This Nissan 350Z Drift Car Was Running With No Oil Filter, So It Got A Fresh LS V8
Buying a car that’s already drift spec is always a gamble, and Gears and Gasoline just found out how big a gamble. Its 2008 Nissan 350Z Coupe came pre-built by a previous owner who, let’s say, did things their own way. The fit and finish was rough, there were self-tapping screws everywhere, and the engine was the worst of the lot. The fix? About as American as it gets.
The Nissan 350Z Gets A Replacement GM V8
The Z already had a 5.3-liter LS truck V8 swapped in. Problem is, the previous owner left it with metal chunks inside. Bringing it back would have taken forever, so the crew just went out and bought another truck engine. The replacement is an L33, the aluminum-block 5.3-liter LS V8 that GM put in the Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra from 2005 to 2007. Cheap, everywhere, and parts are a dime a dozen.
These guys are lifelong JDM fans, and it shows. Coming from twin-cam engines with multiple timing chains, the dead-simple pushrod layout had them seriously impressed. Line up two dots, pull the cam sprocket, done. They stripped it to a bare long block, swapped in fresh valve stem seals, and fitted a Richard Holdener cam and valve spring kit that cost $280 shipped. Holdener says it’s good for 60 hp over stock. There’s no dyno run in the video, though, so that’s his number, not theirs.
The LS Swap’s Missing Oil Filter And First Drive
Then the previous owner struck again. The front-sump oil pan in this car deletes the factory oil filter mount, so you’re supposed to run a remote filter. They never did. The old engine had been running with no oil filter at all. No, it’s not a joke. The crew fitted a big remote racing filter, plumbed in the oil cooler lines, and sent the LS3 intake manifold off for an ultrasonic clean. That intake was likely one of the reasons the first engine died. It came back free of gunk and most of its paint. The leaky 2-inch exhaust got tossed for a simple turndown pipe.
The first fire wasn’t pretty. The starter signal wire was going to ground instead of the starter, and once that was fixed, the cammed V8 could barely hold an idle on the old tune. A fresh calibration from their tuner sorted that out. Then came the first drive. The steering was brutally heavy, which turned out to be a bone-dry power steering reservoir. A top-up fixed it. The e-brake still doesn’t work, but hey, it’s a drift car. It runs, it drives, and through that turndown it sounds nasty. Not bad for a Z that spent its last life without an oil filter.
Source: Gears & Gasoline YouTube
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