how can one tell if its a jdm or an usa engine... one the sr20.


i just got me a car the lady said her machanic put an jdm spec engine.. but i know there are two types how can i tell if mine is the 150 pony engine

i did the jdm swap and so did my cousin,, we are yet to be able to tell which is which... mine has the little fin looking things on the head, his doesnt, he has the goldish colored valve color , mines silver and the valley where the plugs go isnt painted black on mine, his is... who knows dude

Not certain, but I don't think the JDM will have an EGR setup, at least my BB does not.

Originally posted by The Sandman
Not certain, but I don't think the JDM will have an EGR setup, at least my BB does not.

The JDM SR20DE does not have the EGR either. It is hard to tell, if a mechanic did the engine swap, and there is emission testing in the area, chances are he swapped the intake manifold with all the EGR stuff.

But one sure giveaway thats its a JDM, is the there is no EGR equipment on it.

yeah we did have to swap out the intakes on both swaps, but i think he wants to know how can you tell jdm from usdm with it in the car... ive alwys wondered that myself

Originally posted by cantdoadonut
i think he wants to know how can you tell jdm from usdm with it in the car

Well, like I said, if it has the manifold without the EGR stuff, then you can be pretty sure its a JDM, but if it has the one with the EGR, it could still be a JDM and they swapped intake manifolds, so there really isnt any clear way to tell.

the exhaust manifold is longer on the jdm than the usdm, thats how i figured out mine was just a USDM engine.

and for figuring out if you have the 10:1 compression jdm engine, i dont think there really is a clear way to find out. there have been lots of threads on here about it, but i dont recall ever seeing a solid answer.

Originally posted by cantdoadonut
i did the jdm swap and so did my cousin,, we are yet to be able to tell which is which... mine has the little fin looking things on the head, his doesnt, he has the goldish colored valve color , mines silver and the valley where the plugs go isnt painted black on mine, his is... who knows dude
humm my valve cover is also goldish and the plug valley on mine is also black i have always noticed that. The car was like that when i bought it i just always figured the previous owner had painted it like that :confused:

also another thing about the exhaust manifold on the jdm, it looks like a factory header, i think that was one place the jdm got some of the extra power from

Originally posted by 12.30se-r92

humm my valve cover is also goldish and the plug valley on mine is also black i have always noticed that. The car was like that when i bought it i just always figured the previous owner had painted it like that :confused:

That's stock... at some point (not sure of the exact year) Nissan simply stoped painting the valve covers. My '92 (US spec engine in my '93 MDM SE-R) has it but my '96 spec engine doesn't.

I can tell you one thing you can look at to tell if a engine is JDM or US.
Unless someone took the time, like I did, there is a tube coming from the block under the far right most primary, On JDM's they are about twice as long as the US tubes. A lot of people put the black canister over from the JDM cause it fits. Only downside is the other fresh air box has nowhere to bolt to since the JDM Canister has no brackets for it.