When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.
Unless that custom intake clears the strut brace it's worthless for anything besides a drag car.
it looks like it does slope down to OEM level near the front. I wonder which makes more power between this and the kinetix velocity? since they made the lower runners larger it should make more torque.
Man, I need to take a break from the Z. still looking at about 5K of work to do without even getting into FI. All of my plans are still in place but I need to take a break from this car for a while. pay off some bills. it's become damn expensive. I'm going to park it in the driveway with a car cover for a while.
4K in business vehicle repairs this month is a setback. I need to park that car so I don't go into debt. 😂 oh well, 2023, it was fun while it lasted....
You're right, it says they do fit under the strut brace. But I see no performance claims at all. For over $1k I would expect to see some dyno results posted.
I emailed the company two days ago, requesting some numbers, no response yet. I would assume that no response is coming after 2 days. which means this company might be vaporware. nothing but prototypes. and even if the numbers are good and the product is good quality, who wants to put up with that kind of customer service?
Good point. I'll share any news here. this autocross/track subboard would benefit from a general chat area. a competition/performance general discussion area.
such as this: Fortune Auto is a terrific company to deal with. I've had such good experiences with them. they are very friendly. I ordered a custom set of 500s for my Z3 last fall and Devin and Faiz put together a set of E36/E30 coilovers to fit the car. The rear springs were too long so I asked them If there was anything that could be done to fix the rear wheel gap. they are sending me a pair of Hyperco springs, free of charge, to get the car correct.
here's what it looks like now. The handling is superb but the stance has too much rake
that would be cool if they do a factory tour. Take some pics! I love the 510s and it was very nice dealing with them for my purchase as well. What a difference from stock to the fortune though in that last pic!
I've got a cover craft cover on the way for the 350Z so I can park it in the driveway for a while. I somewhat regret having to stop before that is done but parking the car with a cover will force me to stop spending money on it for a while. I won't be addressing the rear diff until winter due to costs.
The Hyperco springs arrived today for the Fortune 500 coilovers on the Z3 and it looks great. I put it at maximum low point which works on the OEM 17s. I'm thinking about putting 18's on it although 17s do fit nicely with this car's stance.
this car can handle 245/35 on 18x8.5 front, and 275/35 on 18x10 rear. or 265 on 18x9.5s. I just don't know if that's necessary. I'm leaning toward new 17s. camber is necessary but I haven't gotten started yet. so there's still an inch or so in the front but I'm leaving it until I get some adjustability installed.
this car only has about 200 HP but it is more fun to drive than either the 350Z or the Cayman. fun doesn't mean it's faster especially on track but fun is important.
The suspension settled and dropped even more! those hyperco springs really are crazy short. not rubbing but hilariously deep inside the rear fender. now like trying to get in and out of a go-kart. comical. I'll have to adjust the rears to get them more in line with the fender opening which should be about 1 in. The E30 lower mount is adjustable separately. (not true coilovers).
Track forum has been quiet this summer.
I thought I would drop in one last comment for a while. My 350Z did well on its shakedown run this spring after a year of work put into it. ran 50 laps on an open track day with no issues. other than shredding a tire on a fender lip bolt and the camshaft position sensors pulling timing. All fixed now.
I haven't gotten to run the Konigs yet with track tires. clutch is wearing out. and rear differential is showing its age. plans there were derailed when my donor LSD died.
the car is covered in the driveway now because I don't want to spend any more money on it this year. The list of race parts just grows if I even start to make a mental to do this. and I can't resist...
torsen LSD, LT headers, kinetix intake, ignition coils, bash bars, oil cooler, diff cooler, trans cooler, track tires, and then probably a vortec.
by March, I'll have my daughter's Mustang built and it won't be taking up space anymore. it's the first time I've driven a modern 5.0 and it's really nice. I was surprised. doing a bunch of high mileage stuff to it like water pump, alternator, plugs, ignition coils, but it's in good condition. I just got it back from the body shop for some touch-ups.
speaking of which, the Z went in to the same shop for estimates. need to get the front bumper done and repair some dents here and there and I'm probably going to paint it flat white with satin clear.
I don't like unfinished projects but this one is suffering from feature creep, so I need to set it aside and work on some other things for a while. hopefully next year I'll get to the track more often..
I'll stop back in here in 6 months to see what's going on.
I've been very distracted these past two years with changing plans and goals. Orig just wanted a nice street 350Z for casual track weekends, but I caught the bug.
last year, 2022, I realized the 350Z is a cheap car. I mean it's fun to drive, easy to maintain, a good choice for a track car, but not great quality. I wanted to try a couple others that I had always dreamed of owning. And maybe get serious about TT, knowing that I'm not going comp for several reasons.
what I saw at the track over about 12 weekends in the "serious" classes which far outnumbered everything else in NASA NorCal, speed SF, track time: classic MX-5, E36, E46, 996, SN95, S197. plenty of other makes and models but these were the majority. only a couple 350Zs.
The Z3 is basically a E36 roadster with E30 rear. I rode with an instructor in his TT Miata and it scared the **** out of me! well not literally but I might have peed a little bit. I literally could not believe how fast we were cornering without flipping over. And I was only a couple inches off the ground. but I've never been a fan of miatas so the Z3 was a good option. My 2.8 looks great but it's rough up close and nothing special. I'm going to slowly convert it over to full track. I just want one backup car. for any time the 350Z is down.
I have a CD 00A to install. going to order a 4.09 torsen and a new clutch. new fenders and then get body and paint. those are my spring to-do items. already have the 00A so biggest cost will be the diff. won't be doing anything for a while though. this is the most expensive time of year for me.
I had a conversation at VIR with a buddy of mine that's been tracking a Miata for years. It basically comes down to the fact that the track machinery is getting faster every season and his Miata is no longer competitive in any form. Mind you this is just a DE weekend, but still it's no fun if you're the slowest car out there and constantly have your arm out the window. He was talking about possible engine swap for the Miata, but also he was asking me why there are so few Zs participating and honestly I don't know the answer. They are cheap, they are reliable and they can be quite fast once setup property. With a stock engine my car might not be the fastest in the instructor group, but is also far from the slowest. From what I've seen I'm about middle of the pack, there are cars that have more power but are slower, mostly due to lack or aero or grip, and there are cars that are properly setup that are faster but only by a second or two, so I can still give them a good chase and have fun doing it. Sure there are a few cars significantly faster, the likes of new vettes and 911 cup cars, but those are 6 figure cars whereas my setup can probably be replicated for 25-30k. So the question remains, why so few Zs at the track? Best I can tell it's a combination of crap stock suspension setup and crap stock cooling that turns off most people from tracking these. These cars take a bit of work to get to a point where they are good track machines. So my suggestion to him (as subjective as it might be) was to go ahead and get a Z and use my experience to setup his car correctly the first time. Only time will tell what he ultimately decides to do, but I stand by my opinion that deep down these are great track car platforms.
I hadn't thought of it that way. a thread on best practices for a 350Z tracker car would be really cool.
it's too bad spec Z didn't do well. I think it might have been too restrictive. these cars need a lot to catch up to an older stock M3 let alone one that's track prepped.
If I could do it again, I would start with an HR. this is a good topic. I'm going to start a new thread.
Yeah, the spec Z build specs were definately my cheatsheet throughout and made a lot of difficult decisions much easier.
Not sure if HR is really all that, it's a small bump in power. For my finding a good unmolested car with low mileage and no rust was top priority. Also I wanted a base model with no traction control, etc. It happened to be a rev-up DE, but so far it's been rock solid :knock on wood:
You don't want to disable ABS entirely without substituting some sort of manual front/rear bias valve. The ABS controls the bias and without it the car would be pretty much undrivable.
Also, if you don't want to cut wires to the ECU I believe the ARC license provides these features via software.
Can concur, disabling ABS without another solution in these cars is a really bad time
I had a conversation at VIR with a buddy of mine that's been tracking a Miata for years. It basically comes down to the fact that the track machinery is getting faster every season and his Miata is no longer competitive in any form. Mind you this is just a DE weekend, but still it's no fun if you're the slowest car out there and constantly have your arm out the window. He was talking about possible engine swap for the Miata, but also he was asking me why there are so few Zs participating and honestly I don't know the answer. They are cheap, they are reliable and they can be quite fast once setup property. With a stock engine my car might not be the fastest in the instructor group, but is also far from the slowest. From what I've seen I'm about middle of the pack, there are cars that have more power but are slower, mostly due to lack or aero or grip, and there are cars that are properly setup that are faster but only by a second or two, so I can still give them a good chase and have fun doing it. Sure there are a few cars significantly faster, the likes of new vettes and 911 cup cars, but those are 6 figure cars whereas my setup can probably be replicated for 25-30k. So the question remains, why so few Zs at the track? Best I can tell it's a combination of crap stock suspension setup and crap stock cooling that turns off most people from tracking these. These cars take a bit of work to get to a point where they are good track machines. So my suggestion to him (as subjective as it might be) was to go ahead and get a Z and use my experience to setup his car correctly the first time. Only time will tell what he ultimately decides to do, but I stand by my opinion that deep down these are great track car platforms.
I’ve been wondering this as well, it seems like a pretty niche car for whatever reason. I think they get a bad rap from all of the VQ gang shenanigans. I’m pretty impressed with the suspension on the Z though, seems to wear tires well and is capable of generating some pretty fantastic grip. You’d think these would be more popular than some of the older (2000’s) muscle cars that still seem to be running consistently.
there's a local tune shop close to home but I'm not sure if they would be any better than a Z1 tune unless boost is involved. either way that's going to be a good step. been running the OEM tune.
