Thanks for the tip PEAK, I'll give it a try at your suggested RPM's and see how it goes

 

Sorry bro
Look on the bright side, I can only go up now, since I've been to the bottom already

 

HAHAH
That is a great attitude.
I am going to beat a dead horse here...practice makes perfect.
Also launching a IRS car is always a pain..takes some getting used to.

 

I think you have a 04' so if I could offer any advice....I have an 03 Touring and when I went to the track last year (completely stock) I found that shifting a non rev up around 6200-6300 was much better then taking it to redline. Unfortunatly I finally figured this out right before my last run but I bounced off the revlimiter on my luanch, had a 2.3 60ft time but trapped a 14.3 @99mph (the speed even with the poor launch let me know that my shift points were much better, my goal was a to break 100 which I know I could of done had I not muffed the launch). I was running consistent 2.0 60ft times and around 14.2 @ 97 mph on my 4 runs prior. My problem though is the tremendous wheel hop that I experienced (very violent). I almost don't want to drag race it this year as I really feel I will break something with more power. What I don't get is I have seen many videos (Alberto) with launches and no wheel hop at all (he was even running slicks). I will try to load the clutch next time but the wheel hop seems to be really bad on a prepped surface versus on the street where there is no wheel hop at all when launched. Any tips from anyone how to get rid of wheel hop on our cars? My last car a RX-7 turbo launched so smooth at the track (on street tires) it really spoiled me.

 

this is just plain old wrong. shifting the z early will not net you better times unless something is wrong with your car and you arent making power to redline like you should. BUT, since a healthy z makes power to redline, shifting early will only take you out of the powerband. that may have seemed like it worked better, but most likely you were faster because you didnt lose traction into 2nd, which makes sense since you werent in the power, not as much power to break tires loose

 

Thanks for the tip bro
But on the down side, I think I would know the year, make, model of my own car (2003 Nissan 350Z Touring MT)

 

Trust me, if you have the stock manifold on a non rev-up, shifting at redline will NOT yield better results (Hooper must be talking about a Honda S2K or something). I'm not sure of the sweet spots to shift for every gear quite yet but I know it's not redline. Oh and on the knowing make model and year of your car, I was on my blackberry last night (yes, I'm addicted ) and it was a pain to go back and double check the year of your car, but knew it was a non rev-up. One more tip if you want to get a faster time and you can shift fast enough.....never let off the gas (I know you are running a 15.3 and are new to this so I wouldn't try this method until you are bangin out 14.0's-14.1's and are looking to say break into the 13's). This is another good reason not to take it to redline as you will have that split second to bang the clutch and get it into the next gear before hitting the rev limiter. I haven't done this yet (and I hope the syncros in our transmission can keep up when I do!) as last year at the track I had owned my car for a whole week and was not familiar enough with the car to powershift it yet. This was a great thing to do with a turbo car in the days before blow off valves and will yield some gain on a n/a car too, but be very careful and make sure you can shift PLENTY quick!

 

you need to check stock dynos and do a gear ratio comparison to see how far down the curve your short shifting is taking you. you always want to shift a little bit past peak power because that will keep you in the "sweet" spot. on a z, redline is only a few hundred RPM past the peak power, which means that a shift at 6200 (often lower that peak power on a z) will take you super far down the power curve

 

I agree 6200 is probably too low and I understand that when you take it to redline it places you in a good rpm when you shift to the next gear. I just feel that a stock non-rev up really starves for air above 6200 and that redline is not the best shift point for every gear. Maybe more people can chime in with their experiences. Hooper you are right the only way to really see the best shift points would be your suggestion of a dyno a doing a gear comparison.

 

there is a chance that when you get up to about 4th gear you might want to shift a little early (100rpm or so) since that would place you in a better torque position, but for the average z, 1-3 will be the most fat at redline. obviously if the z isnt running 100% and making full power up top then short shifting would be advantageous