clutchdust

I never talk to car guys who tell me they've had a car since (insert formidable life period here) and wish they had sold it for something more practical. Just my $.02.

In our litigious society, I have half a mind to sue Nissan for producing vehicles as offensive to my eyes as the Juke and Cube. Every time I see one it makes me throw up a little.

Should have posted the other day when I saw it. Just checked tonight and it was gone, but there was a Craigslist ad here in Vegas for a 99 Hardtop for under $10k. (No wonder it's gone) That would have been a really nice starter for what you want to do. Keep your eyes open for one of them.

Skip shift? What's that? I've had the eliminator ever since I got my car. Even so, I can probably count on two hands how many times I've seen that stupid "shift" light come on. I plan on switching out the rear gear because I really don't understand why I should be able to see 52mph in first gear. Just proves to me that the gearing in the tranny is right, just the final drive gear is wrong. Every one I've talked to that's done the 4.10 swap say it is the way the car should have come.

This is, in my opinion, one mandatory change to any manual c5. My '01 has the MN6 with 3.42 rear. At some point I plan on changing the rear gearing to 4.10. With a 0.56:1 6th gear, it is worthless at anything less than 80mph. I did an empirical data experiment and could not get a distinguishable gas consumption difference between 5th and 6th gear at 75mph, that and 75 feels like it's lugging the motor.

I'm curious to know why you're so hard set on the Z06, if you go with the c5. The coupe can be had for a bargain now and you can add to it later on. Figure 345hp factory, bolt on a Paxton/Vortech and all of a sudden you're pushing 450hp. Better than the c5z did and a price saving to boot. A set of Pfadt bars and shocks and you have a car that's very liveable Monday through Friday and a weekend track terror. Personally, I would look for the '99-'00 hardtop (pre-Z06) if I was going to hotrod one. They're kind of bastard children so they can be had pretty inexpensive and make a great platform for building one up. As to the S2000, I've driven a couple on the track and I find them great track cars. I would totally buy one if it was a dedicated track car. But my only experience with it on streets I found it to be a bit nervous on crappy roads, and the small interior means that it is pretty much strictly a commuter. Fun, but commuter.

Let me know what you find. You may actually have to join the forum first. I don't know. I haven't actually joined yet either. I figure one of these days I'm just going to go to a meet and see who they are first. http://sincityz.com/forums/forum.php

OK, between the two you mentioned, I personally would go with the S2K. I don't have any experience with the Bimmer, but I understand maintenance is a nightmare. Take that for what it's worth. Having said all that, if you can find the Z06, it's the performance bargain of the century. I own a '01 convertible and the thing is just stupid as to how fast it is and how cheap, relatively speaking. I can do all my own maintenance and most repairs in my garage. And it's a Chevy. That may be a negative to a lot of people but here's the thing I look at. You can drive that thing across country and know that you have a shop or dealership within 30 miles that can take care of just about any problem you have. Might not be able to say the same thing about the Honda and no way you can say that about the Bimmer. When I sold my business a few years back I actually considered buying a used Ferrari (never really sold the business for enough to do that). But the maintenance cost and that range issue steered me away from it. In my life, I have actually had to worry about finding parts to fix a car while driving through Gore, OK. Chevy, no problem, imported Euro trash, not so much.

It sounds like what I'm talking about. I can't believe that I haven't been able to find a single diagram on line. But thanks, I think that's exactly the part we're looking for.

I have a friend, well acquaintance really, that is having trouble with the parking brake on his '04 350z. Some metal clip on the bottom of the assembly fell off yesterday. Neither of us can find it in any parts breakdown so I'm looking here. Not sure what it is, but it apparently clips on at the bottom of the assembly where the cable pulls the lever to spread the shoes out. We're not sure of its exact function, only that it screams like a skinned cat when it falls off (imagine that!).

The campus is beautiful. I wanted to go to college there, but like an idiot, chose to get back together with my (now x) wife. Should have done college. Haven't been there in over 15 years so no idea what and how much things have changed. Can't speak to the above post as I was born and bred Miss'ippi. I would be surprised if it was that toxic around the college, but then again "yankees" may interpret Southern Hospitality differently. I would expect more toxicity the farther away from the college. That, and to people who move there and want to change it so it's like the place they left. That will piss people off in a hurry.

No pics/video, didn't happen.

Reminds me of a guy a few years back (more than I care to remember anyway). I used to do a lot of autocrossing and this one kid was all excited that he had just bought this new anti-sway bar for his mustang. He was telling us about it and I couldn't figure out what the big deal was at first because this bar was the same size as the bar already on the car. So he explained he was going to mount both of them together. "Cool", I thought, I'll be interested to see this. The next event we had he was all excited because he got his new bar mounted. I looked under the car and was so shocked I didn't know if I should laugh or run the other way. He had used about 3 dozen zip ties to "mount" his new bar to his old bar!

Reminds me of an incident I had about 10 years ago. Coming back to Vegas from SoCal, I topped a hill just in time to see a CHP on the side of the road shooting radar. I got a glimpse of him just before he got me and reeled down to about 85 (from triple digits). During the ensuing revenue generation, he told me that he probably wouldn't have gotten me if I had been in a pack of cars. OK, now I have a lot of track time experience and like to think I know when it is more safe and less safe to do 100mph. One of the "more safe" times would be when I'm on the road, by my self. In this instance, there wasn't a car for about .5 miles in front of me and probably a mile or more behind me. I couldn't believe that was his advice. I was speeding and was willing to risk the inevitable ticket, but to actually have a LEO tell me to be more dangerous? YHGTBSM. Unbelievable. Also unbelievable, is only a couple miles down the road, just over the next hill were at least two cars with mechanical difficulty. He could have been doing that "to serve..." part, but that just doesn't generate revenue. As for the last paragraph, well, I don't know if I could be that tactful. I find myself often taking long voluntary vacations from this site as I get frustrated with the heavy handed moderation. It's just the internet, guys. Lighten up.

Don't do Facecrap. I'm a member of this and other boards because I want to interact with people of similar interests, even when I'm not directly talking about that particular interest.

I thought this was the place on this forum for us to talk about random stuff. Am I wrong? Is there another place where members can get together and BS about something other than our cars?

This is one of my biggest pet peeves. The vast majority of these tickets are nothing more than revenue generation. What other "crime" can you simply pay off? What if I go into Wal Mart and slap the snot out of the greeter, can I simply write a check and make it go away? If I stole a TV? Snort a couple lines of coke? Nope. There is the line of demarcation. If you can pay to make it go away, it's not truly a crime, just revenue. And just exactly how does a cop see bare feet inside a moving vehicle???

Went by the junk yards a couple weeks ago just to see what was out there. One yard had a couple S30s that were still pretty straight and relatively rust free. Of course, they were bone yard cars so a bunch was missing but they were still surprisingly there. I had a thought that maybe I could pick up both shells and make one complete car out of them and then use parts of the remaining shell to patch my car. Even so, the missing parts tended to be the same on each car so even with both, I would still need about 10% of a car to put one good driver together. The other day I decide to call the guy and find out how much he wanted for both cars. Keep in mind these are junk yard cars that have already been picked. He tells me $1000 EACH! Yeah, right. Looks like that guy is going to sit on them for a bit.

In all fairness, I never did have the SUs adjusted right, but even so, I just wouldn't look back. Stepping up from the SUs to the Holley is like going from points to electronic ignition. As for the performance, I'm still trying to tune the carb, I'll be working on it today. It's still running a bit rich, I just installed an O2 sensor last week so I can sort things out. But even running rich, the thing flat scoots. No drivability issues, electric choke, good throttle response, and I know that even with the biggest cam I dare to use all I would need for a tune is a little jet adjustment. I do have a video on my photobucket account with audio. The sound doesn't exactly match the video and I'm running a cherry bomb pipe at the time but you get the idea.

I have a couple minor warnings regarding the Arizona Z intake. I have been running mine for a couple years and there are two things in particular that I believe need to be addressed. 1) the Arizona intake will not clear any other headers so if Dave STILL hasn't made his design header, you will likely have interference with the MSA or other header. I had to dimple my #2 exhaust pipe and grind some of the #3 intake runner to get it to fit. Really hated hammering and grinding on $500 worth of parts. But now that I've done it, I'm happy with the results. 2) I don't know if it's a core shift issue with the casting or just that my Holley 390 doesn't fit well, but I had to use a 1/2" phenolic spacer to get a full seal on the throttle plate. Just bolting the carburator to the manifold, at least in my case, left about a 1/16" gap between the edge of the throttle plate and manifold flange on one side. Because it was just one side, I think it has something to do with core shift, but I don't know. 3) With the additional 1/2" of the adaptor, it makes fitting an air cleaner with the stock hood a little trickier. Anyway, I'm not bashing the product. I am happy as I can be with the finished product, but it is not exactly "plug-n-play". Just be forewarned if you go this route.

FACT

I'll defer to Luseboy about the details of the various combination of parts. But the one thing that I will add is CAM. All your power is made in the head. You need to get more air/fuel in, burn it, and get it out. The best way to do that is open the valves higher and longer. Clean up the ports and chambers, put on a header it.

Just Damn! That looks so nice. I like the look of it lowered the way it is, but I think you're right that for it to actually be usable on public streets you need another inch or so.

Hey Joa, can't help you off the top of my head. But since you're local, maybe we can get together some time and do some wrenching. PM me if you're interested.

With you on the main jets. Pressure is about 6psi Float level is good. I'll check PV but this is the newer design with PV protection. Thing I'm struggling with though is why it's running so rich even on the idle circuit.