Nissan HR15DE

1.5 L · inline-4 · naturally aspirated · petrol · 2004–present

Also known as: hr15, 1.5 hr, h4k, micra 1.5 engine, note 1.5 engine

Nissan's 1.5 four — sixteen valves, DOHC, variable valve timing, 74 kW and 134 N·m — in the Micra, Note, Cube, Juke, Versa, Kicks, Almera, Tiida and NV200. A very ordinary engine in a very large number of cars, which is most of why it is worth a page.

It is a Renault-Nissan engine, and the Renault name is different — the HR15DE is Renault's H4K and the HR16DE its H4M. A car with a Renault badge and this engine has the same parts and the same faults under another designation, which is worth knowing before searching for a symptom.

The timing chain stretches, and earlier than a chain should. By around 150,000 km it rattles; the tensioner is the usual first failure and a slipping chain follows it. Treat a rattle on this family as the chain rather than as ordinary noise — it is a chain-driven engine precisely so that it would not need this, and it needs it anyway.

And it has no hydraulic tappets. Valve clearances want checking about every 60,000 miles, which is a service item most drivers of a modern small car have never encountered and no warning light will ever ask for.

Cars fitted with this engine

10 generations, across 1 make. From the authored catalogue — an absent car means the catalogue has not reached it, not that the engine was never fitted.

Nissan

Information, not instruction

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What makes one worth reading:

The car — make, model, year and engine. The same fault behaves differently on each.
What you measured, not only what you replaced.
What actually fixed it — or that nothing did, which is worth knowing too.