I've heard that having an oil cooler is a good idea.

I've always run one, nothing like lots of cool clean oil.

yep oil cooler is a must with a racing a series...would worry about one for a street one, unless doing burnouts all the time....

For those who are now a little nervous about rod bolts etc, here is my engine....

I brought an old A12 motor to do a "see what happens" Turbo project on...

This motor was stock as and stuffed, the person I brought it off tried putting a turbo on it and had NO idea. He tried a Nissan RB20 turbo with a down draught webber and still had full advance on the dizzy...

When I pulled it down it had been running lean, detonating, melted pistons and scored bores. My Brother had an old sunny motor that had 380,000ks on it, I took the pistons rods AND old bearings out of it and put in my motor.

The motor received a hone (which didnt get all the marks out) old pistons, rods, BOLTS, and bearing shells, a gasket kit, rings, NO BEARINGS, thats it.... NOTHING SPECIAL!!

A friend gave me a small TD04 turbo, I made some manifolds, fitted an oil cooler, a stromberg carbie and tuned it.....

It makes 70kw at the wheels (130-140hp), 16lbs boost from 3500rpm to 7000rpm, gets treated like I stole it and is still going, I have taken it to the track about 5 times and still hasnt blown up or even blown a head gasket!!!

The pistons, rods, bolts and bearing shells are nearly 30 years old, the block etc is older, it had a $150 dollars spent on the engine itself.... do we need to say any more???



This is a STOCK A12 Datsun motor, 7000rpm (power falls off at 6200 bcos std cam), 16lbs boost, 130-140hp.... and were asking are they reliable.....??

the gearing can keep you in the mid to high rpms all the time, sometimes you just end up running at 4000+ rpm for 90 minutes straight then refuel and another 90 minutes. ( someday I should post an in car video from an average highway trip 0-70 mph as fast as possible typically going up hill or behind a car that should be going lots faster then merge in and open up... { this is why nascar is popular here! } )

* yeah, realistically unless you like going 80+ mph all the time or live in CA you probably don't need one.

but moving the oil filter to a place you can get at easily is worth something too.

Weakness? The Nissan A-series has no weaknesses.

Other engines have weaknesses, like tendency to crack exhaust manifold, tendency to premature camshaft wear, etc. A-series has no such thing. Sure, no engine is unbreakable, but there is no inherent design flaws in the a-series.

a series is storng, no dounbt about it, but i wouldnt say they are not with out their "niggles".

I know of an old lady that ran it for 1 year with oil below the E mark..... just ran hot (she went to my mechanic for a service one day, first in 5 years)
they take abuse thats for sure... and my favorite... they have timing chains... i love engines with timing chains

the terminator of the motor world considering that some are coming up to 30 year old and are now being turbo charged and run reliably i think is amazing

Classic stories about a12!! love em

I almost fell over when I heard they ran steel rods and a steel crank. I couldn't believe it when I seen the stock double row tming chain and I couldn't believe that those weak APPEARING rockers can handle huge rpm with only wear issues not breakage issues!
One tip I received was to use 302 winsor conrod bolts if you want to achieve reliable big RPM, also with the flywheel bolts Craig advised me to use loctite on the threads and the bolt face to insure against a big metal frisbee exiting out the fender during a missed gear change.

Quote: If ever an A series flywheel breaks up during a missed shift, the fender will be the least of your worries as that flywheel is prety much in line with your foot.