if it gets properly serviced and looked after.

We cannot stress enough the need for oil changes with the correct grade of oil on the RB30, failure to do this will exacerbate engine wear, on a tuned RB30 this is more important than ever and close attention should be paid to your maintenance schedule.

If you are interested in learning more or getting impartial tuning advice for your RB30 why not pop over to the forums at TorqueCars where you can chat about RB30 tuning options and read about others projects who may be planning to do similar modifications on their RB30.

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