Have you tried using Nissan's Ester oil? They claim it cures the valve train noise, in fact they wrote a TSB for it.

I drive my car around on the highway at 2000 rpm all the time. Still ticks. Still runs just fine. Gasoline engines make noise...that's just the way the world turns.

Yes Ester oil since the beginning.

Might have to invest in some tick filtering earplugs then. Just learn to ignore the noise, all the VQ's tick to some extent.

I ran NEO for the first 5k miles and now Redline since. There is no noise difference. Nissan's claim that NEO would make the motor quieter seems ridiculous.

Actually it has merit. The ester oil is made up of 0.5% of their nano-particles in suspension which are attracted to the DLC coating, theoretically allowing the metal surface to hold an oil film for a longer period, reducing friction and noise.

There have been plenty of articles talking about how great this technolgy is (in theory) but I've yet to see anyone do some empirical testing to see if it really does make a difference or if it is just marketing hype that allows them to sell overpriced oil.

The FSM refers to the lifters as hydraulic ones. At least that's the case with the HR, the VHR is probably the same.