When Nissan’s variable-compression turbo engines came out on the market a few years ago, they caused a big stir and got a lot of praise and press coverage. The 2.0-liter four-cylinder and 1.5-liter three-cylinder power plants are being looked into by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration right now. The government is looking into about 450,000 Nissan Rogue, Nissan Altima, and Infiniti QX50 cars that have these two engines. The NHTSA says that owners are reporting total failures, metal fragments in their oil pans, knocking sounds, and power outages. Since the engines came out, Nissan has changed the main bearings and L-links to protect them from damage. As of now, there has been no recall. Instead, the NHTSA has started an investigation to find out what the problem is. Even though it’s not obvious, those two engines are the only ones with Nissan’s variable compression technology. This technology can change the top- and bottom-dead-center positions of the pistons to get the most power and efficiency. It will be a bitter irony if Nissan’s VC-Turbo technology is found to be the cause. Because they could change how much compression they had, both of those engines were on Wards’ list of the 10 Best Engines. I don’t want to say it all at once, but too much complexity can be bad. This is something I can say from experience because I have worked with several BMW Vanos systems. The NHTSA is still looking into this, and a recall may be needed in the future.
