So as you guys may or may not know from my previous posting - I have a silver 2004 enth.

I love the car, and have decided to spend a little bit of money trying to make the engine bay look nice. Well, at least nicer than stock.

I've been to zeetoys.com, great site. However, when I purchased the vehicle, the previous owner has put yellow plastic 'cable organizer' type things around most of the hoses and wires. It looks a little goofy, though I do like the yellow accent color.

Silver seems to be a hard color to pick an accent color for - with a black car, or white car, red or blue looks really good, but I don't know about on a silver.

So I was browsing through the engine bay pics thread, and noticed a couple that had almost completely braided lines/hoses/etc. I'm not using them for functionality, as this is a DD, so I thought I'd ask either what/how would you guys dress up a silver stock 350z engine bay nicely, and if you've used or seen either a fully SS braided hose kit, or use the sleeves?

I was thinking the stainless steel braided sleeves may end up looking pretty decent, along with a billet cap (oil, etc) set for the car. Thoughts?

 

Red looks very good with Silver. Especially with Black too... Hey, those are the Nismo colors!

 

do it..ive had this combination in my head for awhile..id love to see it for real

 

Yea I'm thinking about it, I hate choosing colors - I'm usually pretty bad at it Been looking through engine bay pics for a while, nothing has come close to what I'd like to do yet ... so I'm afraid I'll spend a decent chunk of cash and have a shitty looking engine bay

 

then for god sakes please dont install some pep boys looking faux braided hose The plastic cover things are very 1992 also - it just screams "cheesy". You made a great choice in a car, with a history and lineage that rivals that of many other, higher end cars. Keep it classy!

Some advice for a nice, clean looking engine bay, that is not stock, and still classy

1. radiator cooling panel - carbon, aluminum, ti - whatever, they just help give the engine bay a more uniform look

2. polished/powdercoated plenum. This is the focul point of your eye when you open the hood - polished always looks good, powdercoating in a nice neutral color (black wrinkle coat for example) is clean and classy

3. Engine cover - again, carbon , even body color, looks nice, helps make it different but not too much so

4. strut brace - optional, since stock is such a nice piece, but a nice substantial looking brace, maybe GT Spec dry carbon, or Cusco if you don't want to drop tons of coin, again just helps make it stand out a bit more, without being gaudy.

5. Oil/rad cap - again, accent the colors and you these two things work nicely. If you are going with NISMO parts, the NISMO caps are a nice touch. If you are going more JDM, maybe the ARC ones. Greddy also makes a nice combo, and comes in blue/polished, which accents silver well (and matches the blue ends on, say, a Cusco strut brace well).

At the end of the day, of course its your car, and you have to be happy with it. Too much of a good thing, is usually a bad thing. Some nice simple accents with a common color theme will keep it nice looking.

 

Since its being talked about. I have a Brickyard Red Z. What color would you guys recommend for the engine bay? I was thinking of a blue samco hose kit, fluid caps, and engine cover. Maybe red or CF parts? As long as its clean, I just don't know. Its tough, any imput would be helpful. Thanks

 

I think Blue would go great with Silver .... Brickyard...Red or Polished would look good too .... and like Z1 said ... keep it nice n simple and don't go overboard.

 

I have braided lines to and from on both catch cans and another small hose way in the back of the engine. I wouldn't recommend using braided hoses for the cooling hoses. Just leave those black or maybe blue Samco's. the braided ones i have are actuall braided lines, not covers. these pics suck and make everything look orange. I'm buying my parents a new dig cam for Christmas, so i can post some better pics then.