Info on 3L RB30 petrol GQ please!!

[Nev]

I just wanted any info or experiences with the 3L petrol GQ patrols. I know they have a weaker gearbox but is the rest of the drivetrain any different? What are they like offroad? Is power even remotely good? and how are they are on fuel? any info on them would be much appreciated and opinions are welcome!! thanks

[Daisy]

havin driven a mates... i can honestly say they lack a fair bit of power...

reliability. - they're a vl commodore motor / skyline engine and they can go on and on..

power - sucks.. they like to rev hard to make power meanin more fuel..

they come with 4.3 diff ratios...

small shafts, small gearbox, small engine, small flanges.

TOM

[GRINCH]

the

[GRINCH]

the drivetrain on the 3L is much the same other then the gear box and diff ratios. power can be gain a lot by putting fuel injection off a commodore on or evan better huge gains can be made with turbo. engine parts are relatively cheap. down side off road is the 3l lacks low down torque and the factory carby hates hills. fuel economy is better then the 4.2s by a bit or with fuel injection they get reasonable economy (5.5-6 km\l running 35's around town)

over all there not bad value for the money, but if you had the extra cash id probly look at a diesel.

[Beastmavster]

5.5-6km/l around town with 35"s is way better than my SWB carby 4.2 which is about 4km/l (non peak hour town travel on 33"s)

Efi out of a Skyline or Commodore would help, as would the turbo Commodore bits. Replacing the engine with the higher compresson Commodore/Skyline EFI motor would be better again (or of course the turbo motor - if you can fine one these days).

They are also interchangeable with the other RB Series engines. The upside of this is that all of them have way more power (even the 20DE would) but they are lower capacity so you'd have to drive it more like a big zuk (lots of revs) than a Patrol.

They're also stupidly cheap to replace - you can bulk buy 20DE's for $100-$200 a pop if you wanna experiment with turbocharging/supercharging. Neo's and godzillas are expensive, but an R32 skyline GTR donk probably wouldnt cost you any more than the final cost for a V8 swap with adaptor plates and custom parts.

You do see early GTR engines in wreckers for $4-6k these days.

In summary:

RB20 DE (too small for real grunt)
RB20 DET (Still too small even though the turbo puts out up to 160kw)
RB25 DE (much better)
RB25 DET (Much much better - 180kw)
RB25 DET Neo (R34 - 206 kw woohooo!)
RB26 DETT Woooties!

I dont think I could recommend a RB30 carby for a long wheelbase unless you had other plans for it - at least the EFI swap. That's a lot of weight for that engine - the skylines with EFI were pulling half the weight.

[smac]

i know of a guy that had one (not sure if he still does) and he has taken it through the simpson desert, for what he wanted, it was a fine vehicle.

anyone tried Supercharging this motor?

but yeah, as mentioned above, you could band in a jap import motor - RB26DETT would be awesome

[AFeral]

I've got one. Its a bit slow compared to te 4.2 but uses less fuel. engine bits are cheap and very readly avaliable.
Castlemain rod shop do a super charge conversion for $1900 but it has to be fuel injected first.
Heads off the skyline can be fitted too. Just do a search on nissan rb30 engines theres loads of info.
over all i'm happy with mine, fuel imjection is on the cards very soon.

[Beastmavster]

Power for EFI is about 114kw in commodore skyline trim, but it's in the mid 5000 rpm range. The RB 30 is a fantastic motor..... if not looked after by Holden Mechanics. I dunno exact spec on the carby RB30 - probably about 100kw.

RB30 Turbo is 150kw (get tuned up to 700kw by the drag race boys) so they're bloody strong.

Expect both of these to be pretty conservative figures compared to the way Holden quote their power figures today. Also pretty easy to get a lot more out of both engines - considering the capacity and EFI they're in a very mild tune and easy to wake up. 38kw/litre is not gonna be a gutless bottom end.

Compare them to the boat anchor L series....the MQ L28 carby was 88kw... L28 Carby Skyline about 120kw, L24 carby was 114kw as well.
L28 EFI out of the 280ZX was claimed to be 134kw (180hp).

[Brunsy]

I bought a 3.0L six months ago and i am currently doing the turbo upgrade on the existing hi-comp engine. I have had RB-30's for over ten years and worked at Nizpro for about five. In this time i have learned what a great engine these are.
The conversion is fairly straight forward and you will be looking at a conservative 140-160 kw at the wheels on premium fuel, ( hi oct fuel is the only down side when touring). Mine will have a front mount GTi-r intercooler, Hi flowed turbo and standard computer and injectors. So far this has cost me 1500 bucks. Interestingly enough I just sold my HZ ute which had an RB-30 from my mates wrecked patrol it had 240.000 kms i turboed it with aftermarket managment and spun the dyno to 218kw at the rears, Was lots of fun for years. Anyways if you allready have the car just start collecting the bits, it will be worth it.
Incase you are interested mine currently still has the standard carby and exhaust manifold 33 inch tyres and from batemans to melb was getting 20 L/ 100
fully laden, not too bad in my opinion but struggled to keep 100 on hills.
cheers brunsy.
have a look at my cooler pics