Performance Upgrades: Nissan 300zx Twin Turbo

It would seem that once you have experienced a bit of horsepower in a sports-car, you always want more... and so was the case with me. When I purchased the Z back in 2005 it had 83,000 original miles and already a few modifications done to it: an upgraded air intake filter, 2.5" catback exhaust, and a custom tune to the ECU. The car produced a respectable 270 horsepower to the wheels and definitely had some pickup. What it lacked, however, was real strong high-end power, which could only be obtained with larger turbos and all the supporting parts. So the planning and the saving began to upgrade the Z.

I saved up money for sometime in order to purchase all the needed parts, it was no small list.

I found a few key people through the Z community during my ownership of the Nissan Z's. Harry, also known as "Ztuner" with 300zx enthusiasts, is one of the most knowledgeable Z tuners in the country, and he just so happens to live in Sarasota. He knows these cars inside and out, and without his help this project would have never finished. Another friend I met along the way was Derrick with A.R.T. (Advanced Race Technology), he was just opening his own mechanics/performance shop at the time of my project, and so it worked out great to have access to a lift, garage and tools. I learned a lot through the upgrade process, and you'd have to when you pull an entire engine and transmission out of a car and put it back in. From start to finish the project took about 3 months of planning and ordering and close to 2 months of working on the car.

The end result of the project was a gain of over 200HP to the wheels, almost doubling my previous horsepower! The hardest part was getting the car back and having to drive it "easy" to break in the new turbos and parts. Those few 100 miles felt like they took forever to complete! After 2 weeks the parts were broken in enough to tune and test the engine on the dyno. After tweaking the tune a few times and about 5 pulls, we pushed the engine up to 473HP to the wheels on race gas. The Z now has 105k miles and still runs like a champ!

Check out the gallery below for pictures of all the parts and details on the build!