Ciao!

When I started this blog almost a year ago, I wanted to solely concentrate on the Z and nothing more. No family pics or moaning about the trouble & strife; that’s wife for my northern friends. But like all plans, life happens. So the point I’m getting at is it looks like I’ll be missing my December 18^th track day…again. Oh don’t feel bad for me, really and I’ll give you a hint why:

Guess where I’m going? Yup Italia! I’m off to Venice, Florence and Rome. It’s a treat for my better half and I and details of why will have to wait until the New Year. Until then, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. Speak to you all in 2011.

Post-Turkey day work out

I took the Z out today to stretch its legs. As most of the country was enjoying each other’s intimate company in the malls, I decided to hit Angeles Crest High Way and Big Tujunga. I couldn’t have picked a better day; the freeway was open and the canyons were clear from grandma and officer plod. Instead I was sharing the road with the likes of Ducati, Buell and Honda. Did I mention how much I love 3^rd gear? oh and torque, what a thing of beauty. Well I used both to their fullest as I was offered curve after curve. There were straights too and I could have easily hit triple digits but I played nice and hovered just under them. Well enough of my gloating here are some pics.

Forza Italia!!! And a lil love to France too.

Swung by the tale end of the Cars of Italy and France this past weekend. By the time I got there most of the cars had left. Still, there was a smattering of some pretty cool rides. Check out the Junior Zagato and the rest of the cars, enjoy;

Million Dollar Bumble-Bee

I had an appointment in Beverly Hills, just off Rodeo Drive yesterday so I took a detour to take in the sites. Rodeo is a treat in itself but also pretty cool if you’re into cars. All the big marques parade back and forth driven by the usual characters that know the price of all but the value of none. Either way it's good fun. While walking to my appointment, I saw a crowd milling around a car in front of the Bijan store. The store is named after its founder, Bijan Pakzad who is quite a mogul here in LA with billboards displaying Mr. Bijan’s smiling face and his flagship store taking prominence in the middle of Rodeo. Take a peak through the shop window and you’ll see why Bijan has the envious title, at least amongst his peers, of the most expensive store on Rodeo Drive. Well I crossed the street and this is what I saw:

A yellow and black Bugatii Veyron, yup yellow and black!

You may be asking “what the French toast, of all the colors, why would you spend $1 million on a car and order it in yellow and black?” Well yellow and black happens to be the signature colors of the Bijan brand, a brand that does not cater to the shrinking violets of the world but instead to the loud and brash captains of industry. The Bugatii looked great and upon closer inspection I could see the Bijan signature on the left quarter panel as well as what looked like the face of a Venetian Lion on the front hood of the car, painted to display a shadow effect behind the layers of gloss black paint. I’m sure I’m off here on the lion motif, if you're reading Mr Pakzad, please feel free to correct me. Again not the colour I would have picked but since the car is a promotional piece as well as one of Bijan’s personal rides, there must be a tax break in there somewhere, so I can appreciate what’s behind the thinking. Watch out for the Club Sport Z in black and green….not. Irrespective of the color, the car looked great. Heck, yellow and black, make mine neon pink I’ll be driving it around with a smile on my face.

Here’s a bit about Biijan's car collection from wikipedia:

Bijan is known also for his cars: he has a Yellow Bentley Azure with black interior, as well as a Black Bentley Azure with yellow interior. He is also known to have a Black Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren with a customized paint scheme, a yellow Ferrari 430, a Yellow Rolls Royce Drophead Coupe, and a Bugatti Veyron, all of which he is known to park outside of his Rodeo Drive boutique.

What I’d rather be doing…

350Z + The Nurburgring equals heaven!

Last clutch fix.

With the new flywheel and clutch in place it became painfully obvious that it was time to replace the clutch master cylinder.

While in traffic the clutch pedal was not retaining pressure and would stick close to the floor requiring me to kick it back up with the top of my shoe. After reading the message boards, another common 350Z issue is for old hydraulic clutch fluid to go beyond its heat rating, forcing the OEM rubber clutch line to expand in stop and go traffic. This would occur due to the positioning of the clutch line next to the exhaust manifold. Both issues were causing clutch pressure to drop so it was of to the shop to have this taken care of. Greg at Specialty Z had the master cylinder ready for me and I purchased the stainless steel line from Techna-Fit, a high quality local builder of “fluid delivery systems”. Greg wrapped the line in heat-resistant tape for an extra measure of security, bled the old fluid and replaced it with ATE Super Blue high temp hydraulic fluid. The difference is night and day with the pedal travel allowing me to smoothly transition from one gear to the next.

With these minor mods I have increased the performance of the Z by creating a more robust clutch system allowing me to push the Z a little harder when the time calls for it. Well that’s it for the drivetrain mods; lighter flywheel, performance clutch, stainless steel clutch line with heat shield along with high temp hydraulic fluid. I’m now ready to focus on other areas of concern; brakes and engine management.

Buttonwillow

Well my target track day came and went. Work and life seemed to consume all my time but I’m not too bummed. I’m shooting for the next driver’s clinic at Buttonwillow, on December 18th; same format of HPDE with instruction. The months of October and November will allow me enough time to determine if I’m running lean and make the necessary adjustments as well as swap out the brake fluid and replace the pads and lastly save up my pennies for a quality helmet. Another notable announcement; I just hit 41,000 miles so I’m averaging 1000 miles a month since I purchased the car in January.

Differential 101

Also known as how to convince your better half that you need a Limited Slip Differential. Got this from the guys at Crank & Piston

Transparent Z

clutch replaced

Got the car back and its running great; no more slipping at high rpm and now the Z jumps of the line err, stop-light.I still need to go back to replace the clutch line and flush the hydraulics but that will have to be in 2-3weeks.

Clutch replacement time

I’ll be dropping of the Z tomorrow for a day or two to have the clutch and flywheel replaced. After weighing my options I’m going for Specialty Z Sport Street Clutch with the SZ Flywheel that weighs in at 18lbs compared to the OEM’s 30lbs. Here’s a picture of it along with some info from the SZ website:



"Our flywheels utilize a patent pending "segmented" heat shield system. Traditional heat shields warp because of the uneven heat produced by a slipping clutch. Just like a car going around in a circle, the outside tires go faster than the inside tires, the clutch disc slides faster around the outside of the flywheel than it does around the inside. The faster moving outside gets hotter than the inside. Because metal expands more the hotter it gets, the outside of the heat shield expands more than the inside. Traditional heat shields are made of one piece metal rings, so when the outside expands more than the inside, the only thing the shield can do is warp. The segmented heat shields are not connected so they can expand and contract without warping. A warped heat shield causes the clutch to slip, which causes more heat and more warpage.

Our Billet Flywheels are dynamically balanced after CNC machining. Other flywheel manufactures assume that since they CNC their flywheels it comes off the machine fully balanced. This would be true assuming the density of the aluminum is constant throughout the part. Unfortunately even the best billet material is not evenly dense throughout and the starter ring gears are never perfect."

I’ll be mating this to a stainless steel clutch-line and ATE Super Blue brake fluid.

Group B Audi

Saw these tearing up the night time forests in England when I was a kid. Amazing then and amazing now. SWB Audi Quattro, the one that started it all:

Blackstone Labs Oil Analysis

I just received my oil analysis from Blackstone labs. It’s a great way to assess the wear of your engine by analyzing metallic particulate amounts which are suspended in your engine oil with the various metals representing an inner component of the engine; crank, piston, valve, etc. Consider it blood work for the engine. The results from mine look very good with the only areas of concern being the oil filter and the possibility of sludge. To remedy this, I’m going to be moving to a larger Mobil 1 filter, as recommended by many Z owners and run half a can of Sea Foam in the engine immediately before the oil change. Per the Sea Foam website, " Sea Foam will slowly re-liquefy and suspend contaminants for easy removal". I'll be using Pennzoil's new synthetic, Ultra and in 5000 miles I’ll grab another sample, send it off to Blackstone and see if there’s an improvement.

Falken 380Z RS at the 24hrs of Nurburgring

Found this great video on Crank and piston of the Falken cars tearing it up at the 2010 24hrs of the Nurburgring. You can view the results here enjoy:

Count down to Track day

It may be my imagination and according to Performance Nissan it is but I’m still hearing a slight pre-detonation at low RPM/high gear; e.g. 2400 rpm in 3^rd gear. In a week I’ll be having the clutch replaced; details to follow, and at the same time I’ll have my Z shop check the Air/Fuel ratio to ensure its not running lean. If it is, I will need to have that addressed before I take it to the track.

Now the track day I have in mind is more of a performance clinic with an emphasis on car control and driver instruction. They’ll be time spent on a skid pad and hot laps so I need to plan for a full day. The clinic will be held at the Buttonwillow race track in Kern County on October 2^nd .

Here are some details of the track

Buttonwillow website

Turn-by-turn guide to Buttonwillow per Trackpedia

Cars & Coffee, Irvine

A weekend or so ago I attended the unofficial car show that is Cars and Coffee. I left LA, blurry eyed,Saturday morning and arrived at the designated spot by 7am. The place was packed by the time I got there and the cars consisted of all types of vehicles, exotics, vintage, muscle cars and everything in between. Here’s a small sampling of what was there.

Jag D-Type

Some info on the R-Gruppe Cult


The Uber rare Ferrari 458 Italia





Euro spec M6 from the 80s





Daytona!!!!
The Alpine A110
More R-Gruppe