Well, the G35 was given a few less hp so it wouldn't show up the 350z. Just to give the turtle every chance it could for making a good entrance into the U.S. market they gave it seven extra hp "on paper." Infact, they may have the same ecu programs and just the specs are claimed as different. There is no way of knowing for sure unless you crack and read both ecu's.

As far as the sedan goes that was more along the lines of the natural competion with the maxima. They have always been closely intertwined with features and options. The only real differences between the cars until now was the hood and standard leather interior with the Infiniti. With the arrival of the new generations of cars the companies wanted to seperate the brands a little bit with the styling. However, the same idea of giving the disadvantaged Nissan a little more in the engine, as with the 350z and the g35, holds true here as well. The quoted specs are a difference of 5hp but as i said earlier there is no true way of knowing unless you were to read the ecu's.

Nissan has claimed the difference between the vq in the 350z and the max is a different ecu program, a larger intake and more free flowing exhaust. There are some problems with that claim though. The larger intake on the 350/g35 doesn't neccessarely mean better airflow. The maxima's variable intake is extremely efficient and i'll show you how that translates in a moment. They may be right about the ecu's though. It seems that the 350 and g35 ecu's will reset themselves adjusting for mods. This is only hearsay so i don't know how much is truth or just peoples frustration at not being able to tune the car as they easily as they thought it would be. On the exhuast side i don't know how much i believe that one system is much better than the other. The engineers have been known to have done a hell of a job at designing a very efficient and free flowing exhaust since the very first vq series engine. I think the designs are just as efficient at expelling spent gases on all models the vq sits in. You have to realize that there are different engine placements for different models and take those designs for their intended use. So in actuality exhaust may have very little to do with the differences in power.

Now the interesting part. The real world dyno's of the 04 maxima has shed some light on some very interesting facts. It appears that the 3.5vq in the maxima is putting down numbers that coinside with a car that has a bhp of 280hp. This tidbit started showing itself once the new maxima owners started getting their cars baselined on the dyno's. Now i'm not certain of the g35 sedan becasue i have not seen anything for them but i would imagine some similar results. So all things considered the only probable difference would be in the tune of the ECU's. I'm sure there may be other factors for the difference in numbers, but that would be very small.



Hope that helps in some way???