HY51 Fuga Hybrid

[Duncan]

Well, much more to follow about the starting issue once I work it out, but in the meantime I was reminded that these are a very large car.  

This is the (very large!) trailer that we use for moving the race car and have had a head of other things on it like the Leaf and even the tractor at one stage. The Fuga only just fit width wise

And length wise....

....if it didn't have the big curve in the front bar I would have been calling a tow truck

On the bright side, I can confirm a tractor with a tow ball on the 3 point hitch is just as good as a forklift with a ball on the tines for manoeuvring and tilting a trailer

[Duncan]

ugh, almost a year since I posted about a car that is meant to be a daily driver.....suffice to say it still is not running OK and I'll post up once I've got it sorted.

In the meantime, Eric has done a community service by showing what in inside a VQ hybrid engine....and he didn't even have to pull it apart to do so (noting, he did indeed pull apart what was left). Makes me feel much better about the state mine is in, all those oily bits are still inside mine.

 

[sonicii]

yeah, that's not a VQ hybrid engine, it isn't even a VQ35HR..  that is a VQ35DD, which is a bit of a unicorn, only fitted to a couple of vehicles, but definitely not the hybrid.

It is a direct injected engine for a start, the HR isn't.

[Duncan]

well that would explain why it had a mechanical fuel pump that mine doesn't

[alburger87]

Late to the party, specifically joined this forum as I just bought one of these and this thread has been a gold mine of info. If the OP is still around, mind if I ask what gas you been putting in yours? Mine has a Japanese sticker in the cap saying premium but it seems to get way worse mileage on premium (95) than 91. I always thought it was meant to be the other way round🤷 I do think Nissans claimed "6l/100km" is a bit fantastical 😂

[GTSBoy]

Jap premium will be 100 RON. You should use 98.

[Duncan]

Yeah 98 for me, and 6.7/100 was my actual usage.

On the downside the bloody thing still isn't running properly but at least they hybrid system is happy now. It starts but missfires like a bastard, and isn't throwing any code except "missfire". Thanks scoop.

I did notice the AFMs are reading quite different at idle 1.33v and 1.67v so 25% variance (and have both changed and swapped them, the issue stays on the driver's side afm) so I'm looking for exhaust restriction (mouse nest?), compression issue or (hopefully not, no physical damage seen) wiring issue. Throttle might also be an issue but that is harder because you can't swap them side to side and not cheap to fire the parts cannon at.

[alburger87]

  On 05/12/2024 at 7:21 AM, Duncan said:

Yeah 98 for me, and 6.7/100 was my actual usage.

On the downside the bloody thing still isn't running properly but at least they hybrid system is happy now. It starts but missfires like a bastard, and isn't throwing any code except "missfire". Thanks scoop.

I did notice the AFMs are reading quite different at idle 1.33v and 1.67v so 25% variance (and have both changed and swapped them, the issue stays on the driver's side afm) so I'm looking for exhaust restriction (mouse nest?), compression issue or (hopefully not, no physical damage seen) wiring issue. Throttle might also be an issue but that is harder because you can't swap them side to side and not cheap to fire the parts cannon at.

Expand  

Thanks for the replies guys, I'm new to the world of hybrids. It's definitely a lot cheaper to run than my old m35 stagea that's for sure but yeah well shy of the claimed figures so far, hoping the batteries not poked (although it came with a 3 year warranty for the hybrid battery as well). Wondering if it'll take another tank for the ecu to figure out the higher octane if it's been run on 91 for a bit? 

[sonicii]

Pretty sure they run the same engine as the Q50 hybrid which specifies 95 RON.  I ran 98 in mine for a while, but it made no difference in performance or economy, so I have been using 95 for the last few years.  I have never hit 6.0L/100km, but have returned mid to high 6 on the highway.  Being a hybrid, fuel economy is a lot more dependant on how you drive it.  At 110km/h, mine never goes into EV mode on the highway, so returns closer to 7.5L/100.

urban driving can return low 8s if you are careful or over 10 if you are a bit more enthusiastic on the throttle.

[alburger87]

  On 11/12/2024 at 10:01 PM, sonicii said:

Pretty sure they run the same engine as the Q50 hybrid which specifies 95 RON.  I ran 98 in mine for a while, but it made no difference in performance or economy, so I have been using 95 for the last few years.  I have never hit 6.0L/100km, but have returned mid to high 6 on the highway.  Being a hybrid, fuel economy is a lot more dependant on how you drive it.  At 110km/h, mine never goes into EV mode on the highway, so returns closer to 7.5L/100.

urban driving can return low 8s if you are careful or over 10 if you are a bit more enthusiastic on the throttle.

Expand  

Yeah since those first 2 replies I actually went and put some 98 in it and tbf it's already doing much better than the 95 (which is weird and makes my inner tinfoil hat wearer think the 95 was a crap batch), getting 8ish around town. Again, wonder if it takes a while to stabilize if the fuel is changed a couple of times. I swear cars used to just either run "well" or "s**t* in my 20s, none of this fuel optimisation business haha 

[GTSBoy]

95 is just a scam outright. 98 is the real "premium" with all the best detergents and other additive packages, and at least historically, used to be more dense also. 95 is just 91 bargain basement shit with a little extra octane rating.

Of course, there's 91 and there's 91 also. I always (back in the 90s early 2000s) refused to put fuel in from supermarket related fuel chains on the basis that it was nasty half arsed shit imported from Indonesia. Nowadays, I suspect that there is little difference between the nasty half-arsed shit brought in by the "bargain" chains and the nasty half-arsed shit brought in by the big brands, given that most of it is coming from the same SEAsian refineries. Anyway - if there's still anything to that logic, then it would apply to 95 also. 98 is only made in decent refineries and, as I said, is usually the "premium" fuel, both in terms of octane rating and "use this because it's good for your engine because it's got the unicorn jizz in it!".

[sonicii]

98 and 95 have to meet the same national fuel standards beside the actual RON.  91 has lower standards (which are quite poor really), so 95 is certainly not 91 with some octane booster.

It would be an easier argument to claim 98 is just 95 with some octane boosters.

Also RON doesn't specify 'quality' in any sense, only the octane number.  Anything different retailers decide or not decide to add to their 95 or 98 is arbitrary and not defined by the RON figure.

[GTSBoy]

  On 12/12/2024 at 5:13 AM, sonicii said:

Also RON doesn't specify 'quality' in any sense, only the octane number.  Anything different retailers decide or not decide to add to their 95 or 98 is arbitrary and not defined by the RON figure.

Expand  

You're making my point for me.

95 is not "premium". It is a "slightly higher octane" version of the basic 91 product. The premium product that they want people to buy (for all the venal corporate reasons of making more profit, and all the possibly specious reasons of it being a "better" fuel with nicer additive packages) is the 98 octane stuff. 95 is the classic middle child. No-one wants it. No-one cares about it. It is just there, occupying a space in the product hierarchy.

Edited December 12, 2024 by GTSBoy

[sonicii]

But I think you missed mine..

there is also nothing about the 98 spec that supports your claim..  according to the fuel standards, it can be identical to 95, just very slightly higher octane number.

But the ulp vs pulp fuel regulations go show 95 (or 98), is not just 91 with some additives.

any claim of ‘refined by the better refineries’ or ‘higher quality fuel’ is just hearsay.  I have never seen anything to back up such claims other than ‘my mate used to work for a fuel station’, or ‘drove a fuel delivery truck’, or ‘my mechanic says’..

the actual energy densities do slightly vary between the 3 grades of fuel, but the difference is very minor.

That said, I am very happy to be proven wrong if anyone has some hard evidence..

Edited December 12, 2024 by sonicii

[GTSBoy]

I think you're really missing the point.

The spec is just the minimum spec that the fuel has to meet. The additive packages can, and do, go above that minimum if the fuel brand feels they need/want to. And so you get BP Ultimate or Shell Ultra (or whatever they call it) making promises to clean your engine better than the standard stuff....simply because they do actually put better additive packages in there. They do not waste special sauce on the plebian fuel if they can avoid it.

I didn't say "energy density". I just said "density". That's right, the specific gravity (if you want to use a really shit old imperial description for mass per unit volume). The density being higher indicates a number of things, from reduces oxygen content, to increased numbers of double bonds or cyclic components. That then just happens to flow on to the calorific value on a volume basis being correspondingly higher. The calorific value on a mass basis barely changes, because almost all hydrocarbon materials have a very similar CV per kg. But whatever - the end result is that you do get a bit more energy per litre, which helps to offset some of the sting of the massive price bump over 91.

I can go you one better than "I used to work at a fuel station". I had uni lecturers who worked at the Pt Stanvac refinery (at the time they were lecturing, as industry specialist lecturers) who were quite candid about the business. And granted, that was 30+ years ago, and you might note that I have stated above that I think the industry has since collected together near the bottom (quite like ISPs, when you think about it).

Oh, did I mention that I am quite literally a combustion engineer? I'm designing (well, actually, trying to avoid designing and trying to make the junior engineer do it) a heavy fuel oil firing system for a cement plant in fricking Iraq, this week. Last week it was natural gas fired this-that. The week before it was LPG fired anode furnaces for a copper smelter (well, the burners for them, not the actual furnaces, which are just big dumb steel).

I'm kinda all over fuels.

Edited December 12, 2024 by GTSBoy

[Duncan]

  On 11/12/2024 at 10:01 PM, sonicii said:

Pretty sure they run the same engine as the Q50 hybrid which specifies 95 RON.  I ran 98 in mine for a while, but it made no difference in performance or economy, so I have been using 95 for the last few years.  I have never hit 6.0L/100km, but have returned mid to high 6 on the highway.  Being a hybrid, fuel economy is a lot more dependant on how you drive it.  At 110km/h, mine never goes into EV mode on the highway, so returns closer to 7.5L/100.

urban driving can return low 8s if you are careful or over 10 if you are a bit more enthusiastic on the throttle.

Expand  

Yeah I haven't found anything different between the Fuga/Q70 and Skyline/Q50 hybrid drivetrains. I think its also worth remembering that the engine (VQ35HR) is from a 350z originally; unlike say the Toyota hybrid engines it is not totally tuned for economy, there is still a bit of life/fun in it and the setup goes well with 225+50kw available

BTW, FWIW my only qualifications on fuel are that I burn a lot of it. I use the cheapest grade the car is rated for (95) and at times when it was not available have run 94 (E10) without any issue. Same goes for cars I have rated (or tuned) for 98....prices vary a lot in country towns and just last week the cheapest 98 in town was 50c higher than E10, I'm not going to pay more than I have to.

[GTSBoy]

I only drive the car that needs 98 (and currently would probably prefer 100!).

The RAV and the Swifts can burn whatever the female family members put in them and I won't comment. They (the cars) are beneath my level of care, in the same category as air fryers and having your nails done.

[MBS206]

 find it funny everyone claims different fuel chains, do different things with their fuel blah blah blah.

We don't have that many fuel terminals in Australia. The fuel tanker trucks drive into the terminal, fill up, and drive directly to the service station and dump out.

The majority of fuel you get, is coming out of the same terminals. The variation is actually at the individual service stations and how good their tanks are, as well as how much turn over they actually have. Older fuel stations, that haven't had their tanks replaced are going to end up with the worst fuel. Also a lot of older stations have shit design, and shit maintenance, and end up with more water absorption into the tank. This is when you then get a bad batch of fuel.

Other shit things happen, like tanker drivers have a f**k up, and starting to unload the wrong compartment on their truck into the wrong tank. 

[The Bogan]

  On 15/12/2024 at 3:21 AM, MBS206 said:

 find it funny everyone claims different fuel chains, do different things with their fuel blah blah blah.

We don't have that many fuel terminals in Australia. The fuel tanker trucks drive into the terminal, fill up, and drive directly to the service station and dump out.

The majority of fuel you get, is coming out of the same terminals. The variation is actually at the individual service stations and how good their tanks are, as well as how much turn over they actually have. Older fuel stations, that haven't had their tanks replaced are going to end up with the worst fuel. Also a lot of older stations have shit design, and shit maintenance, and end up with more water absorption into the tank. This is when you then get a bad batch of fuel.

Other shit things happen, like tanker drivers have a f**k up, and starting to unload the wrong compartment on their truck into the wrong tank. 

Expand  

Costco uses Mobile as a supplier, I always get Costco 98 when I'm near one, they are typically about 30 cents or more cheaper than the local Mobile

[MBS206]

  On 15/12/2024 at 7:18 AM, The Bogan said:

Costco uses Mobile as a supplier, I always get Costco 98 when I'm near one, they are typically about 30 cents or more cheaper than the local Mobile

Expand  

Did you hit the one 5 minutes down the road from my place before heading back south? 😛