L20 block and E30 head whats going on?

[bigjohnsonzc]

Question here guys, im newish to the site but not new to cars... my question to you all is i can find much on my new addition, i was told its a 76 280z stock engine block and head combo.

The head is stamped E30 and block is L20 113021....

the trans is 7915213...

now im just trying to figure out what year it really is and if it is really the stocker that came with the car. ...

the car has a GS31010985 vin number and again i cant find anything on that as well... im tryin to do alot of configuring but ive ran out of places to go....:stupid:

ive heard that this head is a one of a kind type thing and same with the block.... Is it really?

HELP ME OUT GUYS!!!

[d240zx2]

E30 is a good number. Methinks you may have misread the block number as being an L20. L20 blocks are 4 cylinders. It is quite possible the PO (or prior PO) put an E30 head on an L28 block.

2 cents

Frank

[geezer]

E30 is a good number. Methinks you may have misread the block number as being an L20. L20 blocks are 4 cylinders. It is quite possible the PO (or prior PO) put an E30 head on an L28 block.

2 cents

Frank

I'm not that well versed when the topic of the L20 comes up, but I know the L20 that the Japanese home market cars came with were inline 6 cylinder engines putting out 130hp. The E30 head is the one that came with it. You could run one on a L24, but the compression ratio would be upped a bit. One of my L24s has a E30 head on it. There is nothing "one of a kind" about it.

[Nota280]

The L20 with the e30 head is the standard Fairlady Z motor. Nothing special about them.

There should be a tag in the engine bay with the original engine number. Most everything on the tag will be in Japanese except the numbers.

[kiwi303]

Nissan have the L20B, then the L20A and the L20E, one is a 4 cyl, the other pair are 6 cylinders.

My old '81 and '83 nissan Laurels (Medallist daily Driver and standard parts car) both had L20 2.0L straight 6 engines. the L20A are long stroke (undersquare), so not very fast revving, but with a load of torque. Ideal for a touring luxury waggon like the Laurel medallist, but hopeless for a sports car. So your L20 would probably be a the L20E, a bored, but shorter stroke version of the L20A revving faster for more power less torque.

Early Skylines used the L20E and with a turbo, L20ET.

[Mr Camouflage]

Check the vin tag for the original engine number.

[Carl Beck]

Nissan have the L20B, then the L20A and the L20E, one is a 4 cyl, the other pair are 6 cylinders.

My old '81 and '83 nissan Laurels (Medallist daily Driver and standard parts car) both had L20 2.0L straight 6 engines. the L20A are long stroke (undersquare), so not very fast revving, but with a load of torque. Ideal for a touring luxury waggon like the Laurel medallist, but hopeless for a sports car. So your L20 would probably be a the L20E, a bored, but shorter stroke version of the L20A revving faster for more power less torque.

Early Skylines used the L20E and with a turbo, L20ET.

Nissan had the L20 circa 65-68, followed by the redesigned L20A in 69, then the L20E and L20ET as inline six cylinder engines. Yes the four cylinder is the L20B. I think your 81/83 would have had the L20A not an L20.

I'd be interested in knowing / hearing more about a shorter stoke, larger bore version - I'd seen reports that the L20E was simply a fuel injected version of the L20A. Where did you find the spec.'s for shorter stroke, larger bore versions?

FWIW,

Carl B.

[HS30-H]

.......i was told its a 76 280z stock engine block and head combo.

First thing you need to do is stop listening to people who will tell you stuff like that ;-)

the car has a GS31010985 vin number and again i cant find anything on that as well... im tryin to do alot of configuring but ive ran out of places to go....:stupid:

'GS31-010985' ( note that important hyphen ) would be a C-GS31 model 'Fairlady Z 2/2', 'Fairlady Z-L 2/2', or 'Fairlady Z-T 2/2' model produced in 1977.

Judging by the body serial number of '010985' I'd take a semi-educated guess that it will have been produced around the months of September or October - but don't quote me on that. If you really want to get closer to the actual month of manufacture then there are plenty of little manufacturing date clues all over the car, and the SEARCH function of the forum will quickly show you the many threads where we have discussed them in the past.

Pinning down the actual trim & spec model should not be too difficult if you use a process of deduction. The 'poverty-spec' GS31-S 'Fairlady Z 2/2' would have come from the factory with a 4-speed trans, rubber mats instead of carpet and no rubber trim on the bumpers. Fairly unlikely that too many people would have bothered personally exporting such a beast. It is much more likely to be a GS31 'Fairlady Z-L 2/2' or GS31-J 'Fairlady Z-T 2/2' - with the 'T' being the higher-specced and therefore higher-cost of the two. The 'ZL' and 'ZT' came with a 5-speed trans, but were also offered with an Auto ( coded as GS31-A and GS31-AJ models respectively ). You'll have to give us more details on the actual car for us to be able to tell whether it started life as a 'ZL' or 'ZT'. Of course many things could have been changed down the years, and don't forget that Japanese buyers also had the dealer option lists to spec their car more personally when they ordered them.

You really need a factory parts list and factory workshop manual covering this model to help you understand the original spec of the car, and to help you understand what has been changed over the years that it has been in the hands of others.

There should be a tag in the engine bay with the original engine number. Most everything on the tag will be in Japanese except the numbers.

If the original engine bay tag is still present, it will unfortunately not have the engine block number stamped onto it. Most Japanese market S30 & S31-series Z cars did not have a note of the original engine block number attached to the car. It was on the block itself, and on the paperwork. Nowhere else.

My old '81 and '83 nissan Laurels (Medallist daily Driver and standard parts car) both had L20 2.0L straight 6 engines. the L20A are long stroke (undersquare), so not very fast revving, but with a load of torque. Ideal for a touring luxury waggon like the Laurel medallist, but hopeless for a sports car. So your L20 would probably be a the L20E, a bored, but shorter stroke version of the L20A revving faster for more power less torque.

Early Skylines used the L20E and with a turbo, L20ET.

Some strange data there....... ????

The L20A and L20E engines fitted to Japanese home market S30/S31-series Z cars both had a bore of 78mm and a stroke of 69.7mm.

I'm not sure that I'd call 69.7mm a "long" stroke, especially compared to the 73.7mm stroke of the L24 and the 79mm of the L26 and L28 engines. Factory figures for the L20A with the 8.6:1 compression ratio ( earlier cars were higher ) were 130ps @ 6,000 rpm and 17kg-m @ 4,400 rpm. With the factory diff ratios and relatively close ratio 5-speeds, these cars were far from sluggish for the period when new.

GS31-010985 would have been fitted with an L20E engine from the factory, with Nissan's EGI fuel injection and probably NAPS ( Nissan Anti Pollution System ) emissions equipment - depending on exact model type and the part of Japan that it was originally sold in. How much of its original spec still remains today - and indeed whether it is even the original unit that came with the car from the factory - is going to depend who has been tinkering with it over the years, and how much they knew about it.

We have discussed these models many times on this forum in the past, so the archives will contain some good information that the SEARCH function will signpost the way toward........

Alan T.

[Nota280]

Alan is right about the engine bay tag. After looking at mine it does not have the engine number stamped in. Sorry about that, did not mean to pass on bad information. I have been disassembling to many 280Z's lately.

[kiwi303]

Some strange data there....... ????

The L20A and L20E engines fitted to Japanese home market S30/S31-series Z cars both had a bore of 78mm and a stroke of 69.7mm.

Alan T.

Sorry about the the mixup there, by "long stroke" I simply meant they were undersquare, as in having a longer length of stroke than they had a diameter of bore.

It's been quite a few years since I had the Laurels, so I can't remember the bore and stroke data exactly, but at the time I went to the library in the city I was in at the time and photocopied parts of the workshop manuals the library stocked.

The cars engine data for the L20 version fitted to the laurel medallist was given as 1998cc with a stroke LONGER than the bore diameter. I wish I was still there and could drop by the library and check again. But I'm positive the stroke was more than the bore. which doesn't jibe with the data for the Z cars using the same engines.

[sblake01]

You might be referring to the Cedric P130 engine which was a J20. It was an OHV straight 6, 1973cc, with a bore and stroke of 73x78.6.

[bigjohnsonzc]

First thing you need to do is stop listening to people who will tell you stuff like that ;-)

'GS31-010985' ( note that important hyphen ) would be a C-GS31 model 'Fairlady Z 2/2', 'Fairlady Z-L 2/2', or 'Fairlady Z-T 2/2' model produced in 1977.

Judging by the body serial number of '010985' I'd take a semi-educated guess that it will have been produced around the months of September or October - but don't quote me on that. If you really want to get closer to the actual month of manufacture then there are plenty of little manufacturing date clues all over the car, and the SEARCH function of the forum will quickly show you the many threads where we have discussed them in the past.

Pinning down the actual trim & spec model should not be too difficult if you use a process of deduction. The 'poverty-spec' GS31-S 'Fairlady Z 2/2' would have come from the factory with a 4-speed trans, rubber mats instead of carpet and no rubber trim on the bumpers. Fairly unlikely that too many people would have bothered personally exporting such a beast. It is much more likely to be a GS31 'Fairlady Z-L 2/2' or GS31-J 'Fairlady Z-T 2/2' - with the 'T' being the higher-specced and therefore higher-cost of the two. The 'ZL' and 'ZT' came with a 5-speed trans, but were also offered with an Auto ( coded as GS31-A and GS31-AJ models respectively ). You'll have to give us more details on the actual car for us to be able to tell whether it started life as a 'ZL' or 'ZT'. Of course many things could have been changed down the years, and don't forget that Japanese buyers also had the dealer option lists to spec their car more personally when they ordered them.

You really need a factory parts list and factory workshop manual covering this model to help you understand the original spec of the car, and to help you understand what has been changed over the years that it has been in the hands of others.

If the original engine bay tag is still present, it will unfortunately not have the engine block number stamped onto it. Most Japanese market S30 & S31-series Z cars did not have a note of the original engine block number attached to the car. It was on the block itself, and on the paperwork. Nowhere else.

Some strange data there....... ????

The L20A and L20E engines fitted to Japanese home market S30/S31-series Z cars both had a bore of 78mm and a stroke of 69.7mm.

I'm not sure that I'd call 69.7mm a "long" stroke, especially compared to the 73.7mm stroke of the L24 and the 79mm of the L26 and L28 engines. Factory figures for the L20A with the 8.6:1 compression ratio ( earlier cars were higher ) were 130ps @ 6,000 rpm and 17kg-m @ 4,400 rpm. With the factory diff ratios and relatively close ratio 5-speeds, these cars were far from sluggish for the period when new.

GS31-010985 would have been fitted with an L20E engine from the factory, with Nissan's EGI fuel injection and probably NAPS ( Nissan Anti Pollution System ) emissions equipment - depending on exact model type and the part of Japan that it was originally sold in. How much of its original spec still remains today - and indeed whether it is even the original unit that came with the car from the factory - is going to depend who has been tinkering with it over the years, and how much they knew about it.

We have discussed these models many times on this forum in the past, so the archives will contain some good information that the SEARCH function will signpost the way toward........

Alan T.

HS30-H thank you!1

You gave loads of info there.. thankyou! well i can fill you in a lil bit more on the car.. and yes it is fuel injected and it is a five speed trans.. i just spent a few buck in the trans trying to get it fixed with minimal parts available.. anyways.. the engine number is there and i got the specific number on it if you want them to tell me more.. if need be.. with what you were saying the

]L20E is more likely what i have than? is that good? i would have expected a L28 but odviously japan didnt like that idea at the time.. hahaha.. what can i do to improve the power from this engine?

thanks guys for you posts.. i think some of you might have gone a lil over board with you info though.. kinda far fetched... but still good stuff!!