7 Rarely Mentioned JDM Engines With Surprising Power - Jalopnik

One could be inclined to say that, as a whole, Japan has historically built some of the best automotive engines of all time. This isn't necessarily a hard stance; however, judging by both performance and reliability, the likes of Honda, Toyota, Nissan, and Mazda, among others, are extremely hard to beat. This is probably why a handful of Japan's engines are forever embedded in the hearts and minds of every enthusiast across the world — the Toyota 2JZ-GTE, Nissan RB26DETT, Mazda 13B, and Honda K24 are a few that may immediately come to mind.

But it's important to remember that, while the aforementioned engines are incredible pieces of machinery, Japan didn't just build a few good engines during the 1990s and 2000s. In other eras before and after, Japan's manufacturers have designed, constructed, and sold countless engines with phenomenal performance, many of which aren't discussed as often as those that powered what some would consider the best Japanese cars ever built.

So instead of debating the Toyota 2JZ and Nissan RB26 again, let's look at engines that may have been produced for cars only sold in Japan, overshadowed by those that came before or after, or simply slipped under the radar of the general masses for any number of reasons. Regardless, the motors we have selected in today's piece can be considered underappreciated relative to the performance they are capable of.

Toyota 7M-GTE

The "underrated" status of Toyota's 7M straight-six is based largely on the sheer popularity of another Toyota straight-six, the 2JZ. The 2J set the tuning and enthusiast worlds on fire with its incredibly strong bottom end and near-unparalleled potential for aftermarket power, and to this day, it's among the most well-known JDM engines. So, imagine the poor 7M that came a full generation earlier and now hardly receives a fraction of the love and admiration of its younger cousin.

The most poetically tragic anecdote of this story, though, is not that they were both Toyota straight-sixes, but rather that they were both part of the Supra's Legendary lineage. It first arrived in 1987 in the then-new third-generation Supra Turbo with 3.0 liters of displacement and 6 pounds of boost from a CT26 turbocharger. The 7M-GTE would produce 232 horsepower and 254 pound-feet of torque — enough to scoot the Supra from 0-60 mph in around 6.4 seconds and up to a top speed of 145 mph.

The GTE was essentially the more evolved version of its naturally aspirated sibling, the 7M-GE, which also displaced 3.0 liters but produced a slightly weaker 200 horsepower. In addition to the Toyota-designed turbocharger, the GTE version got an intercooler, an oil cooler, and an upgraded ignition system to facilitate the new height of performance from the straight-six. The 7M-GTE, specifically, was in use for six years between 1987 and 1992, and was only factory-installed into two models, the A70 (Mk3) Supra and the JDM-only second-generation Toyota Soarer, which shared a platform with the Supra at the time. Even with such scarce representation, the 7M-GTE provides power that was quite impressive for the late '80s and would still be considered enjoyable today.

Nissan VH45DE

Nissan's engine development in the late 1980s and throughout the 1990s was impressive, to say the least. The brand was pumping out stuff like the KA and SR-series inline-fours, the "VG" V6s, and the RB-series straight-sixes that would power the iconic Skyline lineup throughout this era. But Nissan wasn't limited to fours and sixes — it would also debut a motor that would challenge one of Japan's most crucial pieces of V8 engineering at the time.

The motor was called the VH45DE. It was a naturally aspirated 4.5-liter V8 that came in direct competition with the fabled Toyota 1UZ-FE V8 that helped to kick-start the Lexus brand as a whole, first with the full-size LS400 sedan and later on in the SC400 coupe. Of course, in the decades following the VH45DE and 1UZ-FE's debut, the Toyota has become far more widely known for its unkillable reliability, smooth operation, and solid performance, but the VH was an interesting (and powerful) engine in its own right.

The all-aluminum, 90-degree V8 featured a forged crank and connecting rods, low-friction pistons, and a 10.2:1 compression ratio that gave it an official output of around 277 horsepower and 294 pound-feet of torque at a maximum redline of 6,900 rpm. It hit the streets the same year as the 1UZ (1989) and was developed for Nissan's full-size sedans like the Infiniti Q45 until 1996 and the Nissan President until 2002. Now, as with most of the performance-oriented or high-trim Japanese engines of this era, the VH45DE's official output ratings were likely a victim of the "Gentlemen's Agreement" among the manufacturers at the time that limited advertised horsepower numbers to 276 or below, as many believe the VH45DE was capable of producing around 300 horsepower or more.

Mazda 20B-REW

Mazda's three-rotor 20B-REW engine is something of a distant dream for fans of JDM machinery. It was a piece of engineering that proved the concept of the rotary engine as a jack of all trades, being able to not only provide top-end power in a sports car-esque application but also deliver that smooth torque you need in a luxury car. There are a few reasons why it can be called a distant dream. Firstly, this was a three-rotor rotary engine — the only of its kind ever produced and sold by Mazda for the road. Additionally, the 20B's most famous and only production application was in the Mazda Eunos Cosmo, a stunning grand touring luxury coupe that was only sold from 1990 to 1995 strictly in the Japanese market.

As one could imagine, these factors taken together make the 20B-REW a fairly rare unit. But setting the rarity aside, this motor also packed the performance to back up its mysterious and elusive nature. Thanks to its 2.0 liters of total displacement across the three-rotor setup, the 20B was capable of an official 276 horsepower and 296 pound-feet of torque, though real-world estimates claim its output to be firmly in the low 300-horsepower range.

The 20B was also among the very first engines to utilize a sequential-turbo system, essentially a twin-turbo setup where air first flows through a smaller turbo to boost low-end power before being fed through a larger turbo that maximizes the top end. And yes, the 20B rotary did have an issue with blowing up, just like its other two-rotor brethren, but its rarity and performance certainly demand more attention than it currently receives.

Nissan S20

It may sound weird to have an engine that was featured in a GT-R model appear on this list, considering it's one of the most storied production and race cars of all time. It would be egregious if we included an RB-series engine, like the RB26 that took center stage in the R32, R33, and R34 GT-Rs. So rather than play into that same old "the RB is legendary" narrative — as valid as it may be — the focus is instead on the very first engine that powered the GT-R, the S20.

In time, they decided to use a detuned version of the straight-six on the Skyline for racing purposes, and naturally, it bled into the road cars, creating the first Nissan Skyline GT-R. Debuting for the public in 1969, the S20 was a four-valve-per-cylinder, 2.0-liter straight-six with hemispherical combustion chambers, crossflow cylinder heads, and special low-friction aluminum pistons, sharing zero parts with any of Nissan's other road-going engines. In the GT-R, it produced 160 horsepower, which, for any Japanese car at the time, was monumental. While it would take nearly 20 years before Nissan produced another GT-R as successful as the original (PGC10) generation, the S20 is a part of GT-R history that demands more respect.

Nissan VG30DETT

Famed or iconic cars from decades past are almost always closely connected to the engine under their hoods, but it can go the other way. Sometimes, a car gains notoriety without its engine rising to the same level of praise. The Nissan 300ZX and its engine might just fit that bill. Now, we're not saying the VG30DETT isn't known, but compared to its other popular Japanese counterparts of the time — the Supra's 2JZ, the GT-R's RB26, the Mazda RX-7's 13B, and so on — the Z's engine flies a bit under the radar.

If you know how Nissan names its engines, you could probably guess that the VG30DETT was a 3.0-liter twin-turbocharged V6, and just like the Toyota 7M straight-six, the VG30 also had a naturally aspirated version. The non-turbo engine was released alongside the new Z32-chassis 300ZX earlier in 1989, while the Turbo models and their upgraded motors would follow later that year. The naturally aspirated VG30 could put down 222 horsepower, which was respectable, emboldening the Z32 to perform sub-7-second 0-60 mph runs. When the "DETT" version popped into existence, those numbers would change drastically. Horsepower was up to the agreed-upon 276 figure (though the engines were certainly making 300 horsepower), and 0-60 times fell into the low 5-second range.

This iron-blocked, aluminum-head V6 was in many ways a look into the future. Yes, the Maserati Biturbo was the first-ever twin-turbocharged production car (it used a V6, too), but the level of performance that Nissan was able to extract from the VG was a better representation of what was to come, as many modern performance cars from all the major car-producing countries have utilized this same engine configuration. So, while it doesn't quite stir the soul like a screaming GT-R, the VG30DETT is formidable nonetheless.

Toyota 3S-GE

The 3S-GE has a long and successful history of powering some of Toyota's most popular models throughout the 1980s and 1990s. The first-gen 3S-GE debuted in 1984 inside the then-new Toyota Camry (ever heard of it?) in the Japanese market only and would produce around 160 horsepower. The only first-gen 3S-GE that would arrive in North America came with the Celica GT-S, which, of course, produced a slightly weaker 135 horsepower, but don't worry; that's not the "surprising power" we're focusing on.

Over the next 15 or so years, Toyota and Yamaha, which helped develop the "BEAMS" 3S-GE from the beginning, would continually tinker with and improve the 3S-GE throughout five distinct generations. During this era, the naturally aspirated 3S-GE would power immensely important vehicles like the Camry and Celica we've already mentioned and several others such as the RAV-4, Corona, MR2, Altezza, and Caldina, some of which were JDM-only cars. The 3S-GE generation of note, though, has to be the fifth and final iteration, also known as the Black Top 3S-GE.

Debuting in 1998, the Black Top got its nickname for its camshaft covers that were painted black, and was capable of around 200 to207 horsepower from just 2.0 liters of displacement, giving it a horsepower-per-liter ratio of just over 100:1 — an achievement that, to this day, would still be considered impressive. Those who aren't Toyota superfans may not recognize this engine because it was sold in the Toyota Altezza, the Japanese version of the Lexus IS. It might also be worth mentioning that the naturally aspirated Black Top made just as much power as the turbocharged version (3S-GTE) a few years earlier in cars like the MR2.

Nissan VK45DE

When thinking of Nissan engines, there are a few two-letter identifiers that one would immediately spot: VQ, VR, RB, and maybe even VG. But how often do you hear someone talking about the VK? Probably not very often, which is exactly why it's in this piece. Its full birth name, VK45DE, meant that this was a 32-valve 4.5-liter naturally aspirated V8, and, essentially, just as the VH45DE challenged the Toyota 1UZ-FE in the early 1990s, the new VK would continue that fight for dominance.

The VK got its first gig as the powerplant for the 2002 Infiniti Q45, the luxury brand's full-size sedan. From there, it would also feature in Infiniti's FX45 mid-size crossover and the mid-size M45 executive sedan. Total output of the VK would slightly shift depending on the model, as the FX45's version produced 315 horsepower, while in both the M45 and Q45 sedans, the VK put down 340 horsepower (and 330-333 lb-ft). Regardless, the V8 was praised for its feeling of torque from the driver's seat, coupling well with the models it was built for.

It's certainly one of those V8s that deserves more attention for its on-road performance, but the VK's influence ran deeper into Nissan's endeavors than just three production models. By the late 2000s, NISMO (Nissan's performance/racing division) would begin to feed the VK with its proverbial super soldier serum and prepare it for the racetrack. The freshly reworked VK would produce 490 horsepower when it took the place of the twin-turbocharged VR38DETT in the GT-R for the Super GT series, and in the 2010s, the engine would serve as the base for a 450-horsepower V8 that competed in Nissan's LMP2 Le Mans racecars.