How does VG30I respond to intake/exhaust mods?

[TheRadBaron]

My question is in regards to how well a VG30I engine responds to performance modifications of the intake and exhaust.  I'm working on an engine swap in my '87 Pathfinder.  As much as I would have liked to swap in a VG33E, I ended up going with another fresh VG30I.  While I'm working on it I'm attempting to increase the performance a little bit without spending a bunch of money.  I have a set of Pacesetter headers installed that dump into a 2" single exhaust with a free-flowing performance muffler.  That should be a big improvement in flow over stock.  Looking at the stock air cleaner it looks like the poor motor is trying to breathe through a straw.  That little pipe that connects the "cold air" duct into the air cleaner housing has to cause a significant restriction.  I thought about cutting more holes into the housing to let more air in but I don't really want to feed the motor the hot engine compartment air.  I have this K&N air filter lid that has a large amount of filter media built into it.  If I modify the air filter housing by cutting out most of the top and attaching the K&N lid I should be able to get a lot more air into the housing.  The lid would protrude through the hood so I'd seal it to the bottom of the hood with foam to keep engine bay heat out and cover it with a cowl induction hood scoop.  I also plan to carefully cut out the charge heater grid in the throttle body for every last bit of flow and as insurance against the grid crumbling into my new motor.

 

Now, I'm a gearhead/hot rodder from days gone by but I always fooled around with carburetors and I don't have much experience with performance mods to fuel injection systems.  I've heard that some systems can readily adapt to basic performance mods like intake/exhaust but others cannot.  How does the VG30I system like these sort of modifications?  Can it adapt to these type of mods and provide a performance increase?  I'm trying to get more performance and I can live with dodgy running while the engine is warming up, etc. but I don't want to do these mods if they're just going to cause trouble and make the truck run worse than stock.

 

What do you guys think?  Thanks.

[JamesRich]

If you like carburetors just do what I did!

 

5 years later still running good! I did have to do a lot of tuning to the carb to get the mixtures right using a wide band. It ran really rich with the carb factory. I drilled the metering block and made jets out of 6-32 setscrews for the power circuit. Was way cheaper than adjustable blocks.

James