Hi everybody. I just purchased my 03 track last week and I'm loving it. I've owned an '84 300ZX turbo, a '90 300ZX NA and a '95 300ZX TT, and the 350 blows them all away.

However, one problem persists throughout the entire group: road noise!
These are noisy cars (my previous car was an E36 M3, pretty quiet, but potent car!), and was wondering if any of you have noticed this. Has anybody found a way to dampen the roar? Maybe some well-placed DynaMat?

By the way, do the Track models have less sound-deadening material to save weight?

TIA,
Greg

 

Yeah, I've got one way...

get the tire feathering TSB performed!


I sure hope this is not what your problem is!

 

I've got that "roar" also and will have the dealership do their adjustments to it...very soon. I'm finding the only way to reduce the noise now is to drive faster!

 

Excuse my ignorance, but are you guys saying that an adjustment from Nissan service could help reduce the interior noise? I've heard of this "feathering" issue--sounds like a suspension geometry problem, right?

ZilvahZ--exactly what adjustments are you speaking of?...

Anyone care to comment on other techniques to reduce the roar--Dynamat and the like?....

 

The "roar" that you hear from the interior of the car is most likely due to the front alignment of the tires. From all the threads I've read here online it seems to be an alignment problem and not the suspension geometry. (?) I've read that the alignment was set incorrectly from the factory and every alignment spec published is incorrect. Thus the feathering,cupping problems the Z has. One thread here puts it: the tire angles are set like this:
/--\ and every atempt to correct it becomes a hit and miss.

I've also read here in this forum that Nissan is sending technicians from Japan to look into this matter as soon as 2 weeks. I'm assuming around the first week of Dec.

I'm actually speaking more of the low speed road noise that actually sound like a roar. My Z's 'roar' becomes very apparent to me when I'm driving 20 -35 mph. Then after that road noise is pretty much standard noise.

As far as I know you might be right in that the car needs more dampening matts throughout its framework. I just notice the tire roar as I believe most people here in the membership do as well.

Oh and btw, as joebva states there is a TSB (technical service bulletin) from Nissan to address and correct the tire feathering aka. eliminate the tire roar.

Good luck, I'm going to schedule my dealer to work on my Z very soon. Oh, and I just got my Bose amp replaced to. Sounds great now.

 

This product looks like an interesting option for dampening road noise.

http://www.quietcoat.com/html/technology_overview.html

I'm thinking of trying it in the rear hatch area.

 

TCL, Thanks for the info on QuietCar. Looks like it might be just what I was looking for.

ZilvahZ, I appreciate your input also. I plan on contacting my local dealer here in Houston (McDavid Nissan) Monday and having them go over the entire car. Are dealers usually forthright about correcting known problems through Nissan TSBs, or is it up to me to insist that these TSBs exist, in order to get results?

I definitely have the roar everybody's talking about; it happens only at low speed--I used to think it was induction roar, but now I'm leaning towards the tire alignment issue. Also, at cruising speed (and beyond) the car is really very loud--almost impossible to carry on a conversation with my wife! Does anybody know if the Track model has less sound deadening?

 

Greg328, I'm going to insist on Nissan eliminating the roar and press the issue that the factory techs are getting involved as well now that the tire feathering issue (aka road roar) has been published in Autoweek. There is another person here on the forums that has spoken to NNA about this and it was well documented that this community is very well informed of the issue and won't back down until it is totally resolved.

My local dealership (Concord Nissan) has been pretty good about everything ...so far. Maybe its cause the Finance Manager is a friend of mine??

But I have to admit, it is impossible to to carry a conversation with my wife at cruising speeds too...she's always screaming! Hahaha!

 

Take a drive in an S2000 with the top up. You will never complain about road noise ever again.