Nismo ecu swap?
 

Just curious , and correct me if I'm wrong. But since the only performance difference between the base, touring and Nismo is the 18 hp tune could that be gained by either a Nismo ecu swap ? Or a tune on the oem ecu :confused:

Stock exhaust is different on the Nismo model..

Yea that too but I doubt you get 18 hp from and exhaust

Not worth the money.

Seems there are exhaust out there that do give that (stillen, F.I.). I like my stillen. Also z1 is selling used Nismo Oem exhaust for a good deal right now as well as stillen. Wish I saw before I bought my new stillen, all well no regrets.

I too wonder about flashing the Oem ecu with the Nismo tune though. I know people get more power from after market uprev/ecutek and am considering an uprev tune from a local tuner that has a good rep but it would be nice if someone found the actual differences between Nismo vs base/sport so we could just input those numbers and know that we may not be getting every last HP but we would have a safe / reliable factory tune.

Given that the NISMO exhaust could definitely account for 18 crank horsepower, what makes you think there is any meaningful difference?

There may not be but that is why it would be nice to see if someone had access to the numbers to verify. Even simpler is if the Nismo has a different software I.d. When programming vs the base / sport. Something I will ask when I bring mine to a contact at the dealer in a couple weeks to check if mine has most current programming is if the Nismo has different programming.

Waste of time. The Nismo tune is nothing special - just slightly less crappy than the OEM tune if its even different at all. Regardless, the differences are going to be so minimal that it's not even worth looking into. Ecutek can do way more and will get rid of the terrible throttle lag present in all stock tunes.

There was a thread on here a few years ago that discussed the difference. iirc the only difference was slightly better timing advance.

Ok so that's what I figured was it would most likely be a more advanced timing.

In still on the fence of going to my local tuner with uprev and may go that route it's just now your putting all your trust in one person and you not fully knowing what they are doing to your car puts me a little on edge. Have to remember Nissan employs a team of engineers putting in a lot of hours to program these ECM to cover all conditions and variables so you don't run into weird drivability issues under any conditions and also make sure the engine last.

What typically gets done on the Uprev if you wanted to keep it mild and reliable.

Any reason why you don't want to use EcuTek? It's generally considered to be better software, especially with the ability to tune VVEL, throttle tables, and traction control. I originally had my car tuned by Seb @ SpecialtyZ, but Rob @ ZCarGarage in San Jose is now doing EcuTek as well.

As for what to look out for in terms of longevity: make sure it's tuned for California 91 pump gas and don't touch the redline. These engines have oiling issues at high-rpm and you don't want to risk it.

Rob is the guy I am actually looking to go to since I live in San Jose. Last I spoke he is starting to use ecutek more but I got the impression he likes it more on the forced induction stuff.

Tweaking he vvel is one of those things that I am not so sure I want done as that is a very complex system and is just now starting to be tweaked and not having really seen the long term effects of it yet. This is my daily driver and I tend to keep my cars for a long time (this is only my second car after 16 years). So I take car of them and try to ensure they are built to last, I am not a pro racer so I don't need that last 2-3hp if it's going to drive cylinder temps up too high etc..

If you're concerned about longevity, Ecutek is by far the better option. Uprev has far less control over timing than Ecutek.

When you say that though wouldn't that mean the uprev would be staying closer to Oem tables which I would imagine would be on the safer side (less advance).

If you tell your tuner to stick to the oem tables, then sure. But that way you're giving up most of the gains to be had with a tune. If you leave timing alone, all you really get is an afr adjustment. That's not going to generate much power unless you've got enough mods to throw the oem ecu for a loop. But the best thing about ecutek is that it runs what you tell it to. You tell uprev what you want, and then it tries to figure out if that's what you really wanted after all.

As long as you've got a good tuner and you tell him not to go nuts, you'll be fine. These motors are stout. Guys are running 600+whp on the stock block. If it can take that, it'll be fine with a moderately aggressive NA tune. There just aren't a lot of people with popped NA motors that didn't do something really stupid.