joshuaho96

The LHD is aftermarket, there are no factory LHD R33s.

Yep, a rubber dead blow in an appropriate size is my go-to but those transmission fill plugs often have RTV and way too much torque applied to them.

Blue threadlocker + tightening by feel is probably the way to go then. You can feel fastener stretch. At first it will be relatively easy but usually you will hit a sudden increase in resistance. Once you get there don't go crazy with the force. A bit more is good enough.

https://www.nicoclub.com/service-manual?fsm=Sentra%2F2005%2Fem.pdf As far as I can tell there is no listed torque spec as it was not intended to be disassembled. It is probably either something like 7 ft-lbs or 12 ft-lbs. Assess what materials you're tightening into. If it's soft aluminum 5-7 ft-lbs is probably what you want.

When I check nicoclub for the 2005 Sentra factory service manual it mentions this step, so I would follow it.

This is another good video that focuses much more specifically on the locking pin.

The Haynes manual is basically telling you to retract the locking pin in the VVT cam phaser and then advance the sprocket all the way to the limit of travel and use a pin to hold it there. Why it tells you that I'm not sure. Go by the factory service manual instead for your car/engine. It's possible you have to do the same procedure but I have literally never heard of anything like this when timing a VVT engine. You can verify that the pin is not ruined by checking that it is straight, no visible gouging on the surface finish, and no cracks or anything like that. The pin is designed to basically work such that when oil pressure is removed from the cam phaser it will naturally retard and hit the lock position at which point the spring pushes the pin into the hardened lock pin seat. Cam phasing is adjusted from there by using a solenoid that controls how much oil pressure goes to each side of the cam phaser. You can see a breakdown of how it works on a Toyota version of the same idea here:

It will reduce noise substantially. When I got my car CA emissions compliant they added a bunch of cats and despite the Apexi catback and HKS front pipe it's quieter than a 100% stock exhaust. It also causes a hilarious amount of exhaust restriction because of how many they added but at least for now that means my turbos on wastegate boost no longer hit the R&R corner of the map.

Probably the average age of everyone here has moved up a decade too and people have re-learned the lessons of the 50s and 60s. Only takes a small group of people decatting their cars to have a significant impact on local air quality.

Nah full decats are obnoxious AF to everyone behind you in traffic. If it's not a track car you trailer to and from the track you should run a cat.

Does it do that when you're cruising at say 60-70 kph? At idle it will bounce between 20 and 80 for some time before finally getting too cold to read and going down to roughly 0 and staying there even when the engine is fully warmed up. O2 will start sluggishly responding around 30C coolant temp when you're driving around as well.

There's almost nothing in the ECU that is operating in closed loop fashion during cold start. Crack it open and see if you have any dead caps.

Rockauto has it listed for 60 USD: https://www.rockauto.com/en/moreinfo.php?pk=1644542&jsn=724

Check oil pressure yourself. Supposedly it can just be the solenoid failure and the gallery gaskets are actually fine.

I doubt any Skyline still running 10 years from now will actually matter for emissions.

The information asymmetry and resulting disasters I see is pretty bad out here.

Sell the car and buy something optimized for lightweight. You could replace all the body panels with dry carbon and only save maybe 140 kg while spending more on those body panels than the car itself. To actually reduce weight requires a complete rethink of the chassis, not window dressing. Look at how Lotus did it in their Elise and you have some idea of what it means to substantially reduce weight.

https://www.rockauto.com/en/moreinfo.php?pk=2656930&cc=1430921&pt=5416&jsn=886 https://www.rockauto.com/en/moreinfo.php?pk=2647470&cc=1429567&pt=5416&jsn=1004 Only difference is the A at the end. In the US the non-A version is listed for 2000-2003 Sentra and the A version is 2002-2006. I have a very hard time figuring out what the difference is just looking at the pictures at a glance. I have a hard time telling what head bolts can be trusted but TTY requires a new set every time. OEM in the US at least seems really cheap for head bolts, if it's only a few dollars each way I would just go OEM to not have to sweat it. Even then sometimes I just end up going OEM in cases like the RB26 oil pressure sensor where all the aftermarket alternatives are notorious for dying rapidly.

Mahle makes a head gasket kit for these engines, I'd probably go with them. The specific kit varies based on the series of the engine. They're on the expensive side for aftermarket but dramatically cheaper than OEM. On Rockauto though they have a set that is heavily discounted down to 30 USD before shipping for USDM Sentras built after 04/01/2003. Normally it's 85 USD. Nissan wants 80-90 USD for the head gasket alone so I'd call it a deal.

Interesting, anything you'd like to say in detail?

I personally value the parts that a VSpec gets because I have no plans to actually modify things like the suspension or rear diff. The question you're asking is how many people actually value those parts. Judging by how often these cars have aftermarket diffs and suspension all that's left is two underbody covers basically. Value is relative. To some people the mechanical diff is actually preferable in the base model because it means no A-LSD errors or other nonsense to deal with when you rip out the factory A-LSD found in a VSpec.

If actuator preload doesn't fix your problem it's possible that there is excessive wastegate bushing wear which will require pulling the turbos to fix. Not sure if that's a common issue with these cars though, it's mostly notorious in the BMW N54 turbos for whatever reason.

It's swings and roundabouts. Doesn't matter that much. The earlier VSpec 1 has slightly better undercoating from the factory, the headlights still have the level adjustment motors, small touches like that. Series 2 base model gets slightly improved brake bias. Focus on condition. Only worry about VSpec vs base if you actually care about the bits that come with the VSpec like the front diffuser, rear diffuser, A-LSD, and slightly stiffer OEM suspension.

I'm surprised setting preload can be done on the car, factory service manual procedure has a specified measurement method for it and it looks like it has to be done with the rack out of the car. I had a tiny, tiny seepage coming from that adjustment and I ended up just ignoring it because I didn't want to mess with the adjustment at all.