Tuning Feature: Nissan VK56VD Modified

"Comprehensive guide to performance tuning the Nissan VK56VD engine!"

We are always getting posts requesting information on the best tips for VK56VD power upgrades. So let us look into Nissan VK56VD upgrades and outline the best mods that work on this great engine and point out some common pitfalls along the way.

We shall examine the options for your VK56VD tuning and highlight the best upgrades. Nissan VK56VD are awesome to work on and with a few sensible tuning mods like remapping, turbo kits and camshafts you will greatly maximise the drivers enjoyment of your car.

When talking about the best parts for your VK56VD engine, we are going to focus on the modifications that give the best value for money.

Significant power gains can be made on engines, and the VK56VD is no exception, through cam upgrades. Altering the cam profile alters the intake and exhaust durations on the engine and can dramatically change the engines power and power output.

NB: Fast road cams normally increase the bhp through the rev range, you may sacrifice a little bottom end torque but your high end rpm power will be higher.

Motorsport cams, increase the high end rpm power band but as a result the car will not idle smoothly and low end power nearly always suffers.

A Motorsport and race cam is not great in heavy traffic.

You should ideally optimize your bhp range to your usage of the car so for a daily driver stick with a shorter duration VK56VD cam

Some VK56VD engines respond better to mild cam durations so set your engine up on a rolling road.

The ecu map and fuel pump and injectors also will say much on the bhp gains you'll make.

A longer valve duration can alter the bhp band and on most engines the exhaust and intake durations do not need to match, although most cams and tuners use matched pairs there are some advantages to extending the intake or exhaust durations.

VK56VD Tuning Stages

Stage 1 VK56VD modifications: Panel air filters, Sports exhaust manifold, Fast road camshaft, Drilled & smoothed airbox, Remaps/piggy back ECU, Intake headers.

Stage 2 VK56VD modifications: Sports catalyst & performance exhaust, induction kit, Ported and polished head, high flow fuel injectors, Fast road cam, fuel pump upgrades.

Stage 3 VK56VD modifications: Engine balancing & blueprinting, Adding or Upgrading forced induction (turbo/supercharger), Competition cam, Crank and Piston upgrades to alter compression, Twin charging conversions, Internal engine upgrades (head flowing porting/bigger valves).

The VK56VD engine blocks are fantastic to work on and we're finding that there are quite a few choices of parts and performance parts around.

ECU mapping allows a tuner to release the full potential of all the upgrades you've done to your VK56VD.

It will usually give around 30% more power on turbocharged vehicles and you can expect to see around 15% on NASP engines, but figures achieved may rely on the upgrades you've fitted and the condition of your engine.

It is vital to any performance tuning project to feed more fuel and air into each cylinder

Air Intake manifolds take the air from the filter and allow it to be fed into the engine and mixed with fuel.

The size of bore and shape and flow characteristics of the Intake manifold can make a substantial difference to to fuel atomisation on the VK56VD.

On popular production engines intake headers are needing aftermarket tuning parts, although a few makers provide reasonably good intake headers.

Increasing the VK56VD valve size, doing some VK56VD port enlargement and head flowing will also increase power, this will afford you increasing the power increase on other tuning mods.

Turbo upgrades for the VK56VD

NASP engines need quite a lot of work when you add a turbo, so we have a separate guide to help you take into account the pros and cons of going this route on your VK56VD

The more air you can get into an engine, the more fuel it can burn and uprating the induction with a turbocharger upgrade makes massive power gains.

If your car has forced induction tuning mods are going to make more power and most turbo charged engines are built using stronger components.

However you will find an engines have weakspots

See where you'll find these limits and install better quality components to handle the power.

There are many people spending a lot of money on turbo upgrades on the VK56VD only to watch the VK56VD go up in smoke just after it's been completed.

Big turbo chargers will usually suffer low end lag, and smaller turbo chargers spool up much more quickly but won't have the top end engines power gains.

Thankfully the choice of turbochargers is always evolving and we commonly find variable vane turbochargers, permitting the vane angle is altered according to speed to lower lag and increase top end bhp and torque.

Twin scroll turbochargers divert the exhaust flow into two channels and push these at differently profiled vanes in the turbo. They also boost the scavenging effect of the engine.

You'll commonly see there's a limitation in the air flow sensor MAP/MAF/AFM on the VK56VD when considerably more air is being drawn into the engine.

You'll see that 4 bar air sensors coping with quite large power gains, whereas the OEM air sensor sapped torque at a much lower level.

Adding a supercharger or additional turbo will make large power gains, although more difficult to setup. We have this guide to twinchargers if you want to read more.

Uprating VK56VD fuel injectors

You will need to ensure that the engine is not starved of fuel so must pay attention to the fuelling when you start extending past 20% of a torque increase.We would recommend you to over specify your injector capacity.

As a rule of thumb add 20% when buying an injector, which takes into account injector deterioration and allows you some spare capacity should the engine require more fuel.

We think this one is common sense, but you'll need to match your fuel injector to the type of fuel your car uses as well.

Best VK56VD performance exhausts

Only look to replace your exhaust if the existing exhaust is actually causing a restriction in flow.

On most factory exhausts you should find that the exhaust flow rate is still ok even on modest power gains, but when you start pushing up the power levels you will need to get a better flowing exhaust.

Sports exhausts can usually air flow through the engine but do not go too wide or you will reduce the flow rate. Stick to 1.5 to 2.5 inches as a rule of thumb.

Common exhaust restrictions are in the catalyst and filters installed, so adding a freer flowing race alternative will help avoid this restriction.

Problems and issues to look out for on the VK56VD

The VK56VD engines, if regularly serviced and maintained, are generally very reliable and have few issues. {But if neglected they can cost a small fortune|When neglected they get very expensive to run|They can however be quite expensive if neglected| }

Regular oil changes are vital on the VK56VD, particularly when the engine has been modified and is putting down more power than the manufacturer intended.

For more information on Tuning your VK56VD engine please join us in our friendly forum where you can discuss tuning options in more detail with our VK56VD owners. It would also be worth reading our unbiased tuning articles to get a full grasp of the benefits and drawbacks of each modification.

We need your help to complete and improve this page, so do give us your feedback in the comments box below.

We really like hearing from our readers, and hearing about which tuning parts were the most effective for them, it helps us improve our recommendations and articles to reflect current trends in modifications and ensures that our VK56VD guides and tips are kept up to date.

Please Check out my YouTube channel, we're regularly adding new content...

PLEASE HELP: I NEED YOUR DONATIONS TO COVER THE COSTS OF RUNNING THIS SITE AND KEEP IT RUNNING. I do not charge you to access this website and it saves most TorqueCars readers $100's each year - but we are NON PROFIT and not even covering our costs. To keep us running PLEASE Donate here

If you liked this page please share it with your friends, drop a link to it in your favourite forum or use the bookmarking options to save it to your social media profile.

Feedback - What do You Think?

Please use our forums if you wish to ask a tuning question, and please note we do not sell parts or services, we are just an online magazine.

Help us improve, leave a suggestion or tip

Your Constructive comments on this article, I really want to improve this article with your help and suggestions.


Please watch this video and subscribe to my YouTube channel.



Member Benefits

Join our forum today and benefit from over 300,000 posts on tuning styling and friendly car banter.

You will also have full access to the modifed car gallery, project car updates and exclusive member only areas.

(All car owners of all ages and from all countries are welcome).