3.6 L V-6

[waverider]

Don't laugh too hard, but I was driving my wife's 2004 Nissan Quest minivan with the 240 horse 3.6 V-6 yesterday and it dawned on me that this is a powerful motor! That van hauls ass!

I've been thinking about putting a 4.3 Chevy in my Toyota pickup but now I am thinking I might want this Nissan engine in my Toyota.

So, who has done an engine swap with this motor?

Discuss :D

[85blue4runner]

some mini van engines, especially front wheel drive ones are mounted tranverse in the chassis and sit kind of high. if they drive the front wheels then there is a transaxle and maybe a weird center diff of some kind for a rear or AWD application, which is sometimes an option. someone mentioned this from a previa i think (which uses a version of the 22RE series) but the design changes create problems, so do your research on the size, weight, mounting, transmission, etc of that particular motor as it maybe more of a PITA than its worth...

[hlb3]

Its a 3.5 not a 3.6 and the Quest isn't the only thing it was used in. The 350Z and 00 or 01-04 Pathfinders also use the VQ35 in a standard rear wheel configuration, the Maxima and Altima also could be had with the VQ35 but are also front wheel drive.

The main thing about swapping these motors is going to be the cost of finding one with everything the need since they are from such new vehicles. The new VQ40 that is in the '05 Frontiers and X's would probably be an even better choice if you could find one 265hp and 284 lbs-ft of torque.

[nissanrondo]

Great Nissan engine choice, very powerful. But consider what trans and tcase you want. I can't imagine there is a market for a trans adapter for anything besides Nissan. So if can be used with an inline Nissan trans then the 2 options are out there. Run the TX1OA Nissan case which is very strong but has a sorry 2:1 low range, then spend 1300 bones to put it to 4:1, and have the output on the wrong side for your yota, or do a divorced tcase of some kind, which would be better.
Also do the cost analysis; my guess is it'll be much cheaper and easier to swap in a 4.3 V6 since motor mounts can be found for yotas, and parts are common and cheaper. The 4.3 is a great engine! I had a 97 S10 Blazer at one time and although the rest of the vehicle leaked like a French submarine, the engine was awesome.