johnc

Proper punctuation and grammer would go a long way to clarifying whatever was posted above. Please read the rules and try to clean up the post so we can all figure out what you're asking: http://forums.hybridz.org/announcement.php?f=76&announcementid=2

Yup. You would be better off finishing the car and then selling it to someone who is not into Zs. A recent example: Myself and a few friends looked at a 1970 240Z that was listed at $13,000+ and supposedly had a lot of mods like a 3.2, etc. When we looked at the car our concensus was that it was a $5,000 car, mostly because of the rust and accident free 1970 chassis. Talking with the seller it turns out he paid a lot more then his asking price for the car because he thought the Z was "cool." Do a few burnouts in front of the nearest high school when it let's out...

Jeez! I've spent almost 5 years posting on this board? I need to get a life!

Now this was fun! Even though it was just an autocross we could get the 810 in some amazing lurid slides on its 185/70-14 Michelins, with 4 people in the car laughing and banging their helmets together like billiard balls.

I know this HybridZ and everything, but if you're going NA and you want it to sound good, the L6 in the car does very well on both counts.

I thought that too but after doing some research I changed my mind. The VLSD gives up after a few hard laps at a race track. The Track model comes with some wacky kind of yaw/skid control that doesn't completely go away. Fine for a street car but not nice on a race track. Talking with my contacts at Brembo revealed that Brembo does stock or sell any of the parts Nissan uses in their Track model brake system. You have to buy those parts through Nissan. Now, maybe if you could figure out the cross reference between the Nissan and Brembo part numbers... So, at least for my plans, I would be removing the items I paid extra for on the Track model.

Everyday here in SoCal they you can find 3+ 2003s for sale with asking prices from $17K to 19K.

Yeah, and I need to lose about 30lbs of it! Here's my initial plan: Buy a base 2003 350Z with as little stuff on it as possible. Keep it street legal and comfortable enough for me to drive it to race tracks on the west coast. Swap in the Nissan Motorsports (or Nismo) LSD 'cuz the factory VLSD is supposed to have problems. Start doing some R&D on the chassis and suspension and see what the car needs. Add lightness. Don't touch the engine at all! See what track times I can get.

We will see... I'll most likely be a 350Z owner this summer. Here's some anectdotal information regarding the 350Zs prowess: West Coast Z Nationals autocross driving school. I make one run in Bryan Lampe's yellow 1971 BSP prepared 240Z, a car that I've driven at an autocross hundreds of times and the car is a multi-time regional BSP champion car running new Toyo Proxes RA1s . My time on my only run in the car is 58.8xx I get out of Bryan's car and into a base model, absolutely stock, 5,000 miles on the odometer, 2004 350Z with a 6 speed. No air pressure adjustments, no alignment, nothing. The female owner is sitting in the next seat so I have to take it easy. Never driven a 350Z before. One run: 61.2xx. You guys can talk trash about the 350Z all you want. I was impressed with the car's handling and power and will be doing something significant with one over the next year or two.

Were you breaking any stub axles with that much rear toe in? I know others who have tried numbers like that in ITS cars and they noticed more cracking around the flange and had to shorten the replacement interval. On topic... Chet Whittle was very successful running without a rear anti-roll bar on many tracks back east. He did run springs up in the 350 lb. in. range (and higher on some tracks). Generally, the more spring you run the smaller your anti-roll bars need to be. For a street 240Z no rear bar is fine. It basically puts the balance back to factory stock and reduces the tendency for the rear to step out in a corner under drop throttle or braking.

We're not on the same page... Inner Hatch Seal 1. Clean the inner hatch seal mating surface on the underside of the hatch. 2. Clean the inner hatch seal (the inside seal on the body of the car). 3. Put a thin layer of grease on the top surface of the inner hatch seal (the inside seal on the body of the car). 4. Shut the hatch. 5. Opened the hatch and looked at the line of grease on the hatch sealing surface (the underside of the hatch). Anywhere the line is less the 1/4" thick is a place where the inner hatch seal is not contacting properly.

I don't know what more I can say. What's unclear?

I sell a complete assembly: http://www.betamotorsports.com/products/240StrutKit.html And Ross at Modern-Motorsports sells a kit: http://www.modern-motorsports.com/catalog/default.php?cPath=23_34

It was on top of the vent can in the rear 1/4 panel. There's a small tube brazed onto the top of it that's the beginning of the main vent line going forward to the block vent pipe in the engine compartment. It had been bent down and had a small crack at the base where its brazed to the can itself. $10 says its the inner rear hatch seal.

No! Drill a nice round hole from 3/4 to 7/8" above the existing hole and then weld up the old hole. Make absolutely sure the holes in the front and back of the crossmember are parallel. Then weld large reinforcing washers around the new holes. No! Use a drill press. And yes, make sure everything is correct before removing the crossmember and drilling the holes. I think you can buy everything you need. Camber gauge Toe plates Tape measures Fishing line Jackstands Notepad Pen

The best thing you can do is beat the guy again at the next kart race, or better yet, beat his 512 with your 240Z on a race track.

Frank Gorshin has died: http://www.eonline.com/News/Items/0,1,16584,00.html He was my favorite Batman villian.

For autocross and street driving increasing the amount of Ackerman in the Zs steering is helpful. For road racing I don't think increasing Ackerman is of much help unless its a tight track or an important corner is very tight. Ackerman helps with road race corner entry if enough steering is used. On most race track corners the steering angle of one wheel is no more then 10 degrees and the combined steering angles shouldn't be more the 20 degrees. If the Ackerman curve can be setup so that its all in within the 5 to 10 degree range for each wheel and does not increase after that, it will help.

As Josh said, its testing and attention to detail that reduces the problem. Here's what I did on his car: Exhaust Fumes Inner Hatch Seal 1. Cleaned the inner hatch seal mating surface on the underside of the hatch. 2. Cleaned the inner hatch seal. 3. Put a thin layer of grease on the top surface of the inner hatch seal. 4. Shut the hatch. 5. Opened the hatch and looked at the line of grease on the hatch sealing surface. Anywhere the line is less the 1/4" thick is a place where the inner hatch seal is not contacting properly. The hatch seals available from MSA and VB are no where near as nice as the OEM part but, unfortunately that's all we've got to work with. The lower rear corners are the places where the sealing is the worst and on Josh's car, these were the problem areas. I improved the seal at the corners by adding some closed cell foam weather strip between the inner hatch seal and the body of the car. This pushed the seal up about 1/4" which was enough to get a constant 1/4" contact area around the hatch. Hatch Finisher Panel Make sure the finisher panel on the inside of the hatch is intact and is sealed well at the edges. Hatch Openings Any openings in the back, underside of the hatch must be properly sealed. Tail Light Gaskets Remove all the rear finisher panels and the interior panel. Put a big, bright light up against the inside of the tail light and look from the outside to see if you can see any light at all. If you can, replace the tail light gasket. Also use compressed air and blow from the outside to the inside to see if any air leaks through the taillight gaskets of through any of the other openings in the rear panel. Rear Floor Seal any holes in the rear floor up to where the Moustache bar mounts. Fuel Fumes Remove the fuel tank and the vent can in the passenger 1/4 panel. Check the fuel tank and the vent can for cracks or leaks. Replace ALL the vent lines!

The current president of the Ferrari Club of America is Rick Race: srace808@hotmail.com The current Director of the South Central Region is Al De Lauro: alamorosso@sbcglobal.net BTW... I've raced indoor karts and on a race track with the past Director of the Pacific Region and he's a great guy and a very, very fast driver. He's a multi-time Sports2000 Divisional champ here in CalClub. Don't paint all the Ferrari owners with the same brush.

I have the Harbor Frieght leveler and it needs a modification to make it work. The little black handle unscrews and comes off almost immediatly the first time you use it. I tossed it and welded a 1/2" bolt (3/4" bolt head) centered on the screw shaft. That lets me use an air ratchet to move the leveler forward and back. Also, these kinds of levelers tend to tilt the engine to one side so you have to think ahead and hook the chains up to the engine so it sits level just when it is on the mounts.

Before doing anything with bumpsteer spacers, assemble the suspension, install your wheels and tires and set the car on the ground. Then set the ride height where you want it keeping in mind that for a street car you should see at least 4" of shock shaft between the top of the strut tube and the bumpstop. Once you've got that all set, then look at the front LCA angles. If they are level or pointing up then install the shortest bumpsteer spacer that will make the front LCAs point down. But, as Jon said, relocating the inner mounting point for the front LCAs is a better solution.

Be careful with crankcase venting. A simpe solution is two lines to a catch can with a filtered breather on top of the can. Locate the can in a place where if it overflows it won't start a fire. A PCV based system is a better solution for a street car. Its common for the crankcases on the forced induction engine to get pressurized under boost from ring and valve seal blowby. A fixed orific PCV valve only opens under vacuum so prologed boost will stop any crank venting. When the PCV valve does finally open it tends to dump a lot of oil mist (and some oil if not properly designed) into the intake tract. There are variable flow PCV systems (Toyota is one) on new vehicles that work correctly based on blow-by production (small orific opening at idle, large opening under load).

The answer is: it depends... Automobiles that have later generation ABS systems have brake bias programmed into the ABS software. In many cases the default braking bias without ABS control is heavily front biased for safety reasons. Its almost as if the cars don't have any rear brakes. I learned this while helping Erik Messley tune the brakes on an Acrua NSX, a Viper GTS, and a Honda S2000. Short of replacing the master cylinders, brake calipers, rotors, and prop valves, the braking balance and stopping distances on those particular cars was much better with the ABS hooked up then without.

I'm with Tim regarding camber plates on a street car. I must be getting older... Two things need to be isolated: the spring and the shock. The spring is easy because you can design the upper and lower spring perches so a .125 to .250" layer of some durometer rubber is incorporated to isolate the spring from the strut. The shock will be more difficult and I haven't thought of a good solution. I also thought about adding a .125" layer of polyurethane between the top of the EMI Racing camber plate and the inside of the strut tower. But further thought and discussion made me change my mind. That layer of flexible material would put the two bolts attaching the camber plate to the strut tower in shear.