Eight-second 1000hp RB30 VL Commodore

The guys from FullBoost check out a genuine 1000hp, street-driven, eight-second VL Commodore with RB power

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Photographers: Michelle Porobic


JOHNSONS Performance Centre (JPC) in Melbourne’s northern suburbs is known for one super-cool thing: fast VLs. They’ve been playing around with RB30s for longer than most, being the first to run VL Commodores well into the 10s back in the 90s, which just wasn’t heard of back then.

Their RB30 development has continued since then, pushing the Nissan six well past the 1000hp barrier reliably, while still keeping the single-cam head.

Luke from FullBoost headed over to JPC to check out one of the company’s new customer cars, an eight-second RB30 VL Commodore with over 1100hp and a PB of 8.77@154mph. “I wanted a 10-second car, and Mark gave me a nine-second car,” said Steve, the VL’s proud owner.

Despite looking like a typical RB30 VL build, the coolness of this particular project lies deep within the details. It may make 1130hp, but it does so with a smaller GT45-based turbo custom-built by JPC, as opposed to a massive head-sized unit. It also revs to over 8500rpm thanks to JPC’s solid-roller cam development, which is a pretty crazy proposition considering the factory engine and head barely huffed their way to 5500rpm.

Another cool fact is that while the rear end has been tubbed, the guys at All Race Fabrications fitted the mini-tubs without notching the chassis like most places will do, making Steve’s task much easier when it comes time to engineer his flying kebab machine.

A true street machine, Steve tries to get his VL out once a week for a squirt.

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