veritech-z

OTM, where are you located? I'm really on the cheap to free plan right now so if they are going to be too much, i'll probably have to pass...However, I've been reconsidering my former disdain of the hatch louvers, since i've heard they can help with the exhaust fume death I've been experiencing lately...Instead of a rising sun, how about a white car with a meatball that starts over the left front fender bleeds over the hood? here is a really bad scan of a really quick sketch...

That must be a euro thing. Aren't the E-type jaguar brakes inboard as well?

Go to http://www.download.com and type in photo resizer, there is a program I use to reduce picture size for myspace called Irfanview which is really easy to use, and free as well.

Well, i'd have to wait for the weather to clear up...it's totally raining like crazy right now, so unless it clears up, it doesn't look too good...Also, my car doesn't actually have ZG flares or louvers, but I thought they might look cool with that particular paint scheme. I think I need a whale tale too...

Here is how my exhaust exits...

Ummm.....did you just say you like driving a "sleeper?" There is not one thing on that car that says "sleeper" to me....I wish my sleeper looked more like yours...seriously dude, you've got one of my favorite cars on the site, or anywhere else for that matter!

I definitely don't think I'm likeing the rising sun fenders...but the drawing is really coming along! I got to thinking about the street camo, and then I remembered the zzzap car somebody found a few days ago...and this is what i came up with at work today: I may actually do it tomorrow, if i get bored enough...

The funny part was the mexicanized picture of Pablo Newman...

OK, so my wife brought home some salsa from the grocery store the other day, and I about fell over laughing when I saw it. How the mighty have fallen was all I could think of to say...looks like Poncho Newman rides once again! NACHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOooooooooooooooooo o o o o!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hey Z-tard, that's pretty good...the front looks a lot like that red car from the aerodynamics and monza wide body threads that everybody was all into a few weeks ago. I'm with you on this one, if you really want it to be accurate, tracing the outside edge is the way to go. Once you have a good line drawing, I like to copy it a few times, so you can try different things without having to redraw the whole shebang..

That's something to think about, I've got an old header that looks like an MSA 6-1, and then it bolts to a collector that is welded to a 21" thrush glassppack, which brings that section of the exhaust back to just before the diff nose. From there i've got the rest of the "glassback" (that was a little joke...) exhaust clamped on to the exit of the thrush, and it is one long piece welded together that angles the muffler towards the passenger side, drift style, with the muffler extending about six inches out from the back of the car at an angle. I'm pretty sure the exhaust isn't coming in from the muffler so much as it might be from that clamped portion...maybe i should get in there and weld that together too... As a general update on the progress, I took my alternator in to get it tested, and it turns out it was only putting out 10v, so I was able to exchange it under warranty. I haven't had occasion to put it back on and check the on-car wiring, but I'm off all weekend, and I'm planning to really get into it at that time. Also, I've been eyeing a replacement exhaust manifold stud that I sell here at the Saturn dealership. It's actual purpose is a motormount stud, but the threads appear to be the right pitch, and I know for sure they are metric. The reason I want to use these is because they've got a little square machined into them so you can tighten them with a wrench without a nut on them. It's part number:11518885, and most Saturn dealers should stock a good amount since they always change them with the top motor mount on the early S cars. I might try them out this weekend as well, and see if they are too long, or whatever.

Oh, also Driftn280zx might want to get in on starting a drawing forum, he's posted a few sketch threads too...

As cool as Mad Max is, I was actually (and still am really) looking really hard at fighter planes from WWII for both camo-schemes, and design cues to theme my z build. I really like the some of the German Naval camo, and the Japanese used a lot of shark pattern green top white bottom designs that might look cool. All the really neat exhausts came from the allies though, since most of mitsubishi's fighters were radial engined, and had exhausts leaving all the way around the circumference of the nose instead of a rad inline configuration like the mustang or spitfire had. Olderthanme, If you like the look of that camo, you're welcome to it, I'm going back to a modified version of my Roy Fokker Veritech skull squadron livery which i had on the car before it was flat black. I'll throw a scan of that up once i get it to my liking... As a side note, if there are any old timers (like, REALLY old timers) still kicking, I'm trying to discover if there was ever a wing of either the army air corps or the Air Force proper that flew captured fighter planes for exhibition or testing purposes, and what, if any, was the paint scheme peculiar to that outfit?

sure, why not?

Here's a quick freehand sketch I did after work without any reference material. It's not 100% either, I just wanted to see if i had a handle on where you were headed with the body kit and paint/wheel combo? I've been known to throw some pretty suspect freehand sketches together when I'm bored at work too (Saturn parts counter can get preeeeettttyy slow), like this one of my car with a P-51 Mustang style exhaust and street camo paint scheme... (I feel i should add a disclaimer to this one that it was drawn directly in pen and with no reference material, and therefore there is no room for correction of any mistakes that were made...) *edit* I mentioned some SSR MKII wheels earlier, but I actually meant to say MKI wheels:

I think the first thing I notice about this that could use improving is the perspective on the nose/hood/passenger side a-pillar relationship. You are only going to be able to see some of those features from any given angle, and the natural impulse is to draw it in. The way you have it shown there, the headlight farthest from our viewing perspective should not extend out as far as it does. Bringing it back a little bit would go a long way towards cleaning up the front end, as a point of reference, that line down the center of the hood should mark the point where the other side of the car should be angling back, if you look at it from the top if forms a mild / shape (but it doesn't reference the sacred feminine in this case). On the back, there is something wrong with the angle of the hatch, and it's relationship to the quarter window, which is what gives it that 2+2 flavor. I assume you are shooting for a widebody, like a YZ (no headlights), so the actual shape of the rear quarter panels is pretty good, and you did a good job contouring the rays of the rising sun to that curve. I don't know if you deliberately left the lines of the door off, or if you are planning to smooth out that other character line that runs along the rocker panel between the wheels, but that goes a long way towards giving some perspective to the side skirts i'm inferring that you've added. A good way to test out body kit designs would be to print out a picture of either a stock z in the angle you want your picture to be drawn, or take a car with a bodykit you like and draw over the top of that picture. If you get a thin point sharpie and trace all the relevant details, then you lay a regular piece of white paper over that you can see just the extra dark sharpie lines you drew and convert it fairly easily into a line drawing. That would allow you to widen the lines to make widebodies, try out sideskirt designs, and so on without worrying about skewed perspective. As for using the red wheel as part of your rising sun, I don't know how that would come off, maybe if you got something like an SSR Mk II that was just a flat plate, it would look cool...Another way to test paint jobs, if you have a playstation 2 you can pick up Tokyo Extreme Racer 3, which has an S30, S130, Z31, Z32, and it features a pixel by pixel paint program that allows you to do custom paint with a mouse cursor on every panel, and will even simulate primer if you play with the gloss feature (gray primer with black primer flames is dope...) and the game only cost $20 brand new, so you should be able to pick it up used for cheap...

TO4E-54 sounds like turbo nomenclature to me, is that a centrifigal supercharger? As for the AC clutch idea, that would be an on/off affair, so you would be running with no boost, or whatever boost you would normally have at that rpm. I've heard mercedes has some kind of electric clutch on their new superchargers, but i'm not too clear how those work...

I wonder if that's short for "evangelion"... Mike, it looks like your seat is going for 67,000yen in that link you posted, which according to the XE.com universal currency converter comes out to $583.044 US.

Kind of looks like 2+2...I dig those bumblebee stripes you've got going on in the back there too. Not too shabby for untrained, are you looking for back patting, or some pointers? I have a bachelor's degree in studio art, so if you want some help I could offer some tips, but if not, that's cool too. I say DON'T put the pencil down, it's the only way to get better, but you also might try looking at a z while drawing it until you get a handle on the details...