I'm considering them in the 8-12 year old variety for a budget friendly dd work/fun car. They seem to sell cheap around here, cheaper, and seems to me like a lot more fun than say a plain jane civic. Four doors and fwd so it is easy to justify owning one and with the six speed it seems like it would be a hoot to drive. Any reason for me to not like these?
Pre cat breaks up, sucks into engine, crunchy pieces of catalyst inside engine ruins your day. A few warrantied when I worked at Nissan dealer, most of the higher mileage ones we serviced regularly had an engine replaced at least once or had an aftermarket exhaust manifold/header that replaced the pre cat manifold.
2001-2003 look the best in my opinion, later models are fuggly, and they just got even fugglier as newer generations were released.
they also have butterfly valves in the intake for some reason and the screws that hold them in tend to back out and get sucked in the engine breaking things that move. BUT that can be fixed for 5 bucks.
good things are the seats are comfy and you have ATB LSD with a 6 speed and with the power/weight you can have confidence passing people on the highway unlike if your DD was a base model fiesta.
all in all the QR engine is a disaster, they should have kept evolving the SR
As a previous owner, the two posts above pretty much cover why you shouldn't. They are a hoot, have a really good power to weight ratio and can be made to handle pretty well, but the QR has been problematic for A LOT of owners.
Had the factory dropped a VQ35 in it, I'd still own mine.
I bought one, replaced the missing IMRC screws and loctited them, put a header on it, discoverd it was too late, added a liter of oil every tank of gas for a while, bored it and installed new pistons. Once that was done, it was fun- Mine had the Brembo brake package which provides you with wonderful brakes, and 6 other items that make the car heavier...
I liked it.
In reply to kazoospec:
Altima SE-R is the answer.
fidelity101 wrote: In reply to kazoospec: Altima SE-R is the answer.
Does that have a LSD?
Interesting. So it sounds like these problems don't necessarily cause catastrophic failure right away, a guy could buy it and later find out he is screwed. That is good to know. I saw one on CL with 105k and a blown engine for pretty cheap. It doesn't bother me so much to buy a blown engine when I know that is what I'm getting. So if a guy has a good engine, fixes the intake and has an aftermarket exhaust is the engine still a liability, or does that take care of its problems?
This is when you open the hood and want to see an old looking header. I am installing the screws with Loctite green, they will never come out!
fidelity101 wrote: In reply to kazoospec: Altima SE-R is the answer.
Aren't the cheaper 100,000 mile SE-r Altimas ones still in the $10,000 price range?
kanaric wrote:fidelity101 wrote: In reply to kazoospec: Altima SE-R is the answer.Does that have a LSD?
The 5.5 gen 6-speed Maximas did have an optional LSD
Buy an SE if you are stuck on a B15. They have a LSD, 5-speed and an SR20 instead of the QR. Drive the piss out of it and if you want to go faster spend $900 bucks to slap a SR20VE in. 180ish WHP and no QR shenanigans.
pimpm3 wrote: Buy an SE if you are stuck on a B15. They have a LSD, 5-speed and an SR20 instead of the QR. Drive the piss out of it and if you want to go faster spend $900 bucks to slap a SR20VE in. 180ish WHP and no QR shenanigans.
If going to the trouble of an engine swap why not go bigger and drop a VQ30 or VQ35 in there?
clutchsmoke wrote:pimpm3 wrote: Buy an SE if you are stuck on a B15. They have a LSD, 5-speed and an SR20 instead of the QR. Drive the piss out of it and if you want to go faster spend $900 bucks to slap a SR20VE in. 180ish WHP and no QR shenanigans.If going to the trouble of an engine swap why not go bigger and drop a VQ30 or VQ35 in there?
Cheap ($900 on ebay), Easy , Good on gas, Revs to 7500 RPM, light weight, 200 WHP is a cam swap away. More power is easily made with the plethora of Turbo parts available for SR20's.
If you start with an SE you can reuse your motor mounts, tranny, Clutch, headers, and intake.
If you want a V6 with a manual buy a Maxima.
+1 on the Sentra SE. I absolutely love mine, I should get rid of it since we car pool to work now and haven't needed a DD for the last two years, but it's still so fun to drive and such a good car that I can't stand the thought of getting rid of it.
It took me on my honeymoon, it took me to college, it brought my daughter home from the hospital. I put 100,000 miles on that car myself. It's been super reliable, fun, and actually pretty practical. Pass up the SE-Rs and look for a 2000 or 2001 SE.
You know, the reason I like the SE-R is because I had a customer back in the day that had a B13, and I loved that car. It was so fun, and so stinkin plain. I just assumed that ten years later they would be improved. I guess thats not the case. The four doors appealed to me because I have two kids, but junk engines don't. Maybe I'll start looking at the older ones and see whats out there.
In reply to pimpm3:
I didn't know they came with LSD, yes the SE is a great sentra.
or G20 it!
pimpm3 wrote: Buy an SE if you are stuck on a B15. They have a LSD, 5-speed and an SR20 instead of the QR. Drive the piss out of it and if you want to go faster spend $900 bucks to slap a SR20VE in. 180ish WHP and no QR shenanigans.
Did all SE's come with an LSD?
The sport package ones all have LSD, not sure about others.
t25torx wrote:pimpm3 wrote: Buy an SE if you are stuck on a B15. They have a LSD, 5-speed and an SR20 instead of the QR. Drive the piss out of it and if you want to go faster spend $900 bucks to slap a SR20VE in. 180ish WHP and no QR shenanigans.Did all SE's come with an LSD?
My roommate has a 02 Spec V. We put conti DW's and koni yellows on it, and had a local shop do up an exhaust. It's a hoot to drive... when it works. He's gone through an engine(I blew it up during the cars maiden autoX run), like 5 coil packs, and some other little stuff since he bought it 3 years ago. IIRC they fixed a lot of the QR's blow-uppey problems in the later years.
My brain is just riddled with ADD. My current project that i've been working on for like two years is at 85-90% and all I can do is think about what I want to replace it with. I'm a little burned out on the thing. I went and stared at it last night. It got me a little more motivated. I need to quit worrying about "what car" and worry about "my car". I need to get it running and driving and enjoy it.
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