Hey how's it going, wanted to make this post (been thinking about it but been busy). Long story short I picked up a GS300 2 years ago (i needed a daily BAD), found this super mint 1 owner grandma owned GS300 so it was a very solid daily pickup. Previously I wanted to find a decent IS300 to build but could never find one for a realistic price so i settled for the GS and over time looking at other builds this thing started to grow on me, aesthetically I never liked them but now i do haha. Not to get too long winded, I started replacing everything on the suspension, everything was SHOT so i started digging into and and now im building the damn car in typical car enthuast fashion. My question/questions are, I want to go manual swap, CD009 for sure will be the transmission route and I had been planning to build a NA-T setup. A friend of mine needed some help with his car (im a mechanic 20yrs, he doesn't work on cars so i helped him out with another car he picked up). Long story short he has a 1JZ non-vvti and kinda offered to sell it to me for a friend price because he won't be using it, with that being said i been trying to figure out what route to go now. I wouldn't mind swapping and running the 1JZ stock then throw on some supporting mods and have a fun daily/street car, 500-600hp would be nice. My thing is what is more realistic, can I swap the 1JZ in and be able to retain all my NA 2JZ ac/alternator/heater stuff fairly easy, do they drop right in or is it a lot of miniscule stuff that has to happen? obviously building a NA-T at minimum going the turbo route rods/pistions/bearings will need to be changed. Just seeing who has done what and what makes more sense. Thanks for any info/suggestions in advance.

 

My initial thoughts are that you're going to be doing mostly the same work to either engine to reach your power goals, but the 1JZ has the disadvantage of lower displacement and figuring out compatibilities with the car.

 

yea that's kinda what was thinking but the !JZ is so cheap but yea i hear you

 

Is it a 1JZ GTE non VVTi turbo or twin turbo? Or just a regular 1JZ GE non VVTi? If it's a GTE, and came from the factory built for boost, then that could be a great starting place for 500-600hp without having to spend any building the motor. If it's a GE, and your planning on doing rods and pistons you might as well just add a turbo to your factory engine so you don't have to deal with everything else like heater hoses and the air conditioning and everything else. There have been plenty of NA/T builds with 700-800hp and the bottom end of the block was never the weakest link in the chain. I would go with a JDM 2JZGTE swap and start with that as your foundation if there is something about your current engine that makes you nervous about forcing a little more air down it's throat? I am not sure what the advantage would be to go with the 1JZ unless it's a GTE, and already got some boost on it?

 

yea it's a 1JZ GTE non vvti and those things are pretty stout, old for sure but they are pretty reliable from what i've seen. I have the NA 2JZ as it's my daily but it isn't worth trying to turbo it stock, i've seen enough people blow them up so if i did go the NA-T route i'd for sure put rods/pistons in it at minimum, those NA rods are tiny in comparison to the GTE rods. Also i don't have the funds for a JDM 2JZ engine, it's either get the 1JZ off of my friend for dirt cheap OR build a NA-T

 

if your going with the 1JZ GTE, and budget is a priority, you should probably look for an R154 trans, the CD009 is definitely the better choice, but the bell housing adapter and everything to adapt to a 1JZ is going to cost at least $5,000 plus the transmission. You can find them in the wrecking yard for reasonable prices but still, it's an expensive path. Compared to the R154 which was the standard engine option during certain years in the GS300, SC300, and IS300. They can be harder to find then the Nissan tranny, but if you could find a donor vehicle, you would be able to get everything you need to do a bolt in swap. If you decide not to go down that path just yet, I think the 1JZ will bolt right up to your factory A650E. You could add a looser torque converter and a shift kit so it matches up better with the power output of a turbo engine.

 

well budget is somewhat priority but i meant more i dont plan on spending money where it doesn't make sense (i.e. going the JDM 2JZ route), im defintely set on the CD009 route given how strong they are, R154 would be nice but for what you pay a CD9 is the better route there. Maybe building a NA-T is the better option

 

Once you open up the bottom end and start replacing pistons, rods, bearings etc, then it's not really an NA-T build anymore. For what your describing, I would just add a small single turbo to your factory setup. You'll be able to run 400hp to the wheels without any trouble on your factory bottom end. And without spending any money to beef up factory parts. The rear end, the transmission, the cooling system, all should hold up pretty well. Obviously if your beating it all the time, your going to start finding weak links. But 10psi, a good intercooler or methonal injection, and a good engine management system and you'll have a fun car for less than $5,000. You'll find anything you need to upgrade, like the fuel pump, can be sourced from an Aristo. One advantage to getting a 2JZ GTE, besides it being ready to handle a lot of boost, is the money you spend can be recouped without much difficulty. Money spent going the NA-T route is basically gone once you spend it. And it doesn't really increase the value of the car. But going with the 2JZGTE swap doesn't involve a lot of work or expensive parts to swap it over. So in the future if something happens to the car like an accident, you can pull the engine back out and sell it for approximately what you paid for it.

 

well not necessarily, there's tons of videos on youtube that many people say they're building a NA-T setup and all of those videos consist of people upgrading the pistons/rods to be able to take going the turbo route on a factory NA 2JZ. Not sure where you got that from ( i mean that respectfully), regardless if i went the NA-T/2JZ na engine I will be upgrading internals, seen way too many people blow them up and the rods typically seem to be the first thing that fails on them at least from what i've seen. I'd want to build it to have room to make more, 400-500 i'd be happy with but i'd rather have the insurance of quality parts than trusting the NA weak rods. Also Im not worried about trying to get money back, I like to build a car for enjoying it not trying to build to sell it to make profit lol. I'm wayyy too deep money wise in my street/drift car and wouldn't make half of what I put into it but that's fine I like to keep my cars.