Hey noobs! What you can learn here. My exterior...
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Design Engineer
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Hey noobs! What you can learn here. My exterior...
Don't take offense to the use of the word noob. It's just what we call you guys who just got a Z and ask what the "best intake is." 
We know most of you are just excited about owning a 350Z and want to get down to modding as soon as possible.
Rewind to 2007: Just bought the 04 Enthusiast Z and wanted rims.... I hated Works, Volks and everything else tuner related, but the Z was the only newer car I liked. I was coming from the lowrider and minitrucking world. I built, welded, fabricated and drove lowriders for 13 years....
Anyway, My first purchase in 07 was a set of heavy, ugly 20" rims for 700 bucks with tires. I thought it was the CHIT, regardless of what everyone here told me regarding what the car was designed for.
Three weeks later came the first accident in the winter, Thought I could make it to the Chinese food place with an inch of snow on the ground:
After this, I decided to go the traditional route with the car (exteriorwise) while incorporating some of the flashiness I learned from my lolo days... Sold the gay wheels to some Russian dude from the Bronx, threw in some 8000K HID bulbs and bought an JP Vizage Type A body kit and had the sides and rear lip molded. I had it painted with a PPG silver base and a PPG blue pearl because I have always loved pearlescent paint jobs. Also picked up a some performance bolt on mods (Not that they do anything incredible like FI. That is one of the first things you will learn.) :
I knew I was on to something at this point based off of how much I loved the way the car looked and what people said about it every day. I spent several months reading here in the Wheels and Tires subforum and looking around every day in the Wheels and Tires Marketplace for a set of quality FORGED wheels. If you don't already know, forged wheels go through a much more involved process that your normal cast wheel. Cast wheels are very common though. The stock 350Z Enthusiast wheels are cast. Aftermarket cast wheels are known to shatter when you hit a nice pothole like the variety grown in the Garden State. Forged wheels are much, much stronger and sometimes lighter which = performance.
I waited and waited until someone listed a used set of DPE Variant RE05S in Titanium Asphalt in a 19x9 19x10 setup with tires in a Z offset. After back and forth negotiation on price ans shipping, I go these $5000 wheels (wheels only) for $2100 with tires shipped!
Rode like this at stock height for a while... picked up a set of coil overs and let them sit in the closet for a bit. When I was ready for the drop, THAT DAY, I was driving home from the car wash and my fuking HOOD flew open while I was driving! See thread here:
https://my350z.com/forum/the-lounge-...ew+open+40+mph
Long story short, I got an INGS +1 front bumper here on the forums for $265 shipped and added a few accessories. I also had the whole car painted in a Dupont Silver base coat with a Dupont Violet Pearl, which was dubbed "Titanium Ultraviolet." Replaced fenders and hood (Bought a used VIS Fusion carbon fiber hood from ErktheJerk and painted it leaving CF accents) had all the dings and such repaired, painted toe door handles and strut bar, shaved the radio antenna, rear windshield wiper and trunk emblem and added CF B-Pillars/Mirror Panels and fender emblems to offset the hood accents that were done:
Afternoon:
Direct Sun:
Here is the progress thread
Here is the photoshoot thread
Fast forward to today, a year later... For well over a year, I've been shopping around and learning about single turbochargier and supercharger systems in the Forced Induction Tech Section and the Forced Induction Marketplace. Pretty much every single question I had had already been answered and was founds through a quick search of the section.
Well, that's my little story. Hope you learned something. I know I did
BEFORE:
CURRENT:
We know most of you are just excited about owning a 350Z and want to get down to modding as soon as possible. Rewind to 2007: Just bought the 04 Enthusiast Z and wanted rims.... I hated Works, Volks and everything else tuner related, but the Z was the only newer car I liked. I was coming from the lowrider and minitrucking world. I built, welded, fabricated and drove lowriders for 13 years....
Anyway, My first purchase in 07 was a set of heavy, ugly 20" rims for 700 bucks with tires. I thought it was the CHIT, regardless of what everyone here told me regarding what the car was designed for.
Three weeks later came the first accident in the winter, Thought I could make it to the Chinese food place with an inch of snow on the ground:
After this, I decided to go the traditional route with the car (exteriorwise) while incorporating some of the flashiness I learned from my lolo days... Sold the gay wheels to some Russian dude from the Bronx, threw in some 8000K HID bulbs and bought an JP Vizage Type A body kit and had the sides and rear lip molded. I had it painted with a PPG silver base and a PPG blue pearl because I have always loved pearlescent paint jobs. Also picked up a some performance bolt on mods (Not that they do anything incredible like FI. That is one of the first things you will learn.) :
I knew I was on to something at this point based off of how much I loved the way the car looked and what people said about it every day. I spent several months reading here in the Wheels and Tires subforum and looking around every day in the Wheels and Tires Marketplace for a set of quality FORGED wheels. If you don't already know, forged wheels go through a much more involved process that your normal cast wheel. Cast wheels are very common though. The stock 350Z Enthusiast wheels are cast. Aftermarket cast wheels are known to shatter when you hit a nice pothole like the variety grown in the Garden State. Forged wheels are much, much stronger and sometimes lighter which = performance.
I waited and waited until someone listed a used set of DPE Variant RE05S in Titanium Asphalt in a 19x9 19x10 setup with tires in a Z offset. After back and forth negotiation on price ans shipping, I go these $5000 wheels (wheels only) for $2100 with tires shipped!
Rode like this at stock height for a while... picked up a set of coil overs and let them sit in the closet for a bit. When I was ready for the drop, THAT DAY, I was driving home from the car wash and my fuking HOOD flew open while I was driving! See thread here:
https://my350z.com/forum/the-lounge-...ew+open+40+mph
Long story short, I got an INGS +1 front bumper here on the forums for $265 shipped and added a few accessories. I also had the whole car painted in a Dupont Silver base coat with a Dupont Violet Pearl, which was dubbed "Titanium Ultraviolet." Replaced fenders and hood (Bought a used VIS Fusion carbon fiber hood from ErktheJerk and painted it leaving CF accents) had all the dings and such repaired, painted toe door handles and strut bar, shaved the radio antenna, rear windshield wiper and trunk emblem and added CF B-Pillars/Mirror Panels and fender emblems to offset the hood accents that were done:
Afternoon:
Direct Sun:
Here is the progress thread
Here is the photoshoot thread
Fast forward to today, a year later... For well over a year, I've been shopping around and learning about single turbochargier and supercharger systems in the Forced Induction Tech Section and the Forced Induction Marketplace. Pretty much every single question I had had already been answered and was founds through a quick search of the section.
Well, that's my little story. Hope you learned something. I know I did
BEFORE:
CURRENT:
Last edited by phreaktor; Apr 16, 2011 at 04:19 PM.
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You can't drive worth a damn bro. I made it through winters in NW NY that would make people cry and pee themselves. If the snow ain't falling in feet, then it ain't snow.
That said.....
Car looks good now and I want to toss this keyboard out the window. Hit backspace about 20 times thus far.
That said.....
Car looks good now and I want to toss this keyboard out the window. Hit backspace about 20 times thus far.
Thread Starter
Design Engineer
iTrader: (22)
Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 28,233
Likes: 33
From: The Marketplace
$4400 the first time $4300 the second time for paint and labor only. Not to mention bolt ons. Yes, I could have went FI with that, but it was not the right time for me as I didn't understand FI as well as I do now and the money required ($8000 +) was not there.
If you have a couple grand buring a hole your pocket, get n exhaust and popcharger, read about FI for a year while saving and then get a nice kit/tune. Al the bolt on stuff gives minimal gains - particularly on a DE. The best you will do is outrun a 07-08 HR by a tiny bit.
If you have a couple grand buring a hole your pocket, get n exhaust and popcharger, read about FI for a year while saving and then get a nice kit/tune. Al the bolt on stuff gives minimal gains - particularly on a DE. The best you will do is outrun a 07-08 HR by a tiny bit.
Joined: Feb 2008
Posts: 13,406
Likes: 130
From: MexiCali dodging potholes
Nice thread man...
Better to take things slow than have them blow up on you. You'll have a greater appreciation for your build after seeing so many not do it correctly and rush to get "teh boost".
And that color is definelty exotic!
Better to take things slow than have them blow up on you. You'll have a greater appreciation for your build after seeing so many not do it correctly and rush to get "teh boost".
And that color is definelty exotic!
Registered User
Joined: Feb 2011
Posts: 41
Likes: 0
From: Tulsa
Well thats a good story but im too high to read all of it. Sounds like u have bad luck and wtf did u hit to mess der bumper up like that? The kit is kinda "out there" but the color is hawt **** bra.
Thread Starter
Design Engineer
iTrader: (22)
Joined: Jan 2007
Posts: 28,233
Likes: 33
From: The Marketplace
I know, these are fully forged though... They're actually 2 piece welded. Basically the point of this thread is to let the new guys know that they don't have to buy cheap parts and that there are a LOT of great deals on high quality things in the Marketplace.
Last edited by phreaktor; Apr 17, 2011 at 05:19 AM.
