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

New Lap Record for the “Green-Hell”

A Pagani Zonda R established a new record for “production” cars on the Nordschleife circuit of the Nürburgring this week, covering the 20.83-kilometre-long course in 6 minutes 47 seconds. The Italian Zonda R is a hand-built carbon-titanium and carbon-fibre sports car, powered by a 750-horsepower, 6.0-litre AMG-sourced V12

www.project350z.com

A great site for prepping your Z for autocrossing:

project350z.com

Great stuff!

Service Engine Soon!!!!!

Well the Service Engine Soon light came on and I took the Z to the good people at Performance Nissan.
John at the service department took care of me,pulled the codes and identified the issue being the catalytic converters. This explains the lean running engine due to the O2 sensors getting an incorrect reading from the malfunctioning Cat-converters. Well 24hrs later the vehicle is back in my hands with two new cats and zero ping from the engine. Oh and the work was covered by Nissan. All is right in the world!!!!

Rally Of Morocco

Results Nurburgring 24h

Pos. No. Make Laps Time
1 25 BMW M3 GT2 154 12:17.344
2 43 Ferrari F430 GTC 154 9:33.019
3 97 Audi R8 LMS 153 9:32.691
4 76 BMW Z4 GT3 152 10:37.803
5 102 Audi R8 LMS 152 10:51.149
6 20 Porsche GT3 CupS 151 9:27.493
7 26 BMW M3 GT2 150 10:52.452
8 18 Porsche GT3 CupS 150 10:41.858
9 69 BMW Z4 GT3 149 10:04.650
10 35 Porsche GT3 Cup 148 10:05.529
11 14 Porsche GT3 Cup 147 9:51.098
12 44 Nissan Z 33 145 10:15.261
13 11 Porsche GT3 RS 145 9:56.683
14 33 Porsche GT3 Cup 145 10:01.348
15 133 Audi TTS 144 10:13.279

The Z33 Falken team ended up at an impressive 12th spot. Here are some details on the car:

Capacity: 3798 cm 3
Engine: VQ35HR (NISMO tuning), extended stroke 7 mm
Max Power: 400 hp, Max torque: 421 Nm
Clutch: NISMO; Drive: NISSAN
Tyres: FALKEN (Front) 280/680R18 (Rear) 290/680R18
Rims: Enkei 11J x 18
Weight: 1.250 kg

Looks like a 380RS engine.

Enjoy the Video:

24 HOURS IN 19500 FRAMES from tim hahne on Vimeo.

Nurburgring 24hrs

The greatest track in the world, the Nurburgring, is running its annual 24hrs race. The Falken Z33 is doing well currently 17th as of 445am German time. The team is as follows:
Falken Motorsports
Dumbreck, Peter GB - GB SP 7 Nissan Z33 (350Z)
Schoysman, Dirk D - Barweiler
Tanaka, Tetsuya J - Japan
Hoshino, Kazuki J - Japan
You can watch it live here but in German but tune in to Radio Le Mans to hear commentary in English. Brew a pot and stay up; Porsche vs. Audi vs. Ferrari, it doesn’t get much better than that.

Some Alfa Love

Saw this beautiful Alfa Romeo Giulia Sprint Speciale last night in Brentwood.

Big Bend Open Road Race...one day....

Senna

This past Sunday marked the sixteenth anniversary of the death of Ayrton Senna. The 1994 San Marino Grand Prix weekend saw some horrific crashes including the death of fellow F1 driver Roland Ratzenberger while qualifying. Senna's crash was no less horrific and was played out in front of a world wide audience. I saw the race live on TV and the moment the crash occurred, I knew this was no run of the mill F1 accident, this was far more savage. Speed Hunters recently visited Imola and sought out the Senna memorial. The image below directs you to the memorial of one of the greatest drivers the world has seen.

Dyno

I Had a day at the dyno over at Specialty Z. The guys there know their stuff and have some monster Z32’s putting down some serious horsepower. I was there to get a base line pull just so I know where I stand. I was shooting for 240HP so when 236HP showed on the graph I wasn’t too worried. The real bummer was that the run had to be cut short due to the Air/Fuel reading high, showing a very lean running engine. In an effort to protect the engine the pull was cut short and we decided that an ECU tune would be needed to rich out the mixture. I had planed on this but at a far later date. So my plans to install an oil cooler and diff will have to wait until this matter is fixed.

Pit Stop

I was hanging out at the Risi Ferrari garage at the Long Beach Grand Prix. Here’s the team practicing a tire change. More pics to follow.

Heel and oh sh%*!!!!

In a nutshell my heel & toe skills suck. There I’ve said it. Sure, if “Driving Miss Daisy” speeds counted for anything, then yes, I can heal and toe with the best of them but as the speeds increase my skills decrease. It doesn’t help that I’ve been driving a lumbering Land Rover for the past seven years, numbing me to the subtleties of high performance driving. To rectify this situation I have focused on the driver and the car. First for the car I have purchased a more “driver friendly” JDM 380Z RS accelerator pedal.



The 05 Base Z has tiny pedals and the postage-stamp sized accelerator pedal is not making life any easier so a change was needed. I’ve heard good things so I’ll see if it makes an improvement.

The second part to making me the next Ayerton Senna, wink-wink, nudge-nudge is the book Secrets Of Solo Racing by Henry A. Watts. My friend Chris loaned me this book and he has a number of years of SCCA SOLO II racing experience and swears by it. So far the book has been a quick read with clear cut directions on all aspects of driving fast; correct lines, apexes and yes heel & toe.






So the last and final step is to put the above in practice. I’ll update the results and here’s to not missing a shift and ruining a perfectly good motor!

My Favorite Alfa

Il Mostro!

HPDE Buttonwillow

Spent the day as a spectator but learnt a bunch from fellow Z owners and the instructor.

DTM 190E

Love this Merc

My Birthday gift: Racing 101

My big 4-0 birthday week revolved around cars and racing. Last Saturday was no different as I received a birthday gift of a training session at K1Speed .My instructor, Timothy, was extremely patient and talked me through the corners, directing me on how to approach the desired lines. I needed all the help he could offer as I have yet to break the 27 second lap barrier. While I listened closely, my execution of his directions was far from exact. At the end of our session I was exhausted, my hands and forearms where burning but I had learned a bunch and was awarded my best time; 28.153. 1/100 of a second less and I'd be knocking on the door 27-second club.