Remember that more cylinders and more hp = much more money.Nissan needed to make the new Z profitable and it has.A 8 cylinder,350-400 hp engine means about a 50k list price.I doubt Nissan wants to travel down that road again.

 

Final specs on the 4.0 VQ havent been released yet. They are just saying 250+ hp and 270+ tq. Remember when the 350Z was just a concept and they said 260+ hp? Look at what we ended up with. I would wait until final numbers are released before we bash it.

 

They told me at NAIAS it was gonna be 280hp-300hp. Hence why I followed up on it. If they said 260hp I would've never considered it...

 

The next NSX is done, the new Honda super car to replace the NSX is the Honda HKS, it will once again be a V6. 3.2L or 3.6L is the displacement, For some reason i dont think Honda makes a V8 engine at all... can neone confirm this?

 

It makes more business sense to go with a 400Z with the new VQ engine than a twin turboed 350Z because it will be cheaper to mass produce and keep the cost down in the current price range. Remember the twin turbo 300Z and Supra and RX7 didnt sell well and spelled the doom for those cars. Only enthusiasts like us would ever want one if it cost like 40k+ for a factory TT 350z. And a lot of us cant afford one. Its a very small market segment already, they dont need a Z to compete against the GT-R when it comes to the US for those of us who can afford it.
I would expect the next Z car to have about 330-350hp to maintain that 50-60 hp difference between the Z car and the C6 Vette which has 400hp.

 

What in the hell are you babbling about? There is no Honda HKS. The last concept has been passed over and NSX will not be redesigned for a few years.

 

A DOHC V8 would probably be too big to physically fit in the Z's engine bay without a major redesign. It would also more than likely weigh in around 100lbs heavier than the VQ35, skewing the Z's weight distribution farther in the wrong direction. A more compact and lighter pushrod V8 would be a better match for the Z than a DOHC mill because of size and weight considerations but Nissan has never dealt with OHV V8 engines before so the development costs would be obscenely high. A V8 Z would be nice, but it would be far, far cheaper for Nissan to add a form of FI to the Z straight from the factory than for it to redesign the Z to accept one of its current V8s without affecting its handling dynamics to too large a degree. A rear mounted transmission would help the weight distribution problem, but that would also require a lot of engineering work and so would further increase the price. For all of these reasons, I think that Nissan would bring back a force fed V6 Z before it introduced a V8 Z.

 

The Audi S4 uses a lightweight V8 that puts out 340hp. It's dimensions are similar to the Z but its quite a bit heavier. Point is, they managed to replace the previous version 6 cylinder with a much more powerful V8 without crippling it with alot of extra mass. So maybe the next Z will be blessed with some next gen. Nissan V8.