Nissan Versa Base 1.6

[Tango Charlie]

Your first and last pictures made me very hungry...
Beautiful scenery! Makes me wanna hit the road!

[skyl4rk]

Originally Posted by ebacherville

cant wait to see what you get on the trip at highway speeds.. were strongly considering this car.. and I know the EPA is way off for a "slow driver" under 60 and not racing to lights.

I'm not sure if I would recommend the Versa. It has suspension problems, at highway speeds crosswinds affect it quite a bit. You have to concentrate hard on steering to keep it in the lane sometimes. Air blasts from trucks affect it too. It is really bad on bumpy roads in windy conditions while driving fast.

It seems to be a great city car or rural road car.

I am still getting used to the high rpm motor. I kind of like it, although I am used to trying to run at the lowest possible rpms.

However, for a cheap econobox, it does the job. Mpg could be better, but I have heard that the mpg goes up as the motor breaks in. Perhaps the original oil is thick.

I just changed the oil to Mobil 1 synthetic, 5W20, at 6560 miles.

For some reason, my Scangauge seems to be goofy. I think I tried to adjust the fillup fuel consumption based on fillups from different pumps and really goofed up the percentage. I need to stick to the same pump for a couple of tanks to try to get the thing calibrated again. I cannot trust the results anymore until it is fixed.

My gas records for my trip show about 40mpg average. This is strange, I never would have guessed I would get that high of mpg. I was not trying to drive slow, although my habit now is to coast to a stop and generally don't tailgate, watch for stoplights, stopsigns, etc. Part of the time I was driving as fast as I could. Other times I was cruising along at 60mph for hours at a time.

I removed the valence block because in 85F ambient, my car was running a constant 204F, which is close to fan startup speed. I also did not want any problems while in a remote area. The car now runs 185F to 190F. As soon as I pulled off the valence the temp went from 204F to 185F within seconds of driving. I'm going to leave the valence block off for the summer.

[groar]

First of all, congrats for all your work and all your results

Originally Posted by skyl4rk

I am sorry to report that the boattail self destructed and no longer exists. I was on my way north and was doing about 85mph while passing a truck. There was a big bang and the tail disappeared onto the shoulder. It was gone except wires dragging on the ground. I went back to look for it and found a few pieces of debris along the road.

Ouch, makes me afraid to extend my uglyback... Will have to be very prudent. I don't drive at 85 mph (most is 85 km/h) but I cross trucks and people are far too close from each other.

Denis.

[skyl4rk]

I thought that I had built the tail very strongly, however the forces at high speeds are much higher than you might expect.

My theory on why the tail went bang: the sections between the trunk and doors were open and only duct taped to the cars body. When the duct tape loosened up, these sections acted as air scoops. At high speed, the air pressure inside the tail blew out the clips holding the tail to the bottom of the bumper, which then also acted as an air scoop and immediately catastrophic failure resulted, with the tail ripping out from under the trunk and side doors.

This may have been prevented by using fasteners on the bottom of the bumper.

I am not proud to have constructed something that may have been a danger to another driver. I thought it had been correctly built but real world testing proved otherwise.

[wagonman76]

Ehh.. sorry to hear about the disentegrated tail. It was a great idea though, maybe just needed some reinforcing. Thankfully being just coroplast, if were to hit another car it would do little to no damage.

Maybe if you wanted to make another one, you could use some clamp-on trunk rods sort of how I did, then make that as part of your attachment to keep it from going anywhere.

I've had the wind from trucks blowing past me rip loose part of the grille block on the 6000 wagon. But it is anchored in the middle, so it can't totally fly off.

Loosening up and turning into a parachute was one concern of mine since it hinges backwards for trunk access. So before putting it on the road, I added an extra metal strip and bolt on each side to anchor it at the front end. That's also a plus of the steel section before the shower liner, the steel won't stretch and scoop air.

Did I ever ask you what part of Michigan you are in, or travel to? You seem to travel a lot. I travel a lot down the west side. Maybe we could meet up sometime.

[aerohead]

Originally Posted by skyl4rk

I thought that I had built the tail very strongly, however the forces at high speeds are much higher than you might expect.

My theory on why the tail went bang: the sections between the trunk and doors were open and only duct taped to the cars body. When the duct tape loosened up, these sections acted as air scoops. At high speed, the air pressure inside the tail blew out the clips holding the tail to the bottom of the bumper, which then also acted as an air scoop and immediately catastrophic failure resulted, with the tail ripping out from under the trunk and side doors.

This may have been prevented by using fasteners on the bottom of the bumper.

I am not proud to have constructed something that may have been a danger to another driver. I thought it had been correctly built but real world testing proved otherwise.

So far,two of my creations have gone "bang".Fortunately,both incidents passed without property damage or injuries,and after"going back to the drawing-board" both have been resurrected with added strength for the rigors of the real world.Hope your not dis-heartened.Your boattail was a sweetheart! I like to think we'll see another.

[skyl4rk]

I am somewhat surprised that the Versa continues to get decent gas mileage, about 40mpg average. In the past few weeks, I have not been hypermiling at all, and have been driving as fast as I can on some long highway trips (75 to 80 mph). The current mods are grill blocks, foglight blocks and 5W20 synthetic oil.

I do coast down to stops which is a hypermiling technique. I guess it would be fair to say that I am doing some hypermiling but nothing like the aggressive EOC that I did to get the high mileage numbers with the tail. Using the Scangauge taught me quite a bit, so even my normal driving is now hypermiling compared to the average person.

Now that I have typed this, I am sure my next tank will be a disaster.

I'm not sure what the next mods will be. I think I would like to remove all blocks and get good baseline performance numbers on a stock vehicle. I'm not sure I want to put the $$$ into a new tail but maybe I will try an air dam in front and see what that does. Then some rear wheel covers and a catamaran and rear wingtip behind the rear wheels.

I probably will leave the valence uncovered. While stuck in a line of cars, my temps got up to 207F momentarily with the full valence open. I don't think I want to push it in the summer time by reducing the valence opening. While driving, the temps usually stay down around 185 to 190F. So its grill blocks and foglight blocks and thats it for now. I think this configuration provides reliable cooling for just about any weather and driving conditions.

As far as my comments about Versa handling in crosswinds at high speeds, I found that with a passenger in the front seat, it handles much better. I was running with no passenger seat and a hundred pounds or so of gear in the trunk, so I probably caused the problem by poor loading practices. I probably should not collect rocks and small boulders while traveling.

[Istas]

Glad to hear your mileage is still good even without the tail.

[Clev]

I don't see why you wouldn't see 40 mpg; my Saturn Ion is a larger car with a 2.2L engine, and I've been kissing 40 mpg lately.

About the grill block, I wonder how the decrease in drag from the grill block compares to the extra alternator draw from the fan. Is it possible that running the fan actually yields better mpg than leaving the grill open? How about a variable speed fan controller based on temperature? (i.e. start a slow spin at 190 degrees, slowly increasing to full blast at 205.)

[Daox]

Originally Posted by Clev

About the grill block, I wonder how the decrease in drag from the grill block compares to the extra alternator draw from the fan. Is it possible that running the fan actually yields better mpg than leaving the grill open?

Thats what I think. The Paseo's full grill block has returned excellent fuel economy for me. My trip to work is 21 miles and the fan may turn on at most a half dozen times (usually 1-2 times) on the way home. On the way to work in the morning, it never turns on due to lower ambient temperatures. Does the fan turning on 6 times justify 42 miles of driving with a hole in the block? I'm thinking no. You do have to make sure that with the fan on, it can pull enough air though. Also, for longer trips I'm sure its less than ideal.