QuintonC's 350Z Build
The following users liked this post:
QuintonC (05-17-2016)
The following users liked this post:
QuintonC (05-17-2016)
05-17-2016, 12:47 PM
#163
Registered User
Thread Starter
iTrader: (2)
Thanks guys, opened my front door this morning to the Z covered in rain drops. Looked so beautiful, but I'm a terrible photographer, so I didn't get anything worth sharing haha.
Planning on shooting tomorrow morning with my roommate, should be good! Who knows, maybe I'll talk the roommate into a night shoot tonight.
05-19-2016, 12:18 PM
#164
The following 5 users liked this post by QuintonC:
APTech (05-20-2016),
KingBaby (05-19-2016),
rustyschopshop (05-19-2016),
SirSpeedyZ (10-13-2016),
sofakiing (05-21-2016)
05-19-2016, 12:29 PM
#165
Car looks great, Quinton. Just so you know, your Z is my inspiration to bring mine back to wingless. Wish I never added the thing now. Gotta get that Top Secret diffuser, too. It really pulls together the rear of the car.
The following users liked this post:
QuintonC (05-19-2016)
05-19-2016, 12:35 PM
#166
Registered User
Thread Starter
iTrader: (2)
Thank you for that, it means a lot. Glad to know that I can bring inspiration to others. What wing do you have? I've actually been thinking about my future plans and I'm fairly certain I'll end up running flares of some sort with the MCR hood and canards with a BCL wing. I think it would make it look so much more aggressive.
05-23-2016, 05:04 AM
#168
05-25-2016, 09:16 PM
#169
Registered User
Thread Starter
iTrader: (2)
UPDATE TIME! 
So let's just start this off right. (Note that this is essentially me reviewing this bumper).
Look at it. Just look at it. At first when I got this bumper, I was like "wtf is this big box at my door?" Then I realized the kind folks over at APTech hooked it up and gave me a sweet opportunity to work with them.
It took me forever to get this thing fitted on the car because I didn't have a very good way to cut the bumper without taking 12 years and being unstable (dremel). So I needed a grinder. I ended up just marking the area that needed cut and sent it off to the body shop to let them do the work.
Overall, the bumper is great. I love pretty much everything about it and the way it looks. I did have what seemed to be a fitment issue at first, but that later turned out to be me being an idiot and not realizing that the fitment issue was due to my oil cooler. So I had to adjust that a bit to get it fitting right.
After getting everything to fit up right, it was time to get this sucker over to paint. Loaded it up in the trusty ol' pathfinder and away she went. Now, I'm saying this because if any of you pick the bumper up, make sure you tell your body shop to add plenty of flex additive into the paint so that it can move on the bumper. The reason that I say this is because the lip that is attached to the bumper flexes on the inner corners of the bumper, and this can cause the paint to crack if there isn't enough flex additive in there (ask me how I know
)
Since installing the bumper and while test fitting it with my friends and roommate (which I owe so many thanks to for the pictures), I instantly started receiving compliments on how much nicer the car looked with a proper and aggressive bumper. It's something about the way that this bumper looks that makes the car look so much more aggressive and just overall so much more proper.
Also to add to that, I've noticed a LOT of people gazing at the car as I'm driving by as well. Whether that is because of the bumper or not, who knows, but I can definitely assume so since not much else has changed exterior wise and I didn't get this many looks previously.
Overall, I would say the fitment is about a 9.5/10. Since I didn't have much help putting it on last time, it took some work to get it to fit properly on both sides and line up with the fenders, but with a little work it will definitely get there.
As far as quality, absolute 10/10. This thing is aggressive and as beautiful of a bumper as the Z needs (especially for us FI guys with intercoolers). It just adds an extra dimension of aggressiveness to the car.
If anybody has any questions or hesitations on picking one of these up, I say go for it. Shoot APTech a message and let them know that Quinton sent you
So let's just start this off right. (Note that this is essentially me reviewing this bumper).
Look at it. Just look at it. At first when I got this bumper, I was like "wtf is this big box at my door?" Then I realized the kind folks over at APTech hooked it up and gave me a sweet opportunity to work with them.
It took me forever to get this thing fitted on the car because I didn't have a very good way to cut the bumper without taking 12 years and being unstable (dremel). So I needed a grinder. I ended up just marking the area that needed cut and sent it off to the body shop to let them do the work.
Overall, the bumper is great. I love pretty much everything about it and the way it looks. I did have what seemed to be a fitment issue at first, but that later turned out to be me being an idiot and not realizing that the fitment issue was due to my oil cooler. So I had to adjust that a bit to get it fitting right.
After getting everything to fit up right, it was time to get this sucker over to paint. Loaded it up in the trusty ol' pathfinder and away she went. Now, I'm saying this because if any of you pick the bumper up, make sure you tell your body shop to add plenty of flex additive into the paint so that it can move on the bumper. The reason that I say this is because the lip that is attached to the bumper flexes on the inner corners of the bumper, and this can cause the paint to crack if there isn't enough flex additive in there (ask me how I know
)
Since installing the bumper and while test fitting it with my friends and roommate (which I owe so many thanks to for the pictures), I instantly started receiving compliments on how much nicer the car looked with a proper and aggressive bumper. It's something about the way that this bumper looks that makes the car look so much more aggressive and just overall so much more proper.
Also to add to that, I've noticed a LOT of people gazing at the car as I'm driving by as well. Whether that is because of the bumper or not, who knows, but I can definitely assume so since not much else has changed exterior wise and I didn't get this many looks previously.
Overall, I would say the fitment is about a 9.5/10. Since I didn't have much help putting it on last time, it took some work to get it to fit properly on both sides and line up with the fenders, but with a little work it will definitely get there.
As far as quality, absolute 10/10. This thing is aggressive and as beautiful of a bumper as the Z needs (especially for us FI guys with intercoolers). It just adds an extra dimension of aggressiveness to the car.
If anybody has any questions or hesitations on picking one of these up, I say go for it. Shoot APTech a message and let them know that Quinton sent you
05-26-2016, 10:28 PM
#170
New Member
iTrader: (13)
Dude the pictures are ****ing great man, very nice, need more pica of bay and interior!
Is it the paint or the clear coat that cracks...never had that issue before.... I used 72500s clear anyways...
Been practicing wraping things in CF, one a bit more comfortable I'll be adding the bumper and wrapping the lip portion n CF
Is it the paint or the clear coat that cracks...never had that issue before.... I used 72500s clear anyways...
Been practicing wraping things in CF, one a bit more comfortable I'll be adding the bumper and wrapping the lip portion n CF
The following users liked this post:
QuintonC (05-27-2016)
05-27-2016, 04:17 AM
#171
Registered User
Thread Starter
iTrader: (2)
Dude the pictures are ****ing great man, very nice, need more pica of bay and interior!
Is it the paint or the clear coat that cracks...never had that issue before.... I used 72500s clear anyways...
Been practicing wraping things in CF, one a bit more comfortable I'll be adding the bumper and wrapping the lip portion n CF
Is it the paint or the clear coat that cracks...never had that issue before.... I used 72500s clear anyways...
Been practicing wraping things in CF, one a bit more comfortable I'll be adding the bumper and wrapping the lip portion n CF
It's the paint itself that is cracked. It's like flaking off, I really need to call my uncle and have him fix it because it's starting to really bother me.
06-12-2016, 07:39 PM
#172
Registered User
Thread Starter
iTrader: (2)
Calling my uncle tomorrow (just got back from vacation in PCB) and probably going to have to take the bumper off and give it to him for the week or so. Also, I've been working on coming up with a sticker design for the bumper canards since KBD/APT is redesigning their logo.
What do you guys think works best? These will be in white, and will be sized accordingly to fit the bumper's canards. I had to go with something clean, I felt that bold font faces represented the car's style the most. On the passenger side of the bumper, I will do a reverse italic to make the font slant towards the rear of the car.
The last one I think I like the most, but I'll have to run it by the guys over at KBD and see what they have to say first.
I'll also be adding Speedhunters tirebomb soon. Chargespeed Bottomlines will come later in the fall, and wider spacers in the back for a more aggressive fit to set the car off just the way I want.
I've also been speaking with a few companies to see if I can't get the Z a big **** transplant.
Stay tuned!
What do you guys think works best? These will be in white, and will be sized accordingly to fit the bumper's canards. I had to go with something clean, I felt that bold font faces represented the car's style the most. On the passenger side of the bumper, I will do a reverse italic to make the font slant towards the rear of the car.
The last one I think I like the most, but I'll have to run it by the guys over at KBD and see what they have to say first.
I'll also be adding Speedhunters tirebomb soon. Chargespeed Bottomlines will come later in the fall, and wider spacers in the back for a more aggressive fit to set the car off just the way I want.
I've also been speaking with a few companies to see if I can't get the Z a big **** transplant.
Stay tuned!
06-22-2016, 12:27 PM
#173
Registered User
Thread Starter
iTrader: (2)
Going to be cutting stickers this weekend possibly with a vinyl cutter that my girlfriend has. I think I'll be cutting the last one for sure, so hopefully it turns out alright.
I've been tracking down a bit of an oil leak for a while now, haven't exactly narrowed it down 100% for sure, but I think I MAY have fixed it last night.
It seemed like where I had to clip the end mounting points off of the oil cooler, there was a small enough gap between the endplates of the cooler where oil was leaking out. I managed to push those back flush to the core of the cooler, and then threw some HondaBond over the gaps to ensure it doesn't leak there anymore.
I also tightened up the rest of the fittings all over the oil cooler setup (so, the fittings on the sandwich plate, the fittings on the cooler itself, and then tightened up the oil feed line as well.)
After tightening that stuff up and crossing my fingers, my roommate and I worked on adjusting the sway bars on the car. I had been putting this off for so long because I for some reason had this idea in my head that it would take forever to do. But, it was far easier than I remember. Moved the front sway to hole 2 (the second loosest position), and then moved the rear sway to hole 2 (the middle position).
Drove it a little bit aggressive on the way into work today and I can tell that the car definitely has a much better steering response as it digs further into the corners. Wish I would've done this a lot sooner, the car has a lot more oversteer response than understeer response that I was getting previously.
Huge thanks to Mic for helping me get everything ironed out as far as the geometry and how the sway bars work on our cars.
Will be driving the car to the body shop Friday morning to have my uncle look at the bumper. If he quotes me to paint it again, I'll just take it somewhere else that has experience painting polyurethane and get it done correctly.
I've been tracking down a bit of an oil leak for a while now, haven't exactly narrowed it down 100% for sure, but I think I MAY have fixed it last night.
It seemed like where I had to clip the end mounting points off of the oil cooler, there was a small enough gap between the endplates of the cooler where oil was leaking out. I managed to push those back flush to the core of the cooler, and then threw some HondaBond over the gaps to ensure it doesn't leak there anymore.
I also tightened up the rest of the fittings all over the oil cooler setup (so, the fittings on the sandwich plate, the fittings on the cooler itself, and then tightened up the oil feed line as well.)
After tightening that stuff up and crossing my fingers, my roommate and I worked on adjusting the sway bars on the car. I had been putting this off for so long because I for some reason had this idea in my head that it would take forever to do. But, it was far easier than I remember. Moved the front sway to hole 2 (the second loosest position), and then moved the rear sway to hole 2 (the middle position).
Drove it a little bit aggressive on the way into work today and I can tell that the car definitely has a much better steering response as it digs further into the corners. Wish I would've done this a lot sooner, the car has a lot more oversteer response than understeer response that I was getting previously.
Huge thanks to Mic for helping me get everything ironed out as far as the geometry and how the sway bars work on our cars.
Will be driving the car to the body shop Friday morning to have my uncle look at the bumper. If he quotes me to paint it again, I'll just take it somewhere else that has experience painting polyurethane and get it done correctly.
06-22-2016, 04:33 PM
#174
350Z/370Z Tech Moderator
MY350Z.COM
MY350Z.COM
After tightening that stuff up and crossing my fingers, my roommate and I worked on adjusting the sway bars on the car. I had been putting this off for so long because I for some reason had this idea in my head that it would take forever to do. But, it was far easier than I remember. Moved the front sway to hole 2 (the second loosest position), and then moved the rear sway to hole 2 (the middle position).
Drove it a little bit aggressive on the way into work today and I can tell that the car definitely has a much better steering response as it digs further into the corners. Wish I would've done this a lot sooner, the car has a lot more oversteer response than understeer response that I was getting previously.
Huge thanks to Mic for helping me get everything ironed out as far as the geometry and how the sway bars work on our cars.
Seriously, no problem, happy to help.
Love the work you've done to your car!
06-29-2016, 08:37 AM
#179
Registered User
Thread Starter
iTrader: (2)
I'm unsure of weight reduction at the moment. I've added a lot of weight with the turbo kit and cage, but taken some out with the OEM seats and the spare tire. Left the tools in, and took some sound deadening out in the back.
That being said, I've not actively pursued weight reduction just yet. I'll probably wait until next year before I start gutting it and cutting everything out.
That being said, I've not actively pursued weight reduction just yet. I'll probably wait until next year before I start gutting it and cutting everything out.